Renault Scenic E-Tech Esprit Alpine EV87 2026 review

After making a splash in Europe as the world’s first small MPV, Renault‘s then-named Megane Scenic established itself as a well-packaged, smooth-riding alternative to the family sedan. But the old Scenic never really took off in Australia.

After a 17-year hiatus, the nameplate is back, as the Scenic E-Tech, this time attached to a handsome, sporty-looking 4.47-metre-long electric vehicle we suppose you’d class as a small, or maybe medium, SUV. Just like the original, though, it sort of isn’t.

With a ground clearance of just 145mm, and sitting only 85mm taller than a Volkswagen Golf, this is a deceptively compact electric car that doesn’t want to be categorised. And really, it’s just a well-packaged family car.

And yet its 625km WLTP driving range rating makes the Renault Scenic E-Tech, on paper, one of the longest-range electric cars on sale.

It beats out key rivals including the similarly-sized Kia EV3 Earth (563km) and Skoda Elroq (529km). The much larger Zeekr 7X with its massive 100kWh pack still doesn’t eclipse the Frenchie, at 615km WLTP, and the $68,900 Tesla Model Y LR AWD offers 600km.

Pricing starts at $55,990 for the Renault Scenic E-Tech Techno EV60 and runs to the tested Esprit Alpine, which asks $65,990 before on-road costs.

The Scenic has another ace up its sleeve, the promise of uniquely sorted Gallic ride. The combination of camembert-smooth bump absorption and surprisingly handling talent the French excel in and that matches well with the horrid roads of Australia. It should be a good one, then.

What are the Scenic Esprit Alpine’s features and options for the price?

The Renault Scenic E-Tech range opens with the Techno trim, available with the standard 60kWh battery (430km driving range WLTP) or larger 87kWh option for $4000 more ($59,990).

It’s worth stepping into the big-battery Scenic, which not only brings that 625km range claim but also adds a more powerful 160kW/300Nm front electric motor, dropping the 0-100km/h sprint (by 0.7sec) to 7.9sec.

The Renault Scenic E-Tech Techno has the following feature highlights:

• 19-inch alloy wheels
• LED headlights w/ sequential indicators
• Power tailgate
• Light grey cloth upholstery
• Heated front seats and steering wheel
• 12.3-inch digital driver’s display
• 12.0-inch multimedia touchscreen w/ built-in Google Maps, Play Store
• Wireless Apple CarPlay/Android Auto
• Telematics service and SOTA
• Wireless smartphone charger
• 48-colour ambient lighting
• Arkamys six-speaker sound system
• Six USB-C charge ports

Stepping up to the Esprit Alpine ($65,990) adds unique exterior styling, 20-inch alloy wheels, a nine-speaker Harman Kardon sound system, power-adjustable front seats with memory, driver’s seat massaging, and driver facial recognition.

Other highlights include:

• Cloth and synthetic leather seat trim with Alpine stitching
• Infrared windscreen
• Metal pedal covers
• Aluminium accents for front door trims

How does the Scenic Esprit Alpine drive?

When it comes to driving experience, the Renault Scenic E-Tech delivers on exactly what you expect from a French electric car. It’s brisk, quiet, well balanced and, most importantly, exceedingly comfortable.

The damping is delightful, you barely notice bumps! There’s negative travel to let the 20-inch alloy wheels dip into pot holes and light spring rates allow the car to breathe over humps. It’s genuinely lovely, with no thumping from the suspension at all, and control at its extremes.

With zero ‘head-toss’ and a level body the Scenic E-Tech would be superb on a long drive, even four up.

The steering is light, as is the brake pedal but in a way that means the Scenic is really easy to drive smoothly. Paddles behind the steering wheel allow tuning of the regenerative braking system from smooth sailing through natural retardation to a sophisticated one-pedal mode.

Where it doesn’t quite excel is in the handling department. The Scenic E-Tech is secure and predictable with a gentle understeer bias that becomes apparent as the 235/45R20 Michelin e-Primacy tyres start to squeal.

