[Will Pwr]

Just picked one up yesterday to replace our X2 2.8 sDrive M Sport lease and the 330e M Sport has definitely impressed us. The talk about trunk space was good to know about in advance, but it wasn’t a deal breaker by any means for us. I also just went from an X3MC to an i4 eDrive40 and am really impressed with the drive characters of the 330e. FWIW, we weren't in the market for a G20 when replacing the F39, hell.. we were looking at a Lexus NX350H… but I’m glad we got turned onto the 330e as it allowed us to keep my wife in a BMW again and gives me a secondary car that I’d enjoy driving too haha

[SoCalJon]

Just over 10,000 miles in the first 8+ months.
Still love it.

Since taking delivery, I've put in 187 gallons (averaging $5.02/gallon (AKI91) here in SoCal), and 1636kWh (averaging $.178/kWh).

Calculated MPGe is 43.14, and calculated cost per mile is $.121.

38.31% eDrive usage (from iDrive) since ownership

[RBradleigh]

Originally Posted by rundeyvoo

Hey all... for all you 330e owners (pre LCI / LCI) -- how do you like the car so far? Any issues? Pros / cons?

Debating on grabbing one for my SO and would like to get everyone's thoughts on the car.

Day 2 so obviously in the Honeymoon period, thoroughly enjoying. On a light highway driving day had to ease it off when I realized I was going 82 in a 70? No need to speed but couldn’t believe how quiet and smooth it was which caused the “speeding.” Previous vehicle was a 2017 GMC Canyon 2WD.

And I have the xDrive, was in ‘sport’ mode at the time.
I think you’ll enjoy.

[JABCAT]

I now have a 2nd gripe about the car which is related to my 1st (no preconditioning if the battery is discharged). Today getting in my car to take my son to practice a message popped up stating the heating/cooling system was disabled because either the components were too warm or the battery didn't have sufficient charge. It's 109 degrees today & 114 in my garage where the car was parked. Needless to say it was a very sweaty ride to practice.

The a/c kicked on about 4 minutes into our drive but was not nearly to sufficiently cool the cabin. Why the heating/cooling can't be connected to the ICE, I just don't understand.

[rundeyvoo]

Originally Posted by JABCAT

I now have a 2nd gripe about the car which is related to my 1st (no preconditioning if the battery is discharged). Today getting in my car to take my son to practice a message popped up stating the heating/cooling system was disabled because either the components were too warm or the battery didn't have sufficient charge. It's 109 degrees today & 114 in my garage where the car was parked. Needless to say it was a very sweaty ride to practice.

The a/c kicked on about 4 minutes into our drive but was not nearly to sufficiently cool the cabin. Why the heating/cooling can't be connected to the ICE, I just don't understand.

Oooof! No way! I didn't realize that about the heating & cooling system not functioning because of the battery being too hot. The preconditioning makes sense though -- if the battery is discharged, then it won't precondition. Makes total sense, just didn't occur to me (lol).

[doublevanosrc]

Originally Posted by rundeyvoo

Oooof! No way! I didn't realize that about the heating & cooling system not functioning because of the battery being too hot. The preconditioning makes sense though -- if the battery is discharged, then it won't precondition. Makes total sense, just didn't occur to me (lol).

Yeah that's a dealbreaker especially in Texas during the summer, I looked at one but passed the smaller trunk was a turn off and so was the range, I would just get an i4 instead of a 330e.

[Randyg]

My A/C works beautifully! Freezes me out more often than not. Starts blowing cold air the second I get in.

[JABCAT]

Originally Posted by Randyg

My A/C works beautifully! Freezes me out more often than not. Starts blowing cold air the second I get in.

Usually mine does as well. It was the second time I've received the message that the cooling system had been disabled.

Per the owners manual, p.330 "if the high-voltage battery is discharged and the combustion engine is started, air conditioning may be limited". So it appears some genius engineers designed the system this way. Guess it doesn't get over 100 degrees in Germany.

[bavarianride]

Originally Posted by JABCAT

Usually mine does as well. It was the second time I've received the message that the cooling system had been disabled.

Per the owners manual, p.330 "if the high-voltage battery is discharged and the combustion engine is started, air conditioning may be limited". So it appears some genius engineers designed the system this way. Guess it doesn't get over 100 degrees in Germany.

I was surprised to read about this issue, although there is truth that at times BMW engineers may not account for all operational conditions.

