(Bloomberg) -- There are few cars that unfailingly elicit smiles upon arrival. The Fiat 500 is one. With its unmistakable round headlights and micro body perfectly suited to navigating Europe’s byways and back alleys, it’s been a veritable goodwill ambassador for Italy since it made its debut in 1957. But a creeping reputation for poor quality and lagging consumer interest in small cars led to a temporary discontinuation in 1975.
The 500 reappeared in modern form in Italy in 2007, launching in the US in 2012 in coupe, cabriolet and specialized Abarth versions, which are generating growing excitement on the secondhand market, by the way. An electric variant, the 500e, appeared here a year later, before all 500 models left the US in 2019, when the previous generation ended and required extensive safety and powertrain investments if it were to be sold in the US and Canadian markets beyond that year. Low consumer interest had again led to declining sales for the Stellantis NV brand. There was also a plan to repurpose the Toluca, Mexico, factory where the 500 was being made for another product, a Fiat spokesperson told me.
Newly returned to the US this year, the all-electric Fiat 500e is launching in “drops” like sneakers or albums; each new version of the minicar offers differing colorways and trims with themes like Inspired By Beauty or Inspired By Los Angeles. The first ones will arrive in North America showrooms starting in the fall. Expect one to two drops per year, the spokesperson said. This year had more drops as the company ramped up the relaunch of the vehicle, they said.
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I drove the $36,000 Fiat 500e Inspired By Music (yes, that’s the name) for a week around Los Angeles. With a peppy throttle, quick charging and endearing styling at a reasonable price, the 500e ingratiates itself to the most hardened of critics.
The Essentials
The 3,000-pound 500e is a two-door, four-seat hatchback that runs on a 117-horsepower, 162-pound-feet-of-torque electric motor and battery system. It will cover 149 miles on a single charge. It goes zero to 60 mph in 8.5 seconds, which doesn’t look very fast on paper but feels zippy in the real world thanks to the instant torque of the electric motor. It pushed me back in my seat so well that the thing felt fast even though, if you want to get scientific about it, it’s not.
Painted in black like a sharp tuxedo, the Fiat 500e Inspired By Music variant that I drove offers a JBL seven-speaker audio system with subwoofer and four different settings that change the acoustic characteristics of the car. The settings range from “My Music Room,” which sounds like the artist is playing in front of you, to “Open-Air Arena,” which is supposed to sound like an open-air arena. I prefer the option called “Giuseppe Verdi Opera House, Pisa” that makes my Mariah Carey/Whitney Houston/Toni Braxton playlist sound like the ladies are performing in an opera hall.
For reference, the Inspired By Los Angeles variant has an exclusive “Marine Layer Mist” exterior color that’s supposed to be reminiscent of the vernal coastal marine layer. Inspired By Beauty comes in rose gold, with beige seats and dashboard wrapped in faux leather. They cost the same as the Inspired By Music one.
In perhaps the most egregious misuse of words in an industry already rife with marketing misnomers, Fiat refers to this miniscule car as a “subcompact SUV” on its website. There’s nothing remotely SUV about it; I’m concerned about why Fiat believes this delusional association with an SUV is a positive attribute that will help it appeal to American buyers. But that’s an essay for another day.
The Good
Nothing could be easier than charging this charming EV. If you can (1) find a charger that (2) works. I failed on both counts; more on that in a moment.
But, Fiat tells me, it fills from zero to 80% in 35 minutes using an 85-kW DC fast charger; on a Level 2 charger it takes six hours, half that of most other EVs. Even just five minutes of charge time adds 31 miles to the battery, according to manufacturer estimates. I drove my 500e for four days to work and back, and on sundry coffee runs and dinner outings, before I even thought about topping it off with 59% of charge still left.
The car looks both charming and modern, with new LED headlights, an updated front grille and that black exterior, which smartens it up over the flashier red that tends to be the signature color of the 500. When you drive this icon of Italian design, people will assume you’re a good person. Or, at least, nice.
The interior is well-appointed for the price, with durable, easy-to-clean faux-leather seats with clever stitching that spells out FIAT. The intuitive infotainment system with 10.25-inch center screen and 7-inch digital cluster syncs easier than several luxury cars I’ve driven over the years. The cabin has ample visibility and feels like sitting inside a sun-drenched pod on 17-inch diamond-cut wheels.
For shimmying around town, driving the 500e is sheer delight. Sure, it feels a little anemic compared with a high-revving sports car, more like a heavy-duty appliance than a fire-breathing machine, but that’s not a bad thing. It had enough power and speed to beat a black Tesla that tried to burn me from a standstill on Santa Monica Boulevard.
Half the length of my 1975 Rolls-Royce Silver Shadow LWB, it darts through traffic with the greatest of ease. Driving it is, in the simplest sense, fun. I loved whipping in and out of traffic in it every day on my way home from the newsroom; I shaved an average of 10 minutes off my commute, by my estimates, just because I could duck and weave my way through the worst of it in the 500e.
In fact, the best thing about the Fiat 500e is its diminutive size. I had my choice of parking spots.
The Bad
The worst thing about the 500e is the cloying jingle that plays every time you turn it on and off. It sounds like walking through the toy aisle in a Walmart at Christmastime—infantile and deranged.
Elsewhere: The single cup holder in the center console is positioned so low that I had to reach far down and fumble to retrieve my coffee; it’s impossible to retrieve the cup and keep my eyes on the road.
While the front seats offer enough head- and legroom even for tall adults, the rear seats are inhabitable only for children. (If you combine that rear-seat space with the trunk, though, that adds up to a nice big storage area.)
And you’ll still have to contend with the abject charging network in this country if you buy it. This is not a negative thing about the 500e in particular, but it relates. When I finally went to charge it, I drove to a charger in a public parking garage downtown, which I had used before. It was broken. I was then directed by my charging app to another “available” charger in a nearby open-air parking lot that—I found out upon returning from lunch—was private. Reader, I was towed.
Two hours later, plus $466 in cash and a sojourn to the absolute sketchiest, worst place I have ever been stateside, I got the car back. If you don’t have the time, the cash and the stomach to do this sort of thing, think hard about buying an EV. The charging apparatus in this country needs help. On the bright side, when I did get the cute little thing back, it had been parked just long enough to get a complete charge. I have no idea how much it cost me; I never got a receipt.
If You Remember Just One Thing
If all electric cars were this small, practical and adorable, the world would be a better place. Let’s just hope the charging networks can keep up.
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