Spend north of £60,000 on an electric SUV and you expect it to be untouchable. In 2026, only a handful actually are — and when Auto Express crowned the BMW iX3 “the best premium electric car” this year, it quietly reset what the money at the top of this class is supposed to buy. That verdict, and the June 2026 leasing numbers sitting underneath it, are what this piece is built on.
Here is the thing about the £60k-plus bracket that nobody selling you a car will say out loud: at this price, outright ownership is the worst way to hold one of these. Depreciation on a premium EV over the first three years is brutal and unpredictable, the technology moves faster than the metal, and the tax treatment rewards you for not owning. So the real question isn’t “which £60k electric SUV is best” — it’s “which one is worth committing to on a two- or three-year lease”. Those are not the same question, and the answer surprised me.
Why the lease, not the logbook, is the whole game (premium electric SUV)
Lease a premium EV and you hand the depreciation risk back to the finance house. On a car that might shed £20,000 in three years, that is not a small favour. It’s also why the sharpest deals cluster around the models manufacturers most want on the road — Select Car Leasing had the iX3 flagged for “best leasing deals” in June 2026, listed at £58,755, precisely because BMW is pushing volume on its Neue Klasse debut.
If you can take the car through a company scheme, the maths gets better again. The benefit-in-kind rate on electric cars remains far below anything with a tailpipe, which is why the EVs that maximise a salary-sacrifice saving are almost all sitting in exactly this price band. A £63,000 SUV that would be indefensible as a cash purchase becomes genuinely rational as a sacrificed monthly figure. Salary-sacrifice and lease figures depend on your tax band, your employer’s scheme and your own circumstances, and none of this is a finance offer, so treat every headline monthly as a starting point to check rather than a quote. That reframing matters before you read another spec.
| Model (from) | Price from | WLTP range | Max charge | What it’s for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| BMW iX3 50 xDrive M Sport | £63,155 | 500 miles | 400kW | The all-round benchmark |
| Kia EV9 AWD | £66,645 | 349 miles | Not stated | Seven seats and 2,500kg braked towing |
| Volvo EX60 | Above the iX3 | 500 miles | Slower than the iX3 | The cabin and refinement choice |
| Tesla Model Y Long Range AWD | £51,990 | 391 miles | 250kW | The sub-£60k value check |
| Where I land: the BMW iX3 50 xDrive M Sport — the £60k EV I’d sign a two-year lease for, on range, charging and incentive combined. | ||||
BMW iX3 50 xDrive: the one that set the benchmark
The iX3 is the car every rival in this list is now measured against, and the numbers explain why. The range-topping iX3 50 xDrive M Sport lands at £63,155 — the trim that clears the £60k line — with a 500-mile WLTP range and charging of up to 400kW. Read that charging figure twice: on a compatible ultra-rapid charger, this is a car engineered to add serious range in the time it takes to buy a coffee. The Auto Express range opens at £53,250 for the rear-drive 395-mile car, but it’s the 500-mile 50 xDrive that justifies the premium-bracket conversation.
What makes the iX3 the benchmark isn’t any single figure — it’s that it doesn’t have an obvious weakness. Range, charging speed and the leasing economics all land on the right side of the ledger at once. WhichEV’s Neue Klasse review makes the same case from the engineering side.
At this money you’re not paying for the biggest number on any one line of the spec sheet — you’re paying for the absence of a weak one. The iX3 is the first EV in this class where I can’t find the compromise you’re meant to swallow.
Kia EV9: seven seats and a towbar the BMW can’t answer
The Kia EV9 is the one car here that competes on something other than the BMW’s terms. On Kia’s published figures it starts from £66,645, and its 349-mile WLTP range trails the iX3 by a meaningful margin — but it counters with 2,500kg of braked towing capacity on the all-wheel-drive version and a genuine seven-seat cabin. If your brief includes a caravan, a horsebox or a school run that needs a third row, the range gap stops being the headline.
This is the honest fork in the road. The EV9 is not trying to out-refine the BMW; it’s trying to do jobs the BMW simply can’t. Cross-shop it against something like the Audi Q6 e-tron and you’ll see the EV9’s practicality-per-pound argument sharpen further. On a lease, the higher list price bites less than it would on a purchase — but 349 miles is 349 miles, and no finance structure changes that.
Volvo EX60: range parity, paid for at the plug
The Volvo EX60 is the direct philosophical rival to the iX3, and on paper it matches the headline that matters most: 500 miles of WLTP range, on Volvo’s own figure. The catch is in the fine print. It arrives at a higher price point than the BMW and, critically, charges more slowly. That combination is the quiet dealbreaker — because on a long UK motorway run, charging speed is what actually determines your door-to-door time, not the theoretical range you’ll rarely see in winter.
I like the EX60 as an object; Volvo’s cabins remain among the calmest places to sit in this class. But when a rival offers the same range, a lower price and faster charging, “the same range” isn’t enough to win. The EX60 is the car you’d choose on taste, not on the numbers — and at £60k-plus, I want both.
Where the Tesla Model Y still belongs in this conversation
The Tesla Model Y Long Range AWD is the outlier that keeps everyone else honest. At £51,990 it sits below our £60k threshold, and its 391-mile WLTP range and 250kW charging (10–80% in around 27 minutes, per What Car?’s head-to-head with the iX3) fall short of the BMW on both counts. But it’s efficient, relentlessly practical and thousands of pounds cheaper, which changes the value equation entirely.
My point in including it: if the premium-badge experience isn’t the thing you’re actually buying, the Model Y makes the £60k cars work hard to justify their premium. It’s the reason I’d never sign a £60k lease without at least sitting in one first. For a wider view of where the value really sits, the second-hand EV shortlist is worth a read before you commit new-car money — as is the Mercedes camp, where the EQE has quietly got cheaper to lease.
On a 24-month deal, this is where I land
Match the lease term to the technology. These cars are improving in generational leaps — charging curves, software, battery chemistry — so a five-year commitment locks you out of exactly the progress you’re paying premium money to be near. A 24-month deal keeps you current, and it’s short enough that today’s leasing incentives, not tomorrow’s residual guesses, drive the monthly figure.
On that basis the iX3 50 xDrive M Sport is the one I’d sign for. It wins the two things a two-year lease actually rewards — 500 miles of range and 400kW charging — while carrying the sharpest incentive of the group. The EV9 only overtakes it if you genuinely need seven seats or a tow bar, in which case the extra outlay buys capability the BMW hasn’t got. The EX60 is the heart choice, the Model Y the value check. But if the brief is simply “the best £60k electric SUV to lease in 2026”, the BMW answers it without asking you to give anything up — and in this bracket, that is the whole point.
Buyer action
EV and salary-sacrifice checks
Use this as the final check before paying a deposit, signing finance paperwork or relying on a headline monthly figure.
