Top 10: as cheap as possible from 0 to 100 in less than 4 seconds

The brand new Kia EV6 GT is quite fast even by EV standards and offers a lot of speed on paper for a relatively favorable price. That gave us an idea: what are the cheapest cars if you really want to be able to go from 0 to 100 in less than 4 seconds?

EVs are fast. That is not necessarily true, but it is often. Tesla in particular is of course lord and master in this area and has ensured that half-lease-driving Netherlands now drives a car that shoots from 0 to 100 at supercart speed. You can debate for hours about how useful that is and how often those Tesla drivers do it in practice. However, it is a fact that traditionally powered cars often get the worst of it and acceleration times of this kind have become much less special thanks to the arrival of the EV.

Still, the Kia EV6 GT is startling. The car sprints from 0 to 100 in 3.5 counts and that is a value that we have only found in the EV field at brands such as Tesla and Porsche. The Kia even makes it to the number one of the list below in one go, where the price and not the sprint time determines the position. The Tesla Model 3 Performance is slightly faster, but also slightly more expensive.

Old C.

The starting point for the list is that the car in question accelerates from zero to one hundred in less than four seconds. Four seconds around does not count, with which a car like the Alfa Romeo Giulia Quadrifoglio unfortunately just falls off. The car must also be orderable and deliverable in the Netherlands within the foreseeable future. That’s a difficult point in the case of the Tesla Model Y, for which Tesla officially promises a sale start mid-year, but the exact launch date is not yet clear. The smallest Tesla SUV therefore receives an honorable mention: with a price of € 71,010, the Tesla Model Y Performance (3.7 seconds) would have finished in third place and displaced the Porsche Panamera from the list.

The facelifted versions of the Model S and Model X are also doubtful in terms of delivery time, but these cars would also end up in the list in their ‘old’ form. The Mercedes C-class deserves a special mention in this context, because the new C-class is not yet available as AMG 63. However, the old model is still on the price list as a coupé (and convertible), and it comes in S- form qualify for ninth place. Incidentally, the Mercedes-AMG A 45 only comes out under four seconds in S trim.

In one heap

Another rule of the game: we only mention the cheapest model variant that qualifies. The price mentioned for the Audi RS5 applies, for example, to the Sportback, but the coupé is of course also part of it. We also sweep the BMW M3 and M4 Competition in one heap because of the great technical similarities. If there are faster versions of a named model, they will not be named separately either. This applies, for example, to the large Teslas (which are also available as Performance) and the Porsche Panamera (Turbo).

Four of the ten ‘cheapest’ fast models are electric, including the entire top three. Yet that leaves six cars with a fuel engine, of which only one is a plug-in hybrid. The fastest car on the list is the Tesla Model S. Tesla does not have to fear for its position as ‘sprint king’, but thanks to Kia the surprisingly affordable competition is now getting awfully close.

5 seconds

Last year we already made a similar list, but then for cars that needed less than five seconds for the well-known sprint. Volvo turned out to be exceptionally good at this, but under four seconds the flush is considerably thinner even a year later.