The Volkswagen ID. Buzz is without doubt one of the most highly-anticipated new models of 2022 and we’ve driven it. Dave Humphreys travelled to Copenhagen to try this new retro-styled MPV EV that comes to Ireland soon.
It’s finally here the volkswagen id buzz has arrived and it looks every bit as cool in person as it does in any of the pictures you’ve seen the front is well it’s so instantly recognizable you’ve got these slender lights here you got this light bar runs across the front big volkswagen badge as well it’s a real nod to the original micro bus then you’ve got all these
Driver assistance systems carefully integrated the car you’ve got front-facing cameras more cameras down here radar in here and this mesh bumper here helps channel air in through here out across the front of the wheel this upright windscreen helps give you a really good feel of visibility you’ve got split a-pillars here as well reduces the amount of blind spots
You’re gonna get and when you see this side on it really does look very impressive it’s made on the same meb platform as the id3 id 485 that means it’s got a 77 kilowatt hour battery that’s good for a range of up to 423 kilometers in this particular version and you’ve got a rear wheel drive setup this has a 204 horsepower motor with 310 newton meters of torque
So it’s no slouch in that respect there will be in time a all-wheel drive version that will have a little bit more power again and will have an increased towing capacity of up to 1800 kilograms being a van or being derived from a van means you’ve got big sliding doors here these are electrically adjustable means you’ve got a lot of room really easy to get kids
In and out in a car park for example and then around the back well you’ve got some really nice details here along the side you’ve got a big charging port in here this will be able to charge at really fast rates you’ll be able to go from five to eighty percent in as little as 30 minutes at the right sort of rapid charger then much like the other id models you’ve
Got lights that wrap all the way across the back and you’ve got another big volkswagen logo here the id buzz nobody is going to be mistaken for what you’re driving everyone is going to know exactly what it is the passenger versions will get this lift up tailgate on this model it’s electrically operated and once that’s up you have 1100 liters of boot space you’ve
Got storage compartments in here if you want your charging cables you can take out this floor again and have even more space there’s also going to be a longer version which will have up to seven seats at the moment these only come as a five seat model but there’s a lot of room just over 1100 liters of boot space here when you fold down the rear seats that almost
Doubles to just over 2 200 liters loads of room in here inside there’s a lot of room in the volkswagen id buzz it’s going to be quite familiar to anybody that’s already been in any of the id cars has the tree spoke steering wheel here with haptic controls they do take a little bit of getting used to i find them a little bit fiddly a little bit too sensitive for my
Liking i’d much rather have proper physical buttons but this is what volkswagen has in this particular model the instrument cluster the digital display is mounted onto the steering hole so everything is fixed onto this that means when you adjust your steering wheel everything moves with it and there’s a good range of adjustment with the steering wheel too which
Is quite good so people of all sizes will be able to find a comfortable driving position the seats are also electrically adjustable in this version again there’s a lot of movement there as well so people are going to find it very easy to get comfortable in this car there’s a lot of free space in here as well particularly between the front seats here there’s no
Big center console you have a lot of empty rooms one of the big pluses of having a fully electric platform there are two different touchscreen displays available with this car again it uses the latest volkswagen software it’s continually being updated too so even by the time you start to arrive there’ll be more updates coming you have haptic controls here touch
Sensitive bar here for your volume and your temperature on either side one of the gripes with this on other id models is that these aren’t illuminated at night does make it a little bit trickier to use although those people who live with this car will probably find it a little bit more familiar over time there’s shortcut buttons on the front here and you’ve got
Other controls your heated seats all the infotainment system has built-in nav it has all your smartphone uh mirroring as well so you can have your android auto your apple carplay all come up here it’s also a wireless charging pad here as well so you can pop your phone in there out of the way you’re not gonna see it it will come up and appear on the screen here as
Well so you have all your apps that you will need there is more space on the center here with cup holders that pop out so it’s nice to have those out of the way when you don’t need them there’s more storage areas here on top and you still have a decent size glove box as well between the seats there’s more storage here on top you can adjust this how you like and
There’s another further pop-out compartment there on the front the seats also have pop-down armrests which is great makes it a little bit more comfortable on a longer journey too the driving position itself gives you a great view at the front here as well that high wind screen and these split a pillars means that you really have very little in the way of blind
Spots and the fact that you sit up that bit higher gives you a really good field of visibility over all of the other traffic the buzz will be a great hit with families as well because there’s loads of room back here not only do you have sliding doors which makes much easier getting kids in and out but there’s a lot of room in here both of the two outer seats have
