2026 Nissan Ariya Advance+ review

Five years passed between the Nissan Ariya’s global debut and its Australian launch, but it is finally here, ready to challenge the Tesla Model Y and myriad competitors from China, South Korea, Japan and Europe.

Having waited as long as it has, Nissan has waded into a busier market than it expected and has been forced to haggle with head office for a sharper entry price, opening at about $55,000 – not the $70,000 to $80,000 it could’ve started from had it launched two years ago.

Do good things come to those who wait? Or is the Ariya already behind the times months after going on sale?

There’s plenty to like about the Ariya, but spoiler alert: there are better options in this category for less money.

On test in this review is the cheapest Nissan Ariya with the larger 87kWh battery, the front-wheel-drive Advance+, priced from $63,840 plus on-road costs – or $70,086 drive-away in NSW with metallic paint.

Cheaper versions with a 63kWh battery – for 385km of claimed WLTP range, rather than 504km – are available for $55,840 in Engage trim, or $59,840 in Advance guise, while the flagship all-wheel-drive Evolve 87kWh is listed at $71,840 plus on-roads.

The Advance+ adds synthetic leather-look and Ultrasuede upholstery, a panoramic glass roof, head-up display, power-sliding centre console, eight-way power-adjustable front seats with four-way lumbar, ventilated front seats, heated rear seats, and sequential indicators.

It is on top of 19-inch alloy wheels, dual 12.3-inch interior screens, keyless entry and start, dual-zone climate control, a heated steering wheel, heated front seats, a wireless phone charger, satellite navigation, wireless Apple CarPlay/Android Auto, a 360-degree camera, front and rear parking sensors, a power tailgate, and a 10-speaker Bose stereo.

That equipment list is not too far off its rivals… but there is a difference in price.

The BYD Sealion 7 Premium is the closest match on features, only lacking the Nissan’s heated rear seats and steering wheel, but it is listed at $54,990 plus on-road costs.

A Tesla Model Y RWD is listed at $58,900 plus on-road costs with similar equipment – no head-up display or sunroof shade, but bigger screens, a power steering column, and more – while a Zeekr 7X RWD is $57,900 plus on-roads, with a shorter but not too dissimilar feature list.

The Ariya Advance+ is the best value in the line-up. Cheaper variants compromise too much on range, while the all-wheel-drive Evolve is more expensive yet slower and shorter-range than its closest competition.

On paper, there’s nothing special about the Nissan Ariya’s efficiency and charging times.

Claimed energy use of 19.1 kilowatt-hours per 100 kilometres is high for this category, the 504km WLTP-rated range is middling, and a quoted 40-minute 10 to 80 per cent charge time at ‘just’ 130kW is slow for an electric vehicle in this category in 2026.

We beat every single one of those metrics in our time with the Ariya.

Indicated energy use averaged 17.3kWh/100km over our time with the Ariya, but I saw the trip computer dip as low as the mid-14kWh/100km, and spike up to 20kWh/100km in more demanding conditions.

It equates to a real-world range of between 435km under load to 500km in mixed driving – spot on to the claim, despite getting there with lower energy use than Nissan’s consumption claim – and as much as 600km in ideal conditions, all based on the quoted 87kWh usable battery capacity.

Nissan claims DC fast charging at a modest-by-2026-standards 130kW, for a 10 to 80 per cent fast-charge time of 40 minutes.

A real-world test on a 300kW plug returned 39 minutes and 15 seconds. Faster than the claim – and with potential to go a little quicker, as the Ariya capped power at 69kW mid-way through the charge, likely due to an issue on the charger’s side – but still one of, if not the slowest-charging mid-size electric SUV in this price range.

A Tesla Model Y RWD needs closer to 25 minutes, while a Zeekr 7X RWD claims in the realm of 15 minutes, provided you can find the right charger.

AC charging is standard at 7.2kW, and optional at 22kW, matching the Zeekr and ahead of Tesla and BYD’s 11kW for a 4.5-hour 10 to 100 per cent charge time on a compatible unit.

The Ariya does not support vehicle-to-load technology in its current guise, but it’s believed to be built into the vehicle’s systems and may be unlocked in a future update.

The Ariya is covered by the same warranty as other Nissans: five years/unlimited kilometres of coverage as standard, which extends to 10 years or 300,000km, whichever comes first, if you exclusively service with Nissan dealers.

Just one maintenance visit not at a Nissan dealer will void the five-year extension, but play by the rules, and it is the longest warranty (by time) on the Australian new-car market.

Should you cover more than 300,000km in the first five years, the extension will also be voided, but Nissan admits very few customers are likely to be affected by that.

Coverage on the battery pack is an industry-standard eight years or 160,000km, whichever comes first.

Five years of servicing costs $1495, over 12-month/20,000km intervals. It’s well priced compared to the $1757 of a BYD Sealion 7 Premium, $1839 (prepaid) of a Kia EV5 Air, and $2385 of a Zeekr 7X, though a Tesla Model Y has no regular service intervals, instead notifying its owner when it needs a check-up.

