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With its wagon-centric Modern Solid remake, our reigning Five-Seat Car Of The Year just got better, smarter, more handsome and broader in appeal
If the Enyaq version one was Skoda’s gymnastic vault into fully electric motoring, the just-launched V2 is the Czech brand’s local arm firmly sticking the landing.
Let’s explain. Enyaq launched locally last year in mid-lifecycle, big-battery form, as an appealing rear-drive Sportline coupe that nabbed our 2025 Five-Seat Family Car of the Year award and as a pricey ($84K) yet likeable dual-motor Coupe RS that was, in as-tested tennis ball yellow, possibly the ugliest car of the year thus far.
Then, just weeks ago (at the time of writing), Skoda debuted its slick Modern Solid design language in Enyaq’s smaller-bodied EV twin, the Elroq ‘hatch’, to double its electric lineup.
It foreshadowed the arrival of Enyaq 2.0, the Modern Solid restyling literally transforming the model’s looks and appeal of Skoda’s only all-important (and all-electric) mid-size SUV. With it comes the subjectively better looking wagon body style to what was a coupe-only lineup in pre-facelift, atop its award-winning if mostly carryover MEB underpinnings.
More? A price-busting 60 Select trim is set to join the Enyaq (and Elroq) rank(s) in the coming months, dropping the Euro designed and built all-rear-drive electric SUV to a super-keen $50,990 entry.
And the go-faster dual-motor RS is set return by Q1 2026, this time in a choice of either a coupe and a wagon.
In one facelift, what was formally the oddest model in the Skoda line-up now appears more handsome, more broadly appealing, and more palatable to more EV buyers, a genuine European disrupter pitched and priced directly — and viably — against Chinese-sourced stalwarts from Tesla, Kia, BYD and others.
And this from a brand that, unlike some logical nemeses, has been slogging away as a ‘challenger brand’ in Australia for almost two decades now.
But while Skoda Australia appears to have stuck the EV landing, is this revamped performance good enough to warrant gold medal consideration.
While a full lineup breakdown is covered off in our pricing and specs story, the Skoda Enyaq effectively launches in three grades across two body styles and with a pair of key options packages. These don’t include the yet-to-be-detailed RS versions coming in Q2 2026.
The new wagon-only entry 60 Select grade drops the entry price of Enyaq down to $50,990, or $54,990 driveaway. It features a 150kW and 310Nm single rear motor paired with a 59kWh net (63kWh gross) battery and combined range claim of 410kms WLTP.
Standard 60 Select features include:
A Signature package ($6000) exclusively for the 60 Select grade adds augmented reality HUD, Canton 12-speaker audio, Matrix LED headlights, rear sunshades, rear side airbags, a powered driver’s seat and more, while 20-inch wheels bring an added cost ($1000).
The ‘core’ variant — and expected volume-seller and our primary test subject here — is the 85 Sportline Wagon at $59,990, or $63,990 driveaway. It carries over the rear-drive 210kW/545Nm powertrain with an 77kWh net (85kWh gross) battery and combined range claim of up to 547km WLTP.
Standard 85 Sportline features include:
An Ultimate pack ($5000) bespoke for Sportline grade brings augmented reality HUD, 635-watt Canton 12-speaker audio, ‘area view’ camera, intelligent parking assist, 21-inch alloy wheels and Dynamic Chassis Control variable suspension that, sadly, can’t be optioned separately.
For this variant, a glass tilt and slide roof is available ($2000).
A sole 85 Sportline Coupe variant essentially mirrors the wagon spec while bundling in Ultimate pack features for $65,990 list, or $68,990 driveaway.
A choice of six colours for Select expands to seven for Sportline, with rich Velvet Red Premium Metallic the only hue demanding an upcharge ($770).
With the 60 Select not due to release for a couple of months after the local launch program — and none available to sample — our review is wholly centred around impressions of the 85 Sportline in a variety of guises.
The $60K question — give or take a tenner — for our drive of new Enyaq is whether it delivers a “sophisticated, mature…calmly competent” manner that helped the old version clinch our Five-Seater Car of the Year award, or whether it’s inherited the strange ride and braking disjoint of its newly baked Elroq twin.
The answer is: very much the former.
Here’s the nutshell. Be it wagon or coupe, the revised Enyaq 85 Sportline feels like a polished, well-resolved, thoroughly honed European petrol car…with added near-silent electric thrust.
