2026 Mazda 6e Takami Review

Mazda’s second attempt locally at an electric vehicle is a more complete offering. It looks good, is priced right and goes well. What’s the catch?

It has been a long time since Mazda built an electric car I would want in my own driveway. The MX-30 of 2021 was a $75,000 proposition that managed around 170km in the real world, and it arrived the same year the long-range Mustang Mach-E was claiming more than 600km. That one car did a lot to put me off the brand’s electric ambitions. The 6e has undone most of that damage in a couple of days.

One grade, everything included

Mazda New Zealand has kept this simple. There is a single Takami specification at $58,990 plus on-road costs, and it comes with the lot: 19-inch alloys, frameless doors, a panoramic roof, tan Nappa leather and synthetic suede trim, a 14.6-inch touchscreen, a 10.2-inch digital cluster, an augmented reality head-up display and a 14-speaker Sony audio system. The only extra is premium paint.

Underneath is a 78kWh lithium iron phosphate battery feeding a 190kW/290Nm motor on the rear axle. Mazda quotes 560km WLTP, a 7.8-second sprint to 100km/h and a 10 to 80 per cent charge in 24 minutes, with DC charging peaking at 200kW. AC charging runs at 11kW. The car is built in China through Mazda’s long-standing joint venture with Changan, which also owns Deepal, but the chassis tuning for our market was done by Mazda Research Europe in Frankfurt. It has a 2025 five-star ANCAP rating, with 93 per cent for both adult and child occupant protection, and nine airbags.

Mazdacare covers it with a five-year unlimited-kilometre warranty, five years or 100,000km of free scheduled servicing, and an eight-year, 160,000km warranty on the battery.

The look

I am not a designer, but I know a good-looking car when I see one, and this one looks fantastic. The proportions are right, the surfacing is clean, and there is none of the clutter that spoils so many modern cars. There is no swage line down the flanks, just one long curve. The mirrors are tapered, the doors are frameless, and the illuminated front “wing” signature pulses while the car charges. It won the 2026 World Car Design of the Year award, and having walked around it looking for a bad angle, I could not find one.

Mazda calls it a hatchback. The tailgate lifts with the rear glass, so it is really a liftback, which makes it more useful than the sedan silhouette suggests. The flush door handles take some learning. You push one end and pull the other, and I still didn’t get it right first time.

Inside

The cabin is the strongest part of the car. Everything you touch is soft and the whole thing wraps around you without ever feeling cramped. The seats are on the firm side but the suede-like centres and Nappa bolsters are lovely, side support is good, and they are heated, ventilated and fully electric. Two glass roof panels, neither of which opens, let in plenty of light and both have sunshades.

At 178cm I had room to spare up front. The pillars are not too thick and the driving position is low without being awkward. Getting in requires a small sidestep because the sill is wide, a side effect of the structure that earned that safety score, but the seat sits at a reasonable 74cm off the ground.

The back is a mixed bag. Legroom is excellent and the floor is flat, with a fold-down armrest, heated seat buttons, two vents and a single USB port. Headroom is tight, though. With the seat behind me set for my own driving position I had about an inch above my head. Two ISOFIX points and a 134cm-wide bench make it fine for child seats.

Boot space is 336 litres with the seats up and 1074 litres with the 60/40 rear seats folded, and the opening is a little narrow where the seat backs meet the load floor. The 72-litre front compartment is a first for a Mazda in New Zealand and genuinely useful for charging cables. Braked towing is rated at 1500kg.

The tech

The infotainment is nothing like Mazda’s own long-running system, and in features it is a clear step ahead. Some attention has been paid to fonts and design, but anyone who has sat in a few Chinese-built EVs will recognise the off-the-shelf roots in its look at times. For everyone else it will not matter.

The big screen runs the whole car, and it is sharp. Wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto are present, but the built-in online navigation is good enough to use, and it shows how much charge you will have left on arrival. That is still not a given in this class. There is vehicle-to-load capability, another Mazda first here, plus a built-in cabin camera, Bluetooth key sharing through the app, and Level 2 driver assistance that handles motorway running well enough once you accept the steering is quick enough to make lane-centring feel slightly busy.

The Sony system is excellent with modern recordings. Older material mixed with less bass will have you reaching for the equaliser, as the subwoofer lives a long way back.

Two steering wheel favourite buttons can be mapped to silence the overspeed warning in one press. Every car should have this. The rest of the warning chimes are reasonably restrained.

There are a few irritations. Almost everything, including fan speed, lives in the touchscreen, and the menu bar sits on the passenger side of the display, so adjusting a drive mode means looking well away from the road. The voice assistant only responded to me reliably when I raised my pitch, which I expect to be fixed by an over-the-air update. And the automatic high beam is no better than anyone else’s, which is to say switch it off.

On the road

This is a rear-drive car with its 2155kg sitting low, the battery less than 15cm off the tarmac, and it drives like it. The steering is quick and lively, and the Michelin e.Primacy tyres, a low rolling resistance choice, still find enough grip to make a 35km/h corner entertaining at twice that. Body control is good, the ride is settled, and there is just enough feel at the rear to remind you which end is doing the work.

Off the mark it is more waft than shove. My own timing matched Mazda’s 7.8 seconds, which is quick enough for a daily driver but not what the styling promises. Regenerative braking adjusts only in Individual mode, and even on its strongest setting there is no one-pedal driving. It slows the car well but you will still need the brake pedal at the end.

Efficiency has been strong. I saw around 480km on the open road and closer to 520km around town, which lines up with the official figure once you allow for a highway bias. My charging test at a ChargeNet hyper-rapid site took the battery from 10 to 80 per cent in 25 minutes, a minute off the claim.

Verdict

The 6e lands in the thick of the Tesla Model 3 and BYD Seal contest with a price advantage over both and a cabin that is more inviting than either. It is not the fastest in the segment and the touchscreen-first interior will not suit everyone. But it looks superb, goes far enough on a charge to replace a petrol car without compromise, charges quickly, handles with real enthusiasm and comes with a warranty and servicing package the Chinese brands struggle to match.

For the first time in a long time Mazda has built an electric car I do not want to give back. Given the choice between this and a Model 3 at similar money, I would take the Mazda.  

Mazda 6e Takami 

$58,990  /  16.1kWh/100km  /  0g/km
0-100 km/h 7.8s
Motor output  190kW
Max torque  290Nm
Battery  77.9kWh
Range  560km
Drivetrain Single-speed auto / RWD
Front suspension Mac strut / swaybar
Rear suspension Multilink / swaybar
Turning circle 11.2m (2.5 turns)
Front brakes  Ventilated discs
Rear brakes  Discs
Stability systems  ABS, ESP
Safety  AEB, ACC, BSM, LDW, RCTA, ALK, AHB
Tyre size  f/r-245/45R19
Wheelbase  2895mm
L/W/H  4921 / 1890 / 1485mm
Track f-1620mm  r-1630mm
Luggage capacity f-72L  r-336-1074L
Tow rating  750kg (1500kg Braked)
Service intervals 12 months / 20,000km
Scheduled servicing  5yrs / 100,000km
Warranty  5yrs / Unlimited k
ANCAP rating  ★★★★★ (2025)
Weight (claimed)  2155kg

This article first appeared in the November 2026 issue of NZ Autocar magazine.