Mazda 6e 2026 review | Traditional family car is now electric

What is the Mazda 6e?

The Mazda 6e is an all-electric reimagining of the Mazda 6 family car. In many ways, it represents Mazda just being Mazda, which essentially means doing things that other car brands just wouldn’t. In other areas, however, it represents Mazda completely changing the way it does certain things, instead doing them in the same way as everybody else.

As an example of Mazda being Mazda, it has basically done what most other manufacturers have stopped doing, in that it’s trying to sell a large family car in Europe that’s not an SUV. Fairly unwise, many might say.

At the other end of the scale, the 6e is most un-Mazda like, because it has gone all-in on throwing almost every control into its touchscreen infotainment. And so whereas in the past Mazda has largely kept its systems fairly simple (and even been vocal in its criticisms of screens being too distracting as a way of controlling the car’s functions), with the 6e it has done a complete about-turn by fitting a massive touchscreen and removing almost all physical buttons and controls from the cabin.

Part of the reason for this is that the 6e is a product of a joint venture between Mazda and Chinese firm Changan Automobile. Indeed, it’s been on sale in China (where touchscreens are a must-have) since mid-2024 as the Mazda EZ-6.

Of course, none of that is of any consequence to British buyers. For us, the Mazda 6e is a large (nearly 5 metres long) all-electric family car that competes with rivals such as the Volkswagen ID.7, Hyundai Ioniq 6, BYD Seal, Tesla Model 3, Tesla Model S, BMW i4, Volvo ES90, and more.

How practical is it?

The 6e's boot space stands at a useful 466 litres. The hatchback tailgate gives good access, and there’s very little load lip to get in your way when you’re loading heavy items. The rear seats fold down in a 60/40 split to boost your luggage-carrying capacity to 1,074 litres, and although the backrests don’t quite lay totally flat, they do get close.

Under the bonnet, you’ll find an impressively large 72-litre frunk, which is big enough to carry your charging cable plus a piece of carry-on luggage. A handy plastic basket that fits the space perfectly is also available as an accessory.

When the rear seats are needed for people, those people will enjoy very plentiful legroom, and fitting three across the rear bench is relatively comfy due to a wide cabin and a wide middle seat with a flat floor in front of it. However, headroom is a little on the tight side - anyone over six feet tall will be in danger of the headlining interfering with their hairdo, perhaps not helped by the standard-fit panoramic roof. Headroom is even tighter for whoever sits in the middle seat, because their seat is slightly raised.

The driver's seat adjusts via electric motors, which combined with decent manual adjustment in the steering column means that finding a comfortable driving position is a doddle. The front of the cabin is also teeming with useful storage spaces. However, rearward visibility is dreadful due to a small rear window that’s shallow, narrow, steeply angled, and flanked by thick pillars. Thankfully there's a good reversing camera to help you out instead.

What’s it like to drive?

The 6e is fitted with a 78kWh battery that delivers a range of up to 348 miles. It powers a 254bhp electric motor, and allows the 6e to get from 0-62mph in a brisk 7.3 seconds. As you'd expect from an EV, it picks up strongly from a standstill, and always feels ready to pounce with a flex of your right ankle. However, once you’re up and running, the rate of acceleration does tail off quite noticeably.

Put your foot down and the acceleration is accompanied by a reasonably satisfying sound (think half car, half spaceship), but it's when you take things easy that the 6e really impresses, because it is so quiet. Road noise (something that many Mazda models we’ve experienced have struggled with) is very well contained, while thick windows also isolate wind noise very well.

Elsewhere, the 6e doesn’t quite have the get-up-and-go of most Mazda models, but it does a very reasonable impression. The rear-wheel-drive layout, combined with the strong body control and fast, responsive steering, makes the car feel eager to turn. It’s too big and heavy (almost two tonnes) to feel properly agile, but most of the time it does a reasonable job of masking its mass, and feels vastly more sophisticated to drive than many of the electric newcomers from China.

In terms of ride comfort, the 6e has that typical Mazda trait of feeling firm but mostly fair. The low speed ride is actually better in some ways than at high speed, because when travelling faster over uneven surfaces the car's sheer mass can make it feel a bit unsettled.

