Afeela, Sony and Honda’s joint-venture electric vehicle (EV) brand, have unveiled their second model at CES and, as expected, it’s an SUV.
Although it’s officially known as the Afeela Prototype 2026, it looks very close to being production ready, although the SUV won’t go on sale in the US until 2028.
The company hasn’t disclosed any other details about the car, except to say that it will be more roomy than the Afeela 1 liftback-disguised-as-a-sedan.
While the SUV’s exterior doesn’t share any panels with the sedan, the two are clearly penned by the same design team.
It’s likely the two vehicles share the same platform, meaning the SUV could feature the same drivetrain as the sedan, which comes with a dual-motor system making a total of 360kW. This is paired to a 91kWh battery that’s said to deliver a range of 483km under the US EPA standard, and supports DC fast-charging up to 150kW.
The Afeela 1 is 4.91m long, 1.9m wide, 1.46m tall, and rides on a 3.0m wheelbase. There’s a minimalist interior with pair of screens stretching the width of the dashboard. It’s also available with a screens and camera combo in place of traditional wing mirrors, and screens mounted on the front seat backs.
A Level 2+ autonomous driving assist system uses 40 sensors, including 18 cameras, 12 ultrasonic units, nine radars and one LiDAR.
Sony-Honda Mobility hasn’t provided photos of the prototype’s interior, but it also hasn’t completely blacked out the windows. From some exterior shots we can see the prototype seems to have a dashboard that’s carried over from the Afeela 1 sedan.
Interestingly, the Afeela 1 will be offered in only three colours: white, a blue-tinted silver, and black. Indeed, the base Origin variant will only be available in black.
The Prototype 2026 shared the Vegas stage with a pre-production version of the Afeela 1 sedan, which will be built by Honda at its factory in Ohio. Pre-orders for the sedan have commenced, but the first deliveries of high-end Signature model won’t commence until late 2026, with the entry Origin trim set to become available some time in 2027.
Pricing will likely see the Afeela 1 sell in small quantities. The base Origin is priced from US$89,900 (A$133,000), while the up-spec Signature kicks off from US$102,900 (A$153,000).
For reference, in the US the slow-selling Lucid Air begins at US$70,900 (A$105,000) for the base 321kW rear-wheel drive model and goes through to US$249,000 (A$369,000), while the all-wheel drive 290kW BMW i5 xDrive50 starts at US$70,100 (A$104,000).
Sony first dipped its toes into automotive waters with the Vision-S sedan concept at CES 2020 right when the Tesla Model 3 was going gangbusters, and the related Model Y SUV was about to head into production.
It then released the Vision-S 02 SUV concept in 2021, and signed a partnership agreement with Honda in 2022. The production-intent Afeela 1 was unveiled at last year’s CES.