It’s fluid and familiar, balancing shades of sportiness with ingrained core comfort in a package that’s wholly cooperative and predictable. And it all centres around the ride and handling balance.
Unlike passive-only Elroq the, Enyaq fits a choice of regular passive or 15-way adaptive suspension — aka, Dynamic Chassis Control — that’s standard in the flagship Coupe or optional as part of the wagon’s ($5000) Ultimate bundle. It’s the latter we try first, along a route from Hunter Valley to Wollombi, across some of New South Wales’ most pockmarked roads.
Even on 21s, the DDC-specc’d Enyaq nearly smothers all road acne without flustering. We’ll take the wallowy body control as a fair trade, though it’s easy to dial in just enough chassis tautness within the adaptive dampers 15 progressive steps. The middling settings of its range is perfect.
The wonderful variable ride is complemented with genuine driver connection, especially through the steering that’s weighty yet naturally fluid and direct. Meanwhile the brakes, which are a slightly complex blend of disc front/drum rear with adaptive regen, still lack a touch of bite and assistance at low speed, but are noticeably better than Elroq’s.
Wollombi to Mount White takes in the fast-flowing Great North Road, a biker’s favourite that’s particularly daunting to wet and changing conditions, this time in an 85 Sportline wagon on passive suspension.
There’s bona-fide engagement, and more than a few shades of that signature Skoda Euro-sport character, in the wagon’s dynamic manner. It’s not exactly lithe — a circa 2.2-tonne weighbridge ticket sees to that — but there’s an innate and responsive manner to the wagon, which grips up surprisingly well despite the lumpy surface and wet conditions.
When the rear-driver’s chassis does shimmy, there’s a keen balance across the axles that anchors faithful cooperation with the driver, with enough slip window in the stability control to allow some fun while keeping proceedings firmly within the safety net.
Key to its fine engagement is power and torque delivery from the rear axle — right-pedal response is progressive in normal drive mode and firm without being unruly or peaky in sport. A testament to its innate athleticism is that it can be driven on the throttle with gusto, even at its weight, in the wet, on a slithering course.
A back and forth between the two suspension formats (and both wheel sizes) through to dry running from Mount White to Hornsby via the famed Old Pacific Highway, strongly suggests that both types are very good and equally well sorted. The passive set-up, while firm, brings a convincing blend of body control and compliance that very nicely struck indeed.
Other facets? Bar switching off the enthusiastic active lane keeping, the Skoda is absolutely free of driver aid annoyances. It’s just as well sorted in the active systems’ calibrations department as you’d expect a fine European machine to be.
Downmarks on the road? There are only a few. The augmented reality feature in the head-up display — which we couldn’t get working in Elroq — functioned as described in Enyaq, though looming arrow and distance instructions projected into the windscreen isn’t the usability leap some might have you believe.
Elsewhere, the regen adjustment user interface — via paddles in D for drive or B for braking on the drive selector, but not in tandem — is less intuitive than it ought to be.
Before (literally) diving in, the paradigm shift from coupe only to a predominantly wagon-based line-up is a great one. Not only does the wagon offer more usable boot space — 15 litres more (585L) as five-seater, 100 litres more (1710L) with row two stowed — it subjectively looks more natural and handsome in styling than the coupe.
To your reviewer’s eyes, Enyaq looks better still on 20s — the 21s add a Hot Wheels-like caricature effect to the narrow hipped, tall roof proportions. In the metal, the new Olibo Green metallic paint is stunning.
Unlike the Modern Solid exterior revamp, the Enyaq interior is largely unchanged and carried over, and virtually a dead-ringer for the smaller bodied but otherwise technically twinned Elroq that’s also just been launched locally.
So it’s the same balance of freshness and familiarity with the same organically curvaceous dash fascia in a pleasingly slick and straightforward design. The functionality and usability is oh-so ICE-like ought to make the transition to electric motoring easy for new EV buyers.
But where this properly midsize Czechian-built SUV impresses most is the sense of premiumness. And mostly down to the impressively upmarket look and feel of the materials used and Skoda’s deft hand in blending them into a theme. It’s all soft touches and satin sheens in all the right places.
Like Elroq, the new look S-K-O-D-A wheel with ‘classic’ roller controls frames the small digital driver screen neatly, while versions with head-up displays have an odd black ‘shield’ strip the looks like another display but, instead, seems placed to hide the HUD hole in the dash top from the driver.