One thing we think certainly could improve about the 6e’s driving experience is the regenerative braking. You can adjust it in four stages, but even the strongest of them isn’t very strong, and if you’re after a one-pedal sort of experience, the 6e gets nowhere near it. What’s more, there are no paddles behind the steering wheel for switching between the settings: you have to do it through the touchscreen.

Technology, equipment and infotainment

The 6e’s infotainment system brings together a head-up display that beams important driving information onto the windscreen in front of the driver, as well as a 10.2-inch digital screen behind the steering wheel that displays much of the same information, plus a bit more. Your main interface with the car comes in the form of a 14.6-inch central touchscreen with which you control pretty much all vehicle settings.

You still have switches for the electric windows, and a button to open the glovebox, but that’s pretty much it. Almost everything else is operated by the touchscreen. That includes the electric door mirror adjustment (you select the corresponding screen on the system and then use arrow keys on the steering wheel to move your mirrors), and even the headlights and windscreen wipers. Yes, that’s right: rather than flicking a stalk to turn on your swishers and clear your screen, you have to dig out an on-screen menu from the gazillions on offer, and then select a speed. Thankfully you can pre-programme the lights and wipers to two favourite buttons on the steering wheel, but it's still less intuitive than using a traditional stalk.

Even disregarding those extreme examples, the complexity of the structure of menus, submenus, checkboxes and widgets makes it difficult to quickly and reliably find the function you need. Yes, there are shortcuts along the bottom of the screen, plus more that swipe out from the left hand side of the screen, to make things a little simpler, but it’s still easy to get lost. Screen sensitivity is a bit hit-and-miss, too. Granted, there’s voice control and gesture control on hand to act as alternatives to the touchscreen, but as we often observe with such systems, that functionality is hit-and-miss at best.

There are two trims, called Takumi and Takumi Plus. Takumi includes 19-inch alloy wheels, a panoramic glass roof with tinted, heat-insulating glass, rear privacy glass, a powered tailgate and an electrically extendable rear spoiler. Inside you get the head-up display, the 10.2-inch driver's display and the 14.6-inch touchscreen, plus a rear touchscreen for back-seat passengers to adjust the climate control, a 14-speaker Sony sound system with subwoofers, and 64-colour ambient lighting. Both front seats are heated and ventilated, and the steering wheel is heated too.

Takumi Plus costs £1,000 more and adds tan Nappa leather with artificial suede and woven cloth seat trim, a tan artificial suede dashboard with contrast stitching and titanium accents, matching suede door trims, and an electric sunshade for the panoramic roof. Rear passengers can also operate that sunshade from their own screen. Both trims share the same wheel design and the same seven metallic paint options, so there's little to tell them apart from the outside.

Mazda 6e running costs

The 2026 Mazda 6e costs £38,995 in Takumi specification, or £39,995 in Takumi Plus. That's around £10,000 less than a Volkswagen ID.7, and £7,000 less than a Hyundai Ioniq 6. Clearly, those are not the kind of savings to be sniffed at, although paying on finance might bring the numbers much closer.

Hook your car up to a 7kW home wallbox charger, and it'll take around 11 hours for a full charge. Use DC rapid charging, and the 6e can accept a rate of up to 200kW, which equates to a 10-80% charge in 24 minutes. And so while it doesn't have the longest range or the fastest charging, the 6e is certainly competitive on both fronts, and a world away from Mazda's previous EV, the short-range MX-30.

As with any EV, utilise that DC rapid-charging capability and you’ll pay a lot more than you will for charging at home. Prices vary between charging stations, but bank on paying 90p per kWh or more for such a hookup, in which case a 10%-80% charge will cost around £50. At that point, it becomes barely any cheaper to run than a regular petrol car, so we’d recommend only charging this way in emergencies.

Benefit-in-Kind tax incentives are still very compelling for EVs, so choosing the Mazda as your company car could save you a packet compared to a combustion-engined equivalent.

Mazda 6e reliability

The Mazda 6e is still too new for us to be able to report any specific reliability data. The historical data would suggest that you might expect a very average level of reliability. Mazda placed 16th out of 33 carmakers in the manufacturer standings of the latest What Car? Reliability Survey, while the outgoing Mazda 6 placed 9th out of 20 models in the Executive Car category, although obviously, that car and the new car share nothing in common.

Mazda’s warranty package for the 6e runs to six years and 100,000 miles, while the battery is covered for 8 years and 100,000 miles. Not class leading, then, but also not at all bad (much like the car itself).