In person it lives up to the high expectations gleaned from photos and online information. The design is properly original and refreshing, and exterior colours available are Surf Blue, Ski White, Forest Green, Parkour Red, and Boulder Grey. The interior would only come in one colour, a mix of dark blue and light grey. 

Built on BYD’s e-platform 3.0, the first BYD to debut here with the spanking new BEV-only chassis, the Atto 3 bound for Singapore is good for a 480 km range under the NEDC cycle with a 60.5 kWh proprietary BYD Blade battery. The Blade battery doesn’t catch fire as easily as conventional batteries and is rumoured to be supplied to Tesla as well in the near future. The Atto 3 is also really efficient if its 14.9 kWh/100 km energy consumption claim is anything to go by, and from a previous test drive of the new e6 we can believe this.  

With 150 kW (~ 201 hp) and 310 Nm going to the front wheels only, the Atto 3 will offer more speed than we’d ever need in Singapore with a 0-100 km/h sprint time of 7.3 seconds. Sources say this is a conservative figure and the Atto 3 is more than happy to time a launch for you through its Sport mode. We can confirm that the car is pleasingly brisk on a short test drive just after the launch, and surprisingly refined too. Ride quality is fairly supple through the car’s fully independent front and rear suspension setup, a premium feature you’d only find in much more expensive cars.

It gets even better inside. Although it’s a curious mix of the athletic and music world (think muscle sinews, dumb bells and guitar strings), it’s all rather funky and fun in the Atto 3. Soft touch surfaces abound and the overall impression is ‘this feels rather expensive’. The rear seats are commodious, helped no doubt by a flat floor and also decent headroom even with the panoramic sunroof specified. 

The 12.8-inch touch screen is rotatable, the door handles sit on a speaker cylinder and the guitar strings on the door pockets are meant to flexibly secure larger items. BYD’s proprietary DiLink software is surprisingly snappy to use and has decent graphics and UX too. There’s currently no Apple CarPlay or Android Auto, but this functionality will be added for free conveniently through Over The Air (OTA) updates later this year.

For more evidence of BYD’s thoughtfulness, there’s a built-in high-res front dashcam and even a tyre monitoring system that measures not just pressures but also temperatures. It’s BYD at its most premium, and probably the most European car we’ve seen from China on our shores. 

An interesting accessory to add on, perhaps for those driving to rural Malaysia, is a Vehicle-to-Load capability through a cable that allows the car to function like a mobile power bank. At the launch, the Atto 3 was seen powering a fridge. 
 

The Atto 3 is available now at a launch price of $178,888 with a Cat B COE and more than 100 pre-orders have already been placed. 

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