The floating 13.0-inch touchscreen is fine enough, with a handy permanent HVAC strip set low and customisable shortcut icons located high in its bright, quick responding touch screen. Being able to preset auto time-of-day activation for the aircon is handy, and thankfully, unlike Teslas, wireless Apple CarPlay or Android Auto connectivity anchors infotainment.
The Sportline seats (and the wheel for that matter) are pleasingly Euro: tactile and ergonomically sound, blending comfort and purpose nicely. There’s a pleasing resolve to the cabin, be it the placement of handles and storage cubbies — of course, flocked — and coloured stitching helps the cabin theme just avoid grey washout dullness.
Skoda claims the smaller-bodied Elroq shares the same interior space and dimensions to this, the Enyaq twin with a larger 4.7-metre exterior footprint. And yet the somehow, placebo effect or not, the Enyaq’s cabin seems to be a little larger and roomier.
Up front, it’s nicely airy in ambience but doesn’t feel hefty and unwieldy (like Mitsubishi’s Outlander, say). But it’s really sat in row two looking forward where the sense of the sheer cabin length, and the clever interior packaging, really rams home.
Second row head and knee room are excellent, though the cosy cabin width really makes the Enyaq feel best suited as a four-adult proposition. As if to anchor the point, one example we tried fitted the removable floor-mounted storage box with cupholders, which is handy but does rob foot space (which is why it’s removeable, of course…).
Elsewhere in the Enyaq’s bag of expected ‘simply clever’ tricks are phone pockets in the back of the front seats, automatic proximity door locking/unlocking, a QR code sticker in the boot to shortcut feature how-tos and, of course, the umbrella housed in the driver’s door.
The Enyaq carries over the five-star ANCAP rating from the old ‘shape’ version from an older assessment regime as tested in 2021, which covers all variants moving forward.
It scored a resounding 94 percent and 89 percent for adult and child occupant protection, respectively, with 71 percent for vulnerable road user protection and 73 percent for safety assist.
Features include:
The Enyaq’s systems appear well calibrated and were wholly unobtrusive on test bar the slightly enthusiastic lane keeping, which is easily switched off. Both the AEB — it’s a long story — and the stability control system worked faultlessly during our drive when triggered.
At a thrifty $1650 for an eight-year/120,000km package or $1950 for a 10-year/150,000km bundle, the Enyaq is remarkably cheap to service, averaging out to $206 or $195 per year respectively. Not only is this cheaper maintenance than Toyota BZ4X ($2504 for 10 years), Skoda’s 24-month/30,000km intervals are half as frequent.
As mentioned, the Elroq 85 Sportline wagon returned an indicated 16.2kWh/100km average for our assessment drive, against a 15.9kWh/100km combined rating. The aerodynamically slipperier coupe brings a more favourable 15.5kWh claim.
Range claims? Skoda says 547km and 561km combined (WLTP) for the wagon and coupe, respectively. The city cycle comes with claims of up to 687 kilometres for the slipperier coupe.
Peak DC charging power is down, from the old Enyaq’s 175kW to now 135kW, though Skoda says the 10 to 80 percent charge is roughly unchanged (28 minutes) due to a flatter charging curve. Meanwhile, the 0-100 percent AC charging time is around eight hours.
Warranty is seven years of unlimited-kilometre coverage, with eight years and 160,000km of surety on the high-voltage battery.
Unlike Tesla, the VW Group’s MEB platform offers a ‘modular repair concept’ designed with repairable cells, so that the whole battery doesn’t require replacing after a battery failure.
Pivoting to a wagon-centric line-up with a broader variant choice makes our reigning Five-Seater Family Car of the Year a more compelling proposition. While the soon-to-launch price-busting $51K 60 Select and go-faster dual-motor RS (coming Q2 2026) will have their day, the ‘core’ 85 Sportline wagon already appears to be the sweet spot.
Skoda’s only mid-size SUV is a fine one at that. The wagon format improves practicality and appearances. Unlike the ‘family’ blobby Volkswagen IDs or ostentatious ‘Gotham City’ Cupras, the Skoda’s slick yet restrained styling arguably presents a more broad-reaching appeal.
It drives like a fine European car as one conceived and built in Europe should. And it’s priced seductively, directly against Chinese-sourced rivals. Further, it offers buyers a familiar ICE-like experience, right down conventional Apple Carplay and Android Auto compatibility.
Is this the smartest offering from the ‘simply clever’ marque? Could be…
Perhaps the restyled, newly wagon-ed Enyaq will transform what has been a lukewarm local reception to Skoda electrics thus far.
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