Julian Kirk enthuastically greets our new, fully electric long termer.

Our new all-electric Audi e-tron long-termer

P11D £61,120 BiK 2% RANGE 192 miles ON FLEET RANGE 145 miles ON FLEET 2.0mpkwh

My last long-term test report was a farewell to our Audi Q7 plug-in hybrid – a car that left us fairly underwhelmed thanks to the compromises it asks you to make.

The same can’t be said of our new Audi long-termer – an all-electric e-tron. Designed from the ground up as an EV, it combines the space and all-wheel drive security of an SUV with zero tailpipe emissions driving.

Our test car is the entry-level 50 quattro model, which means 230kW of power, rather than 300 in the ‘55’ models. But power isn’t the be-all here – even in 50 trim it’s quick enough to get yourself up to speed with other traffic easily (impressive when you consider the e-tron’s kerb weight of nearly 2.5 tonnes!).

Trim-wise, Technik specification brings pretty much everything you’d expect as standard, such as climate control, leather seats and 20-inch alloy wheels, plus the lovely virtual cockpit.

There’s a lengthy options list to choose from, of which our car has been treated to metallic paint (£750), upgraded four-zone climate control (£825) and the combined ‘comfort’ and ‘sound’ packs at £1,895 which add advanced parking assistance, Bang and Olufsen stereo, reversing camera and heated front seats.

The only other item I wish had been ticked was the virtual wing mirrors (£1,250) which replace the bulky side mirrors with tiny pods on which cameras are mounted which stream live images to tiny screens in the doors – not essential, by any means, but an interesting bit of future technology.

It’s early days with the e-tron, but this already feels like an EV without compromises – it’s really roomy inside, every switch and screen is familiar to any other Audi model, while charging via my PodPoint home charger is simple (and the Audi app means you can check on progress remotely).

Julian Kirk