It’s a family SUV that can’t quite get up on its tippy-toes and dance — to be fair, we only expect excellence here because it’s wearing a sporty Esprit Alpine badge and big wheels.

The Scenic isn’t rapid like some of its rivals. Ample outputs of 160kW and 300Nm are very French — no more than you need. Pace is best described as adequate for a front-wheel drive family car.

Four drive modes — Eco, Comfort, Sport and Perso — influence accelerator response, steering weight and stability control calibration. Comfort is plenty nice for most of the time, with Perso offering customisation. The Scenic remembers what mode you selected when you switch it off, too, which is a nice touch.

The control layout is, well, quirky. Instead of a central gear shifter, Renault has followed the trend of a column-mounted selector on the right behind the wheel.

Thankfully, the French didn’t move wiper controls into the screen, though Renault also soldiers on with its multimedia control stalk. This means there are three stalks on the right. It’s quite busy and we did engage the wipers a few times instead of reverse.

Being compact and squarely proportioned with great visibility and parking support systems (360 camera and front plus rear sensors), the Scenic E-Tech is painless to park in town.

The final win worth talking about is a consistent, trustworthy adaptive cruise control system. The Scenic E-Tech is one of those cars that just works most notable for its lack of annoying tendencies like poor ride quality or unnecessary beeps and bongs.

What is the Scenic Esprit Alpine’s interior and tech like?

Considering how small the Scenic E-Tech is — at least in relation to today’s family car default — it may comes as a surprising to learn that its back seat is a real highlight.

Full-size adults will be comfortable for hours in the back, with plenty of head and knee room (though toe space is a little tight). The back rest is sculpted to hold you in, there’s plenty of under-thigh support, great vision over the front seats’ skinny headrests and massive windows.

The back doors are very long and open wide to easily take child seats. Outboard seats have ISOFIX tabs and all three rear seats are fitted with a top tether anchor.

When it comes to amenities, the Scenic E-Tech excels. Air vents, four USB-C charge points, plenty of pockets in the seat backs and a fold-down centre armrest with hidden storage, cup holders and clever rotating tablet/phone holder all feature. The Scenic E-Tech Esprit Alpine even has snazzy blue carpet in all four door bins — that’s attention to detail.

Material quality is, on the whole, excellent in the Scenic. Rather than imitating cow-hide, Renault’s design team has picked tactile, warm fabrics that add a sense of calm to the cocoon-like front cabin.

The front seats are cloth-centred with imitation leather bolsters with three-stage heating and power adjustment. The low-set driving position is typically French and the seats offer a good range of movement.

Renault markets the seats as featuring a massage function, though it’s referred to as ‘Active Lumbar’ in the vehicle menu which is more accurate, as it inflates and moves the lumbar adjustment around. It’s more for fending off back fatigue than providing physio-level muscle relief.

Technology is excellent, too, with the control array twisted towards the driver featuring a crisp digital driver’s display that can show in-built Google Maps and responsive 12.0-inch portrait touchscreen.

Running Android Automotive software, the Scenic E-Tech gives freedom to download applications including Spotify, video-streaming services and more. It even comes with an in-built Mario Kart knock-off you can play while charging.

The screen has a row of persistent shortcut buttons for vehicle menus along the top and a line of climate control down the bottom. These remain even when wirelessly mirroring Apple CarPlay/Android Auto. There are more physical switches beneath the screen, too, so it’s eminently usable.

The Scenic features built-in Google Assistant. Typically these have been clunky though the Scenic’s connected system’s commands are pleasingly natural (and ever-evolving). You can simply say ‘I’m feeling cold’ and the car will adjust the climate control to suit, for example.

Continuing the unconventional theme is the squared-off steering wheel upholstered in smooth, quality leather. There are buttons on the left for cruise control functions, on the right for media and driver’s display interaction and a ‘Multi Sense’ drive mode shortcut button.