[rundeyvoo]

Originally Posted by bavarianride

I was surprised to read about this issue, although there is truth that at times BMW engineers may not account for all operational conditions.

I was talking to a buddy of mine about it and mentioned that he had the same error come up once on his iX. He called his dealership who then instructed him to take in to get looked at and they said it was a software issues so updated his to the most current version.

He said the issue hasn't come up again but not sure if that's the actual cause or his BMW service advisor didn't know what else to do so just upgraded the software in his car lol

[gorthol]

I have a euro spec 2021 330e. It currently have 32.000 kms/20k miles. I have done 30% on iDrive, most of it city driving.

My average MPG since factory is 5.4l/100 or 43.55 USA MPG or 52 UK MPG but the last year was very atypical for me because for family/medical reasons I had to do a lot of 1000 kms trips. This year the average MPG is 3.2l100/73 MPGUSA/88 MPGUK, which is more representative of my normal usage.

On pure electric I usually get these ranges:

- Winter pure city driving: 35 kms/20 miles (however winters over here are very mild, rarely going under 10C).

- Winter road driving: 45 kms/28 miles.

- Not winter city driving: 40 kms/25 miles.

- Not winter road driving: 52 kms/32 miles, but once I did 37 miles (road with 55mph limit).

Don't trust the estimated autonomy on the dashboard, for some reason it's usually very low compared to the real one you will get.

I have PV panels at home and I almost always charge the car when they are producing so for me the electric cost is 0.

My typical driving is pure city 85% of the days and highway road on the other 15%.

I upgraded the brakes to M Performance ones and the suspension to Bilstein B12 and the car handles beautifully despite the weight, and I sometimes like to drive it HARD on some twisty road.

However, with the default suspension it was somewhat "floaty" and the default brakes I could get into fading pretty easily driving it hard (with the M Performance ones I haven't found fading even going down for 35 minutes of hard driving on a mountain road). I bought the car stock so that's why I had the stock suspension and brakes; if you order it from factory the M or adaptive suspension and the M brakes are a must in my opinion (and note that at least here in Europe the "M" package doesn't include them!).

I'm very happy with the car and if things go well I plan to have it for at least 10 years.

Highlights:

- Xtraboost mode is fucking amazingly fun. It's like having nitro, but with electrons. It will usually give 315/325 engine hp on a dyno.
- On Xtraboost, the electric motor masks the turbo lag that you can feel on the 320i or 330i pretty well.
- City driving on iDrive not only means you are not using the engine when the MPG would be higher but also your engine doesn't suffer from the worse driving conditions (carbon deposits, increased wear et cetera). I don't know how much the batteries will live but I'm pretty sure the ICE will be pristine for much longer than non-phevs.
- Regarding the batteries, this is not a Tesla where if you have a problem you've to change all of them. BMW did the rights thing and there are six battery modules, each worth about $900. In my case, since I plan to have the car for a long time (10+ years), I expect I will have to replace the batteries at some point but there are already some BMS for reusing the old ones for your home so you can store the energy from PV panels ("wasted" car batteries usually still have 65-70% of usable capacity, they can't be used for the car because they can't produce 400 volts anymore, but they're perfectly usable for PV storage systems).

[rundeyvoo]

Originally Posted by gorthol

I have a euro spec 2021 330e. It currently have 32.000 kms/20k miles. I have done 30% on iDrive, most of it city driving....

Thanks for the feedback, really appreciate it. For those of you that chimed in -- thank you so much!! This helped in the decision making process. We placed the order for her 330e a few weeks back and CA said that hopefully we'd take delivery by October (:fingers-crossed. We'll post pics once we have it!

[Kirth Gersen]

Hello all,

I have had a 330e Touring xDrive (G21) for more than two years now. A pre facelift version, which is fine as I prefer the previous dashboard.
I can recharge at home and not burn gas at all on my daily commute (twice 10 miles).
And I travel from the Paris region to the south of France (800 km/500 miles) once every two months or so.
The longer distance I've achieved in full electric mode has been 54km.
Sure, a C300e could reach much more, but it would not bring any benefit to my daily commute, and it costs the Mercedes 150kg additional weight and no 4WD.

My average consumption over 2 years/42,000km is 5.1l/100km (46 mpg), plus 8.9kWh/100km which is much better than my previous petrol car with which I was over 8.3l/100km (28.4 mpg) in the same conditions.
Worst consumption (for a full tank) was achieved in winter, on highway with winter tires, no initial battery charge, and with a roof case: 8.5l/100km (27.6 mpg)
Usually, I'm around 7l/100km (33.5 mpg) on long distances.

