MG ZS EV SUV Exclusive auto 5d Owner Review

MGZS EV Issues and Niggles Water Ingress - rear doors leak into floor well when the car is parked nose up on the driveway during rain and high winds. Solution is to park face down, no leak, but then I can’t charge. Seals have been replaced so appears to be a design fault. Creaking and excessive steering wheel play - extremely annoying but solution so far is to tighten the nut on the adjustable column, it’s certainly a lot better but still not perfect. This is a common issue with lots of posts and threads online. I will have this looked at again next service. Door handles sticking in open position - particularly in cold weather. Again another known and common issue. Charge Flap not opening or locking in freezing conditions - need to use a hair dryer around the flap or park the car face into the sun to warm it up. Air vent reflections in both mirrors - silver trim in middle of air vents shines onto the glass and is constantly seen when looking at either near side or offside mirrors. Condensation build up on windscreen - I don’t see to be the worse here with this issue but then a I don’t have carpet mats inside the car which only hold winter and rain moisture from your feet. It’s still not the best for condensation build up on the inside of the windscreen particularly when it’s been sunny during the day and cools rapidly as soon as the sun goes down. Also is an issue when it’s cold and moist out in winter with little wind. Poor headlights - I’ve replaced my headlight bulbs with Osram Nightbreakers. They are a bit better but still not great. Fortunately I don’t do much night driving and most of what I do is in town under street lights. Lack of interior lighting - At night time the inside of the car, particularly the rear passenger space is a very dark place. For me made worse by the fact that I came from a BMW with changeable ambient lighting all round. I’ve replaced the standard bulbs in the front and interior light and boot space to led bulbs which are better. I’ve also added an additional led usb rechargeable light in the boot space and a removable Obulb on the rear of the console to add some light to the footwell of the rear. Poor positioning of charge socket - it’s not ideally suited given that you’ve got to crouch down to see the covers and insert the cable into the charge port. Speed sign recognition - regularly misreads road signs or isn’t intelligent enough to realise you’ve left a speed restricted area. I’ve had it showing that I’m in a 60 in a built up area and likewise showing I’m in a 20 when I’m on a National speed limit road. Speed warning indicator - keeps coming on by itself despite me switching it off. Flashing indicator is annoying. Seems to default back to on position after charging. No lighting in charge port - would be nice in the dark when you are crouching down to see what you are doing. I’m sure most other EV’s have a light in there, i3 certainly does and it’s colour coded too. They went to the bother of created a glowing MG badge so pity they couldn’t have added a light to the rear of the flap when they were at it. Poor infotainment system - extremely sluggish and on occasion non responsive. I’ve had to restart mine many times to get it to work although sometimes it just randomly goes blank and restarts by itself. It seems to be worse when a phone is connected and using CarPlay. The ZS finished in last last place in a What Car review of infotainment systems. To be fair that review was done before recent software updates although I suspect it would still finish last. Again, I’m a bit spoiled here coming from BMW iDrive system. Sat Nav system - mapping detail very basic. So I don’t use it. I tend to use Waze and occasionally Google Maps and have all my favourites saved on there. Faux leather seats - verging closer to vinyl rather than leather. It would have been good if they had been textured and at least partially ventilated. At least they are easy to keep clean. 12 volt battery drain - using consumables like heater and so on drain the 12 volt battery, even for a short while is enough for the car not to start. Not provided with a type 2 cable - you have to pay for one, haggle or take out MG finance to get one from the dealer. No window tints - so had to pay to get mine done, front and rear, but at least I got to choose my own “legal” shading. Car looks better and and should be more secure from peering eyes. No battery percentage indicator - It’s there when it’s charging so why can’t we have the display available as and when required when actually driving instead of having to guess what the little led light on the speedo indicate. Regenerative braking - it’s not that strong even in Kers 3 and despite MG suggesting that you will be able to one pedal drive you most certainly will not. It’s more like stronger deceleration and the car just will not come to a halt on its own, it’s just keeps rolling forward unless it’s going uphill. Sound system - it’s ok, it’s not bad but it’s not good either even with it optimised in the Exclusive model. No climate control - just air conditioning, dual zone would be better still. No light in glove box - again a little light in there would be handy. Some cars also have them in the storage tidy in the centre console. No baggage hooks in boot - I bought mine from AliExpress and hung them onto the rear headrests so that a couple of shopping bags can at least be helh secure without falling over. No phone app - Another common feature but missing here so no ability to control any of the vehicles functions remotely or check on the state of charge. No scheduled charging - Not in the vehicle itself so reliance is on the home charger having that facility. I have a Zappi so I’m sorted in that respect. Even though my i3 can set charges eithe on the app or in the car I now tend to set all my charging through the online Myenergi account based on electricity price. Sharp edged trim - I’ve cut my wrist on the plastic of the rear wiper washer hole whilst washing the car. There are also a few sharp edges along the bottom of the doors and below the bonnet to be wary of. Expensive and limited official MG accessories and parts. “Cheap” car but expensive add ons like the mats, cables, roof bars and so on. Mostly all found at a fraction of the price aftermarket or on the aforementioned AliExpress which has loads.