NIO lets you swap for a bigger long-range battery for holidays

It was already an option in China, but now it’s also available in Europe, in the countries where NIO is already present: temporarily swapping your ‘daily’ standard battery for a bigger, longer-range one, like for going on a holiday trip.

The Chinese premium EV maker lets you buy an EV without the battery, offering the latter as ‘Battery-as-a-Service (BaaS) for €169 per month. Upgrading takes a quick reservation via the NIO app at a nearby Power Swap Station up to one day in advance and will cost you a one-time €169 extra for four weeks.

Not cheap on first sight?

It’s called Flexibele Upgrade Service and has been available since December 3rd in Norway, Germany, the Netherlands, Sweden, and Denmark, where the Chinese brand is present in Europe.

It doesn’t come cheap at first sight, as on top of the starting rental price of for a standard-range 75kWh battery with 445 km range (WLTP), you’ll pay an upgrade fee of €120 plus €49 ‘service fee’ for 30% more range, or 560 km with the 100 kWh pack.

Swapping taking less than three minutes

Swapping your new battery takes under three minutes in one of the 58 Power Swap Stations available in Europe today, of which ten are in the Netherlands.

However, NIO claims that you don’t have to pay the heavy costs of a long-range battery from the start when you only need it occasionally.

 ‘Chinese BMW’

For instance, a NIO ET5 Touring – comparable with a BMW i5 eDrive40 Touring – will cost you today €51,900 and €169 per month for renting the standard battery.

By the way, NIO, which focuses on the premium EV segment, is often called the ‘Chinese BMW’. No wonder, as the original design team in Münich was staffed with people who earned their ‘wings’ with Daimler and BMW,, like Director External Design Oliver Samson and Vice-President of Design Kris Tomasson. The latter, who was Head of Exterior Design for BMW i at that time, joined NIO in 2015 to set up the Munich design center.

Back to NIO, you can buy the battery for €12,000, bringing the price of this ‘Chinese BMW’ closer to the base price (€76,300) of the genuine German one with an 81 kWh battery for a 483 km range. However, it is still €13,000 cheaper.

The 21,000 euros to’ own’ an NIO long-range battery can be avoided by renting it permanently for €289 monthly. That’s the standard €169 plus €120.

Saving €1,071 annually

If you only use it for a holiday one month a year, you could save €1,071 annually by choosing NIO’s new Flexibele Upgrade Service for the time you desperately need the extra range.

So far, NIO hasn’t announced a date it will become available in Belgium. However, several Belgians have already bought one via the Dutch office in Breukelen, imported it, and are using the BaaS swapping service in bordering cities like Tilburg or Maastricht for the time being.