Isofix points so it’s very easy to get child seats in and out and this center seat is much wider than you would typically see in a normal suv that does give it a little bit more scope as well much better if somebody is going to be sitting here they’re not going to feel quite as hard done by there’s a lot of room in here the seats themselves can slide forward and
Back so there is actually you can move it a good bit forward depends on what you need if you need more boot space you can move the seats forward or you can move them right way back they also recline as well so if you’re on a longer journey you want to kick back and relax you can do that as well there’s even plenty of room to get your feet in underneath the seat in
Front so you’ve got a good bit of space here if you do want to stretch out for reference i’m about five foot nine i’ve got a lot of headroom here loads of headroom in fact and i can just about touch this seat in front which is more or less set up from my driving position there’s a handy armrest here which is for me at a really good size and i like the fact that the
Windows aren’t all that small either so even little ones should be able to still see it quite easily and that’s a great way of averting any potential travel sickness the seats themselves even the back of the seats well you’ve got some storage here if you want to pop your device in there you’ve got a pop-up table as well that’s really handy it’s a good height as
Well and there’s pockets in the backs of the seats there isn’t any ventilation or any charge points here you might see but there are usb c charge ports in the doors themselves so you can still keep your devices topped up and if you’ve got the electrically operated doors you have a button right here to open and close them i cannot remember a car in recent memory
That has created so much interest from people so much positive feedback from people it’s been really quite eye-opening and kind of refreshing to see and it shows how much the design of this car matters to people how much attention it creates how it catches people’s eyes and obviously a big part of that is the fact that it’s in this quite striking two-tone paint
But it’s really kind of nice and it’s absolutely not something you’re gonna get driving an suv put it that way you’ll also notice that driving position you sit up nice and high and the view out is really good you can see pretty much everything what’s maybe a little bit surprising initially is that you sit further back from the windscreen than you might expect a lot
Further back in fact but it just takes a little bit of time to get used to because the front is so upright and so blunt that it’s not really an issue you can creep right up to into a tight parking space for example and you’ve got really good cameras front and rear to help get you into that space as for the electric motor well it’s pretty perky even though it’s
The same moment power as an id4 or id5 it’s 204 horsepower and even though this is a heavier car it doesn’t really feel it and gets up to speed quite quickly the power delivery is as you would expect from the electric car oh so smooth so it’s really nice as you just cruise away from a stop the steering is actually pretty agile this car does not really feel as big
As it looks now the size yes you do have to take into account how much space you take up on the road but it’s quite agile may have seen volkswagen quote an 11.1 meter turning circle for the id buzz which is pretty much on par with a volkswagen golf however that figure applies to the left hand drive model i’m driving right now right hand drive models because of
Some technical changes under the skin means it doesn’t get quite the same turning circle it will be around about 12 meters so it’s not bad but it won’t be quite as good as the left-hand drive models which is maybe something you might want to consider the performance of that 77 kilowatt hour battery is pretty good actually volkswagen says it’ll do 423 kilometers
In wltp so far today over a mixture of different driving scenarios it has returned 21.2 kilowatt hours per hundred kilometers and that’s over a variety of different situations such as motorways urban driving city driving and a bit of country driving so we’ve really covered off a lot of different bases today and that figure just actually is consistently be coming
Down so at the moment it’s on 21.2 kilowatt hours per hundred kilometers not bad for an electric car of this size one other aspect that the id buzz is surprisingly good at is ride quality now we are on some pretty nice and well paved roads here but it’s given us a chance to experience that multi-link rear end through some of the faster bends on roads and it does
Stay very planted very stable but also i’ve noticed there’s not a lot of road noise even though this is on some fairly large wheels it’s not as pronounced on this car as i’ve experienced on an id4 and an id5 for example so that’s a positive for the id buzz and that’s really going to be a key to the success of this car because it drives like a car it doesn’t feel
Like a van with some extra passenger seats in the back and that’s one of the big big differences with this model volkswagen has done a very good job in that respect this seems so far on this initial first impression to be much more than a van with some seats on a big battery this is a car that simply push just oozes charm it’s full of character people seem to
Love how it looks and everywhere it goes it brings a smile to people’s faces in much the same way as the original microbus did back in the day volkswagen has absolutely nailed it with this car so that’s our first drive review of the volkswagen id buzz if you want to find out more head over to the aaa website
Transcribed from video
Volkswagen ID. Buzz Driven and coming to Ireland soon! By AA IrelandliveBroadcastDetails{isLiveNowfalsestartTimestamp2022-09-06T220113+0000endTimestamp2022-09-06T221606+0000}