A year of comprehensive insurance coverage with a leading provider is quoted at $1546, based on a comparative quote for a 35-year-old male living in Chatswood, NSW. Insurance estimates may vary based on your location, driving history, and personal circumstances.

The same parameters return $1886 for a BYD Sealion 7 Premium, and a whopping $2909 for a Tesla Model Y Premium RWD.

The Nissan Ariya is covered by a five-star ANCAP safety rating, though due to the age of the vehicle in overseas markets, the score was assessed under 2022 criteria not as stringent as those in place today.

That said, it was hardly tested to easy criteria, so it will still likely perform better in a crash than most vehicles on the road, and its 95 per cent safety assist score in ANCAP testing means it is loaded with crash-avoidance technology, even by 2026 standards.

Most of it is calibrated well, as not to annoy or frustrate drivers.

Adaptive cruise control is smoothly tuned and holds speed well. I experienced no false activations of autonomous emergency braking, the driver attention alert is not overzealous, and the Ariya does not beep by default when the vehicle exceeds the speed limit it has detected.

Lane-keep assist produces a loud beep when it intervenes, but it doesn’t do so before the wheels actually touch the lane marking, while lane-centring assist is prone to either running wide or disabling itself entirely in curves tighter than a gentle bend.

It may be in the same category, but the Ariya is not as large as a Model Y, Sealion 7 or 7X.

Instead, it is closer in dimensions to the Toyota RAV4 and Mazda CX-5, and a touch shorter nose-to-tail than the Nissan X-Trail hybrid.

Its sloped-roof shape is similar to its electric rivals, though, with all bar the top-of-the-range Evolve riding on relatively plain 19-inch wheels with aero covers.

There are more vibrant colour options than the Gun Metallic grey in these photos, including two-tone Akatsuki Copper and black in Nissan’s marketing photos.

There’s a pleasant, homely vibe to the Ariya’s cabin, which doesn’t attempt to wow you with an overload of technology, and offers a greater sense of airiness than its rivals, helped by a pass-through under the dashboard.

The centre console slides electrically: forward to align the armrest with the elbows of taller occupants, or backward to unlock more floor space. Moving it back allows easier access to the dual USB ports (one A, one C), and extra sunglasses space low on the console.

There’s a lot of grey and black inside this Advance+ grade, but soft materials are used in places you touch, offset by rose gold detailing, funky ambient lighting, and decent storage between the tall door pockets but small dual gloveboxes.

The wood-look trim on the dashboard is a love-it-or-hate-it affair, and long-legged drivers will find it brushes their knee while driving.

Also not ideal are the touch-sensitive air-conditioning buttons for the dual-zone climate control, which are hard to use on the move and need a lot of force before they provide feedback.

Nissan brags about them in the brochure, but it should read the room, and notice that brands that have moved towards ‘haptic’ touch controls – from Volkswagen to even Ferrari – have backtracked due to customer criticism.

Similar touch-sensitive controls are seen on the centre console for adjusting drive modes and regenerative braking, and these require too much force – while diverting your eyes far from the road – to interact with.

There are no shortcuts for the heated/ventilated seats and heated steering wheel, forcing drivers to tap the fan icon on the right side of the screen, and press a fiddly seat icon to adjust them. Even similar on-screen designs in Teslas and Zeeks do a better job of this.

The physical volume dial and electronic gear selector are much easier to use, as are the clicky controls on the heated steering wheel, which offers lots of adjustment.

The eight-way power-adjustable front seats (plus four-way lumbar) are comfortable and supportive in all the right places, and the synthetic leather-look and Ultrasuede upholstery is plush.

Other amenities include heated/cooled front seats, a panoramic sunroof with electric shade, wireless phone charger, and keyless entry, with a start button.

Six-foot (183cm+) adults seated behind similarly sized front occupants will find loads of knee room in the rear seats, but head room is only decent, and there is little to no toe room with the front seats set low.

Under-thigh support is also modest, but the floor is flat, and three adults will fit across the rear seats if required.

Features include outboard heated seats, dual USB-C ports, air vents, bottle holders in the doors, map pockets on the seatbacks, and a fold-down armrest with cupholders, plus the usual outboard ISOFIX and three top-tether anchor points.

The boot is also small for the category. It’s reasonably deep, and the power tailgate opens high and wide, but the load area isn’t very tall with the floor in its standard position, and dropping it down adds a lip to lift items over.

There’s no spare wheel, like most electric cars, nor any under-bonnet storage, but there are slots, a light, and a floor that can be lifted and removed in two pieces for easier access.

Standard in the Ariya is a 12.3-inch infotainment touchscreen with wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, embedded satellite navigation, Bluetooth, voice control, and AM, FM and digital DAB+ radio.

It is here where the Ariya feels its age most. The system is relatively easy to use, but the display resolution is nothing to write home about, and compared to the smartphone-like reflexes of rivals, it’s not super quick to respond to inputs.

