Nissan Leaf Review 2026: Price, specs & boot space

If you're after an EV that's practical without being too large, absolutely. The only problem for the Leaf is that the same can be said of the Kia EV3, Skoda Elroq, Volvo EX30 and many, many more similarly sized options. We'll have to wait and see how the Leaf shapes up in terms of pricing and specs to see if it shines through in a busy area of the market.

As far as the battery goes, that all comes down to how often you'll be undertaking longer journeys. The range of the standard pack should be more than enough for most drivers, so if you can avoid having to pay more for the Extended battery, it's worth doing so. We can't comment on which trim to go for just yet, as these haven't been confirmed for the UK at the time of writing.

While the old Leaf was a little difficult to pigeonhole, the new one sits in one of the most hotly contested corners of the market, so it'll have no shortage of rivals. Cars like the Skoda Elroq and Kia EV3 offer similar range figures and are around where we expect the Leaf to be in terms of price. Although it's a hatchback rather than an SUV, the Volkswagen ID.3 is also a car the Leaf could be cross-shopped with.

As mentioned, the Nissan Leaf has a quality finish inside. It’s a notable step on from the previous Leaf, which had a few too many scratchy plastics for our liking, and has benefitted from the step forward made from the Nissan Ariya it’s derived from.

This quality appearance is mirrored on the outside. Nissan says it’s reduced all the panel gaps to make it slipperier through the air, and this also helps give it a more premium look, with Lexus-like snugness to the way everything fits together. The rich paint quality and fine attention to detail of the test cars reinforced this, and we look forward to seeing the Sunderland-built cars when production begins.

The Nissan Leaf has a ‘floating’ screen setup with dual 14.3-inch displays. The touchscreen infotainment system in the centre of the dash runs Google software, which makes a great deal of sense. Why bother persevering with your own navigation system, which many users will simply ditch in favour of connecting their phones via Android Auto or Apple CarPlay and using Google Maps? 

Because the Google Maps system is fully integrated into the car, it means the Nissan Leaf can precisely estimate the remaining charge in the battery at the end of every trip. This is a real boom. And if your trip is longer than the charge in the battery, it will automatically build in charge stops, as efficiently as possible – even down to predicting how many minutes you need to spend at the public charge point. This clever system makes a huge difference to living with an EV.

The system comes pre-installed with various apps, with further compatible apps available from the Google Play Store as well, including YouTube, to while away the minutes when charging. One of Nissan’s tech engineers boasted it also has 3D gaming, “and we already have around 10 games, with big names like Angry Birds”. We’ll try out gaming in a Nissan Leaf when it arrives in the UK.

It’s a new generation of infotainment system, powered by a Snapdragon chipset, so it’s powerful and responsive. The menu structure is flatter and more easily ‘swipeable’ – we found it familiar and easy to understand right from the off. There’s a customisable background that stretches across both screens, which changes according to the time of day.

A premium Bose sound system has been developed for the car, including a headrest speaker reserved for navigation and phone announcements, so others in the car won't have their favourite track interrupted by a loud voice harping on about turning left. It has the usual fine Bose sound quality and will be an option worth considering.

The Nissan Leaf is available with a head-up display. We found this quite useful, with plenty of information logically displayed across a broad area. It’s even able to show sat nav directions from third-party navigation apps, such as Waze, rather than just the built-in Google system. This is something we haven’t seen before, and is a praiseworthy tech development.

The airy feel behind the wheel of the Nissan Leaf is thanks to its semi-high seating position and a lower-set, more open-plan dashboard. Nissan has moved the heating system forward, under the bonnet, so it doesn’t eat into cabin space. Because it’s a little higher off the ground than a regular hatch, it’s easy to get in and out of.

Things are tighter in the rear, accessed through slightly fiddly ‘hidden’ rear door handles. Adults might find the aero profile of the roofline eats into rear headroom, although the clever panoramic glass roof does help a bit – because it has auto-dimming functionality, Nissan doesn’t need to fit a space-intruding electric sunblind. They might find foot space a bit on the tight side, too – it’s not cramped, but doesn’t have the free space you’ll find in something like a Skoda Elroq. The seat base could be a bit more supportive as well (the front seats, however, are lovely).

The Nissan Leaf has a 437-litre boot (we don’t yet have figures for when the seats are folded). It has a double floor design, with twin removable panels that can be dropped into the lower section for more space, or positioned vertically to divide the boot into two (and stop loads sliding around). There’s a clever charging cable stowage device beneath the boot floor as well – although the Nissan Leaf doesn’t have a front boot, or ‘frunk’, because of where the heating system is located.