Cabin storage is strong with a deep central storage compartment, generous door bins, single centre cup holder with more oddment storage in front. And the phone-holder, cupholder and USB-C facility in the rear fold-down armrest is inspired.

Some drawbacks? The E-Tech is noisy on start up as some fans grumble to life. We recall this from the related Megane E-Tech as well. There are two options missing from this top-spec trim too, with no seat ventilation or sunroof offered.

Renault has had to sacrifice something for cabin space, and that’s boot shape. The quoted 545-litre space sounds huge though it’s a shorter, deeper boot than a Tesla Model Y or even the smaller Kia EV3, thanks to the Scenic’s low-set floor. This means heavy items need to be lifted up and over a lip — not necessarily the end of the world.

Fold the back seats down and space grows to 1670L with a small step in the load area. The Scenic also does without a ‘frunk’ and doesn’t carry a spare tyre, though there’s extra storage under the boot floor for charging cables.

Is the Scenic Esprit Alpine a safe car?

The Renault Scenic received a five-star Euro NCAP crash safety score when tested in 2022, and this has been translated to a five-star ANCAP rating.

What’s refreshing is how quietly and accurately the systems installed in the Scenic E-Tech work. Lane-keep assist, for example, functions well and doesn’t annoy so there’s no need to turn it off. There are rarely any beeps and bongs either, and the ones you do notice have a softer tone that’s assertive without bleating.

Possibly the best example is the driver fatigue monitoring system which, if you yawn, gently suggests it’s noticing ‘early signs of fatigue’, rather than beeping and advising you to pull over immediately, lest you cause a massive accident. A measured response.

There’s also a configurable ‘My Safety Perso’ setting allowing drivers to easily defeat systems they might not want. Standard safety features include:

• Seven airbags
• Forward AEB with junction, pedestrian and cyclist detection
• Speed sign detection
• Blind-spot monitoring
• 360-degree camera
• Rear cross-traffic alert
• Side-exit alert
• Adaptive cruise control
• Lane-centring assist

What are the Scenic Esprit Alpine’s ownership costs?

The Renault Scenic E-Tech Esprit Alpine uses an 87kWh NMC battery pack manufactured by LG for a WLTP-rated 625km range from a full charge.

That is deeply impressive, though on test we pulled up short of the rating in a mix of urban, suburban, rural and motorway driving. Our 16.8kWh energy use would see only 518km of driving range in the real world.

We intend to further interrogate the driving range of Renault’s electric Scenic. One factor we noticed were the relatively low tyre pressure recommendations — cold pressures are to be set at 30PSI, where for example Tesla recommends 42PSI in the Model Y.

Being a 400-volt electric platform, the Scenic’s charge speed isn’t overly impressive. The brand quotes 150kW DC peak for 10-80 percent (of its admittedly very large battery) in 37 minutes.

Regular AC charging at the Scenic’s 11kW peak means a flat-full charge will take nine hours. We also observed a significant charge drop overnight in the test car. We left it at 15 percent and returned to find 12 percent in the battery, corresponding to a 25km range loss.

The Scenic E-Tech is covered by a five-year/unlimited-kilometre warranty, and servicing is due every 12 months or 30,000km with Renault’s Australian importer Ateco yet to confirm service pricing.

The honest verdict on the Scenic Esprit Alpine

This car really does exactly what you expect. The Scenic E-Tech is quiet, comfortable, spacious, well appointed and therefore a seriously satisfying vehicle to live with.

A massive, properly fitted-out back seat makes it an ideal family car with pleasant road-trip manners. Question marks about real-world driving range and slower-than-others charging speed remain, however.

The extra goodies fitted to the top-trim Esprit Alpine are nice but do bring the price up to Tesla Model Y proximity, so our advice would be to also consider the more affordable Techno trim or alternatively bargain hard at the dealer.

With so much sparkly, shiny metal from new brand names with shouty advertising campaigns, the basically excellent Scenic E-Tech feels like a tonic. Engineered well, executed excellently, it’s a family-friendly vehicle that feels like more than the sum of its parts.