2024 Volvo C40 Recharge and XC40 Recharge First Drive: Same Old Fling

There was a time, young children, when rear-wheel-drive Volvos were A Thing—in fact, until the introduction of the 850 in 1992*, rear-wheel-drive Volvos were the only thing, much to the chagrin of Rust Belt yuppies who had to slip and slide their kids to and from school every snowy winter. But we've entered a new electric age when front-wheel drive no longer has the advantage of an engine to weigh down the wheels, and we're tickled to learn Volvo's first single-motor electric luxury SUVs, the 2024 XC40 Recharge and the coupe-profile C40 Recharge, will employ rear-wheel drive, just as god and Gustave Larson intended. And if that's not enough, all-wheel-drive versions now have a rear power bias.

* Yes, yes, we know about the 340, 440, and 480, but they were never sold in the U.S., so we're not counting them.

The Single Motor version of both cars—we capitalize because that's what Volvo calls 'em—employ a new 248-hp drive motor, developed and built in-house by Volvo. It's fed by a new 82-kWh battery that provides 297 miles of driving range in the C40 Recharge and 293 in the slightly less aerodynamic XC40 Recharge. Volvo anticipates a 0-60 time of 6.9 seconds, a number that, based on our previous testing, is probably about a quarter-second on the conservative side.

That same motor, with output cranked up to 255 hp, will also be used on the Twin Motor AWD vehicles, and it's now paired with a supplier-built 147-hp motor for the front wheels, an asynchronous unit that produces less drag when it isn't supplying power. Total output is 402 hp, same as the outgoing 2023 vehicles (which employed twin 201-hp motors), though torque is up slightly to 494 lb-ft. Volvo claims the same 4.5-second 0-60-mph time as the outgoing car; we timed the XC40 Recharge to 60 in 4.2, and we reckon the new version will deliver as much scoot.

Oddly enough, Twin Motor vehicles don't get the new battery; they make do with the same 78-kWh unit in the current (heh) cars. Improvements in motor efficiency have resulted in a driving range increase to 257 miles for the C40 and 253 for the XC40, an upgrade of 31 and 30 miles, respectively. But although the Single Motor's bigger battery can charge at up to 200 kW—charging from 10 to 80 percent in 28 minutes, according to Volvo—the Twin Motor battery still tops out at 150 kW, requiring 34 mins for the same charge. That said, as Volvo points out, you get more miles out of that 80 percent.

Volvo brought us out to its home city of Gothenburg, Sweden, for a brief taste of the new powertrains. We took our first loop in a 2024 Volvo C40 Recharge Twin Motor luxury SUV, and we found the acceleration is no less of a grin-generator than before. Not all electric cars feel as quick as they actually are—we're looking at you, Hyundai Ioniq 6—but the new 2024 twin-motor Volvos sure as heck do. Power response is instantaneous, and it doesn't feel like it trails off significantly as speeds climb. Volvo's digital speedometer adds to the fun: It doesn't skip numbers but rapidly flips through them all like a prop in a sci-fi movie. We'll admit to enjoying the skyrocketing figures almost as much as the acceleration itself.

One thing we didn't enjoy was the One Pedal driving mode, because we noticed a slight delay between lifting off the accelerator and the onset of regenerative braking, which made it difficult to modulate deceleration. Oddly, the C40 hesitates before braking but not before accelerating, so to drive smoothly we had to lift off the pedal early and step on it late. Sound weird? Wait till you drive it.

As to how the rear power bias affects the driving experience, it was too subtle to discern on the roads we drove the all-electric SUVs on. If you gun the go pedal coming out of curves, the Volvo actuates both motors and launches itself like the proverbial cannonball. Also, the back roads around Gothenburg are reeeeeally narrow, so we weren't taking heroic action to provoke any tail-out responses. (Call us chickens; we'll remind you fear is a survival mechanism.) We expect to feel more of a difference someday soon on our figure-eight test course, so you'll have to stay tuned until we can get one of the new Twin Motor models out for instrumented testing. (We're ready when you are, Volvo.)

For our next lap, we drove a 2024 Volvo XC40 Recharge with the single-motor setup. The Twin Motor is a tough act to follow, and our first thought when we goosed the accelerator was, "Boy, that's slow." But it isn't—the Single Motor XC40 electric SUV offers the same right-now power delivery as the Twin Motor car, just less of it. Merging onto the highway, zipping away from traffic lights, or passing slower traffic—the Single Motor Volvos do all of the above as well as or better than your average gasoline-powered SUV; the Twin Motor cars merely do it that much better.

We did try a bit harder to prompt the Single Motor car into a little back-end misbehavior, but the only indication of which wheels were getting the juice was a flashing stability control light as we whizzed out of the corners. Volvo pointed out that the latest advances in electronic stability control mean a rear-drive EV can handle winter driving conditions better than a front-wheel-drive combustion engine vehicle. Again, we decided to wait for the safety of our test track before turning off all the nannies and seeing if the latest C40 is as much of a drifter as the rear-drive Kia EV6. (Our first inkling is that it probably isn't.)

Other than the powertrain changes and a couple of new paint colors and a new wheel design for the C40, these cars are unchanged from the 2023 models. The aspects we like (attractive styling, excellent interior packaging in the XC40) are unchanged, as are the aspects we don't (interior could use nicer materials, center screen is smallish). We're pleased Volvo now has a model that approaches the 300-mile range, and we're glad to see the company has upped the charging rate somewhat, at least for the rear-drive models. We asked Volvo when Twin Motor cars will get the 82-kWh battery; company reps hemmed and hawed in a way that made us think it'll get here, but not especially soon.

Will Volvo elbow its way into first position with these improved Recharge models? We're still waiting on pricing, and that will factor into our opinion. A Twin Motor C40 now has more range than the plucky Genesis GV60, but the latter still accelerates harder and charges significantly quicker. These new luxury SUV models are more about filling out Volvo's electric lineup than setting any new standards, but they've certainly given us more reasons to like this rather unique pair of electric SUVs. That's definitely a step in the right direction—and as any yuppie who tried to drive their old 960 wagon through a snowstorm will tell you, a rear-drive Volvo going in the right direction is always a good thing.