A practicality downvote is the lack of a rear wiper. This is becoming a little commonplace with modern aero-tuned EVs, as boffins in the wind tunnel don’t want a bulky wiper mechanism getting in the way of their detailed optimisation. But it does mean backing a Leaf out of a driveway in winter will be awkward, not to mention driving in grimy weather.

Keeping things relatively straightforward, your chosen size of Leaf battery also determines the motor output. The 52kWh battery has a 177PS, 345Nm motor, while the 75kWh 'Extended' battery has a unit outputting 218PS and 355Nm of torque. In each case, the motor is fitted to the front axle. 

Unusually, Nissan details 52kWh Leaf performance figures to two decimal places. It accelerates from 0-62mph in 8.35 seconds, Nissan says, rather than rounding it up to 8.4 seconds. Run it in ‘Sport’ mode and it falls further, to a highly precise 8.26 seconds. The 75kWh version is more conventional – and closely-matched – with 0-62mph in 7.8 seconds, or 7.6 seconds in Sport mode. Both versions have a top speed electronically restricted to 99mph.

We don’t yet have Euro NCAP crash test results for the latest Nissan Leaf. However, the Nissan Ariya it’s derived from was given a five-star rating in 2022. And a year later, its ProPilot driver assistance tech was rated ‘very good’ by the safety organisation.

Of course, the Nissan Leaf is equipped with plenty of ADAS safety assist features as standard. The firm has made it easy to turn these off, though, with just two button presses. Drivers can customise which ones they quickly turn off, rather than disabling the full suite. There's also Nissan's ProPilot Assist system, a clever cruise control that can adapt your speed for bends and changing speed limits as necessary. 

Potentially helping avoid low-speed knocks is something called 'Invisible Hood View', which uses the front-mounted camera and the two screens to allow the driver to look 'through' the bonnet at obstacles. Front Wide View, meanwhile, uses a 180-degree camera to help you see past parked cars.

The Nissan Leaf is being billed as a particularly efficient EV. The 52kWh battery has a WLTP range of 271 miles, while the 75kWh ‘Extended’ battery has an impressive 386-mile range. The latter figure is better than many direct rivals, and even outpaces the £40k entry-level Tesla Model 3 (you’ll need the Long Range Model 3 to better it).

The Nissan Leaf is efficient at higher speeds, unlike some other electric cars. This is thanks to a slippery drag coefficient of just 0.25. At 70mph on the motorway, it has a range of up to 269 miles, claims the firm. It has energy consumption as low as 4.5 miles per kWh.

Notably, a heat pump is fitted as standard. This will help efficiency in wintery British weather, and also when the temperature is particularly high. It has the ability to heat or cool the battery, so it can be preconditioned ahead of a DC rapid charge, so you get peak charging speeds right away.

If you use the built-in Google sat nav, this will automatically be factored into any charging stops en route. But because some people prefer to use third-party navigation, such as Waze, Nissan has added a battery preconditioning button to the infotainment system as well.

As a brand-new car, it'll be a while before we get a clear picture of how reliable the third-generation Nissan Leaf is. Nissan ranks in the lower third of brand reliability part of the HonestJohn.co.uk Satisfaction Index survey, but few issues for the previous-generation Leaf have been reported by readers. The CMF-EV platform used by the Leaf is well proven by this point, and as an EV, it has fewer moving parts than a petrol, diesel or hybrid-powered car, meaning there's less to go wrong.

Nissan's warranty is nothing ground-breaking, lasting for 60,000 miles or three years, whichever comes first. Like most EVs, the battery of the Leaf has separate eight-year/100,000-mile coverage. 

As is now the case with all EVs, the Leaf won't be exempt from paying Vehicle Excise Duty (VED) or car tax. The annual rate from year two onwards will be the same as petrol, diesel and hybrid-powered cars, which is currently £195. EVs also now have to pay the government's premium car tax supplement of £425 annually from years two to six, but we're hoping that most versions of the Leaf will sneak under the £40,000 threshold. 

Along with pricing, the Leaf's trim structure and specs hadn't been confirmed at the time of writing. For now, we at least know that there will be seven "expressive" colour options, including the rather lovely 'Luminous Teal' seen daubed on the car in these photos.