I find the regeneration working particularly well on the BMW, and you never lack the support of the electric engine. What may be different from other PHEVs is the fact that the focus here is on making the car dynamic and responsive rather than focusing entirely on cutting fuel consumption.
Still, by my calculations, with petrol and electric prices here in France, I’ve started saving money over a 330i since I’ve reached 35,000 km (21,750 miles).

That's the most fun car I have had since I started driving in 1985. The ride is excellent. I'm driving quite often in small roads in the mountains. About the additional weight, I'd say this is felt only in very particular conditions, such has braking hard or curves taken at (too) high a speed. And as a matter of fact, it's not that much heavier compared to a diesel 330d.

Overall, so far, I'm fully satisfied with the car.

[MBM340]

Originally Posted by rundeyvoo

Hey all... for all you 330e owners (pre LCI / LCI) -- how do you like the car so far? Any issues? Pros / cons?

Debating on grabbing one for my SO and would like to get everyone's thoughts on the car.

I was just given one as a loaner (M340 is DD). It is ok but only 20 miles or so on battery is meh....it isn't a bad car especially if you have a short commute.

[jcl78]

Originally Posted by MBM340

I was just given one as a loaner (M340 is DD). It is ok but only 20 miles or so on battery is meh....it isn't a bad car especially if you have a short commute.

Very insightful.

[MBM340]

Originally Posted by jcl78

Very insightful.

I have Parkinsons and have to type with one finger. Next time I won't bother.

[LarryMarcia]

I think the 330e is an excellent car if one travels only very short distances and does not need a large trunk.

I personally opted for the standard gas engine because I needed the larger gas tank as I often travel long distances and like to limit my gas stops.
And I definitely needed the bigger trunk.

I would add here that I've read some posts that say the Air Conditioning in the 330e will not turn on right away if the battery is dead, and takes a few minutes to actually turn on when running on gas only / very warm ambient temperature.

If that is true, then that would for sure be a deal breaker for me as I like to turn on the AC right when I get in the car (and have it actually start working) on a warm day.

[MBM340]

[Zeros]

I have had my 330e for about 8 months now and am really enjoying the car. This is our third car, as my oldest just started driving, so she took my old car, a 2013 5 series. My commute to work is about 25 miles, so I am able to get to the work garage at just about the range of electric. Since we have chargers at work, I am able to charge during the work day, then get close to home on electric as well. I have probably filled the gas tank 6-7 times since I have purchased the car. The ride is fun and sports, but definitely not the same as my 5 series. The only downfall for me is the trunk space, as my golf clubs just barely fit, but that is not a huge deal for me. If I need to move something bigger, I will take the 5 series or my wife's QX80. This is my first hybrid, and all in all, I am loving it.

[Zeros]

Originally Posted by LarryMarcia

I think the 330e is an excellent car if one travels only very short distances and does not need a large trunk.

I personally opted for the standard gas engine because I needed the larger gas tank as I often travel long distances and like to limit my gas stops.
And I definitely needed the bigger trunk.

I would add here that I've read some posts that say the Air Conditioning in the 330e will not turn on right away if the battery is dead, and takes a few minutes to actually turn on when running on gas only / very warm ambient temperature.

If that is true, then that would for sure be a deal breaker for me as I like to turn on the AC right when I get in the car (and have it actually start working) on a warm day.

I have not seen this on my '23 LCI. Even if the battery is depleted, the A/C turns on when I start the car.

[JABCAT]

Originally Posted by Zeros

I have not seen this on my '23 LCI. Even if the battery is depleted, the A/C turns on when I start the car.

I've noticed it depends on what drive mode I'm in. In Sport the a/c kicks on immediately and is very cold. In hybrid, it's not as cold. Keep in mind we've had 100*+ days for the last couple months. The times I've received the a/c not available message was when my car was parked in my driveway in full-sun.

[LarryMarcia]

Originally Posted by JABCAT

I've noticed it depends on what drive mode I'm in. In Sport the a/c kicks on immediately and is very cold. In hybrid, it's not as cold. Keep in mind we've had 100*+ days for the last couple months. The times I've received the a/c not available message was when my car was parked in my driveway in full-sun.

I wonder if the manual indicates anything about that. Seems illogical that after being parked in the sun on a hot day that the a/c not available message comes up.

Those are the days that we really need to be able to turn AC on right after starting the car.