The plastic covering the display also makes it look unnecessarily blurry. And yes, I wiped the screen before I came to that conclusion.

For buyers who don’t want a screen-heavy interface, there’s a lot to be said about the modesty of the Ariya’s displays, but if the technology of a Tesla, Zeekr or BYD is a selling point for you, it may be a disappointment.

Wireless Apple CarPlay worked reliably in my time with the car, and there were no tech glitches to sour the experience.

The 12.3-inch driver display offers surprising customisation of layout – from two large dials to small power and range readouts up high – and shows a broad range of info, including multiple resettable long-term trip computers (you won’t find that in a BYD) and tyre pressure monitors.

Most of the time, you’ll likely be looking at the head-up display, which projects a large image onto the windscreen, and is a handy addition for the Advance+ grade.

The 10-speaker Bose sound system delivers above-average but not exceptional audio quality.

Absent, however, is any form of companion phone app for remote control of locks, lights and charge scheduling, even though it is offered on multiple petrol-powered Nissans – and the Ariya’s main electric rivals. It’s a disappointing omission.

The Nissan Ariya is a straightforward car to drive. There is no need to turn off annoying safety features, fiddle with a touchscreen, or relearn how to drive a car. Just press the start button, move the shifter into drive, and go.

That’s great for buyers new to electric cars, but there are competitors that are similarly easy yet are punchier, more supple and more refined.

The 178kW/300Nm front electric motor isn’t a powerhouse, but it delivers enough punch in Normal and Sport modes (not Eco) to keep up with traffic and merge onto motorways.

The Ariya will spin its front wheels in the wet – or with a firm press of the accelerator when some steering lock is applied – via Bridgestone tyres that are decent but not exceptional.

Nissan has rightly opted to prioritise comfort over sportiness in the tuning of the Ariya’s suspension.

It is soft and supple over speed bumps and crests – perhaps overly so on country roads, such that it is not as sure-footed over undulating tarmac as we’d hope for a family car – but it struggles to contain the car’s 2.1-tonne mass on rough roads around town.

The result is a bobbly ride that fidgets over potholes, expansion joints and other fixtures of poorly surfaced city streets, which you’ll notice as a jiggle in your tummy, or your head lifting on and off the headrest as the suspension tries to soak up a bump.

It is not strictly a Nissan problem – there is a similar sensation in an XPeng G6 or Kia EV5, which also struggle to control the extra weight of their batteries over comparable petrol SUVs – but a more supple ride is on offer in a Zeekr 7X, Volkswagen ID.4, or even a Tesla Model Y.

Around town, the steering is light and nicely geared – not too sensitive to small inputs, but not like you’re driving a bus – and the brake pedal is easy to modulate as the electric motor’s recuperation blends into the ‘friction’ brake discs behind the wheels.

There is no one-pedal drive mode that will bring the car to a full stop without touching the brake pedal. Even turning on e-Pedal and pushing the shifter into B will only bring the car to about 8km/h – albeit quite aggressively – before starting to coast.

On country roads, the Ariya is not the dynamic choice among its peers. Soft springs translate to moderate body roll, there’s little connection through the steering, and while it never feels unsettled, it’s not the last word in sharp handling. For most buyers, that will be perfectly fine.

If it bobbles over bumps around town, and it’s no superstar on winding roads, the Ariya is at its best on freeways where the suspension settles down, and wind noise and tyre roar are kept low.

If you’re after honest electric-car motoring, the Nissan Ariya is worth a look.

But unless you’re a Nissan tragic, it is a tricky vehicle to recommend wholly in 2026.

It is quiet and easy to drive, reasonably spacious inside, well equipped, easy to interact with, and enjoys the backing of up to 10 years of warranty coverage.

However, those are all attributes of its best rivals – and, fundamentally, warranty aside, there is not much the Nissan Ariya does better than its competitors that should lure you to buy one.

It is not class-leading on interior space, the boot is small, the technology is starting to look dated, it is not as comfortable or perky to drive as it should be, the driving range is good but not exceptional, its DC charging performance is behind the pace, and it cannot match its Chinese rivals on price.

And if you’re after a familiar badge, there are more competitive offerings from Toyota, Hyundai, Kia, Volkswagen and even Subaru that are worthy of attention.

Nissan claims Australia was not ready for the Ariya until now, but given how hotly contested the mid-size electric SUV market has become, we would've hoped for more.

If you’re going to show up late to the party, don’t leave the salad bowl you've promised at home.

Alex Misoyannis has been writing about cars since 2017, when he started his own website, Redline. He contributed for Drive in 2018, before joining CarAdvice in 2019, becoming a regular contributing journalist within the news team in 2020. Cars have played a central role throughout Alex’s life, from flicking through car magazines at a young age, to growing up around performance vehicles in a car-loving family. Highly Commended - Young Writer of the Year 2024 (Under 30) Rising Star Journalist, 2024 Winner Scoop of The Year - 2024 Winner

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