2026 Geely EX5 review

Geely has proved a quiet achiever in Australia.

China is now the leading supplier of new vehicles to Australia, but not every Chinese brand has taken off, with some reporting only modest sales – if they report their sales at all.

Not so, Geely. It commenced local deliveries early in 2025 and despite not even being on sale for the full year, it outsold the likes of KGM and Jeep. Not bad for a brand many people hadn’t heard of.

Mind you, Geely has had a presence here for some time through brands it owns such as Volvo and Polestar. But Geely’s namesake brand has never been offered here, apart from a short run in Western Australia under a third-party distributor in the 2010s.

The electric Geely EX5 mid-size SUV was the brand’s debut model last year, followed shortly thereafter by a plug-in hybrid sibling, the Starray EM-i.

The styling is, at best, inoffensive. To my eyes, it looks like a previous-generation MG HS with the grille closed off, and is about as exciting as a Leapmotor C10 – looking at these two rivals, it’s like seeing a Hisense and a Haier next to each other at The Good Guys.

These two rivals have helped form a new sub-section of the mid-size SUV segment, offering the spaciousness of something like a Tesla Model Y or BYD Sealion 7 but for a lower price closer to that of the smaller (but categorised as ‘medium’) BYD Atto 3. The EX5 and C10 will soon be joined by another new Chinese rival, the Forthing Taikon 5.

Much like fridges, Australians are becoming increasingly spoiled for choice in the electric mid-size SUV segment.

The EX5 recently received a larger battery with more range, coinciding with a $1000 increase in price. Nevertheless, this is still a sharply priced SUV.

How much does the Geely EX5 cost?

There are two members of the 2026 EX5 lineup, with our tester being the top-spec Inspire.

The EX5 goes up against electric versions of the Leapmotor C10 (currently priced from $47,990 drive-away) and the Forthing Taikon 5 (from $38,990 drive-away), as well as the BYD Atto 3 (from $39,990 before on-roads).

To see how the Geely EX5 lines up against the competition, check out our comparison tool

What is the Geely EX5 like on the inside?

Particularly with the two-tone ‘Cloud’ colourway of our tester, the EX5’s interior presents well. Once you start to use it, however, it proves frustrating.

There are some nice details here. The colour-adjustable ambient lighting pours out from within the dashboard, and the window controls have a knurled metal look (though oddly require a push instead of pull action to wind down).

The front seats are comfortable, with heating, ventilation and power adjustment, as well as one of the best massage functions we’ve experienced in a sub-$100,000 car.

Then it all starts to go pear-shaped. The centre console is split into two levels, as in many of the EX5’s rivals, and you can fit a handbag on the lower level; there’s also padding on the side of the upper level, though oddly only on the passenger side.

The USB-A and USB-C outlets are buried down here and there’s no illumination, so trying to plug in a cable at night is a real pain.

There are just four physical buttons on the centre stack: demister, air-conditioning on/off, recirculated air, and air-conditioning auto. There’s also a comically oversized volume knob.

For everything else, you have to use the touchscreen. There is an anchored shortcut bar at the base, plus a swipe-down menu, but everything requires one or two extra pushes compared to rivals with actual buttons.

Even functions as simple as opening the sunshade for the (fortunately openable) panoramic glass roof require you to use the touchscreen.

You could use the voice assistant, but it struggles with simple tasks and weirdly continues to listen until you cancel out of it. Fun fact: it can accurately transcribe swear words I’ve uttered in frustration with it.

The infotainment system has attractive graphics, quick response times, and relatively straightforward menu structures, but the collection of wallpapers is a bit cringe – I thought this was a car, not a desktop PC?

The head-up display helps prevent distraction by keeping your eyes on the road ahead. Tesla, take notice.

Not only is there a head-up display that’s missing in the Model Y, but there’s also a digital instrument cluster which is absent from the rival Deepal S07. It’s neatly laid out, though not without its quirks – I had to chuckle at the animation that appears when someone walks in front of your car, as it makes them look like a crab or a South Park character.

The interior all feels well screwed together and the doors close with a solid thunk, but the stripy trim of the centre console won’t be to everyone’s tastes, and the dash top is hard plastic with only a sliver of padding at the front.

You can customise a shortcut button on the steering wheel to allow you to switch media source, open the tailgate, change the drive mode, or activate the surround-view camera.

As you approach the vehicle, the door handles will pop out to allow you access, provided you have this feature activated. Otherwise, you can tap the driver’s door handle – but, unusually, not the passenger’s – to gain access.

The walkaway locking feature is inconsistent. It’ll either lock the vehicle almost immediately, or you’ll get several metres away and inside your house and it still hasn’t locked.

Also, why do Chinese brands feel the need to reinvent the key fob? You can’t put the Geely’s on a key ring. Are there no valets in China?

Step into the rear and there’s plenty of headroom and legroom, as well as a completely flat floor, which makes it more habitable for a centre-seat occupant. The seatback also reclines.

There are air vents at the rear of the centre console, plus a USB-A port and a USB-C port. Geely has also included a handy drawer under the middle seat.

Boot space is decent, and lift up the boot floor you get a handy storage compartment that’s ideal for loose items.

No, there’s no spare wheel. Frankly, we would have been surprised if there was. The best Geely can do, as with many other EV manufacturers, is a tyre repair kit.

To see how the Geely EX5 lines up against the competition, check out our comparison tool

What’s under the bonnet?

The Inspire has the same battery and powertrain as the base Complete, but WLTP range drops from 475km to 450km while WLTP energy consumption rises from 16.0kWh/100km to 16.9kWh/100km.

The claimed 0-100km/h time also rises from 7.4 to 7.6 seconds.

The EX5 also has vehicle-to-load (V2L) charging capacity of 3.3kW and vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) capacity of 6kW.

To see how the Geely EX5 lines up against the competition, check out our comparison tool

How does the Geely EX5 drive?

All aboard the SS Geely!

There’s certainly something nautical about the way the EX5 drives.

The ride is soft, which means it absorbs most craggy surfaces well. However, while the Geely therefore has a comfortable secondary ride, its primary ride needs work.

Quite simply, it gets awfully bouncy on roads where the surface isn’t level. This suspension tune is simply too soft, and if your commute involves undulating roads you’re going to wish you went with a car that rides more firmly.

There’s this age-old wisdom that front-wheel drive is better in wet or snowy conditions than rear-wheel drive, but the instant torque delivered to the front tyres means if you’re not judicious with your right foot you’ll end up chirping them, even mid-acceleration.

We can’t wait for the EX5 to switch to rear-wheel drive, though that’s no guarantee the Geely will become fun-to-drive overnight – just look at the rival Leapmotor C10.

Of course, the instant grunt expected of an EV gives the EX5 peppy performance. But it’s no fun to drive, thanks to steering that’s feather-light by default or, when adjusted to a heavier setting, a bit gooey and still lacking in feel.

The electric powertrain is quiet, and even at highway speeds the cabin proves quite well insulated.

As expected of a modern Chinese car, there’s a long list of standard active safety and driver assist features, many of which will drive you batty.

You engage adaptive cruise control by pressing a button called OK, adjusting the speed with the up and down arrows. No, Geely didn’t bother properly labelling any of these buttons as most brands would, but at least it didn’t follow the increasingly popular (and frankly, daft) trend of having cruise control engaged via the gear shift stalk.

The adaptive cruise control feels smooth enough, but you’ll often see the speedometer flickering incessantly between, say, 100km/h and 101km/h. It’s extremely distracting.

Word of advice: turn off the Automatic Speed Limit Assist function. I’ve yet to drive a car from any brand that can identify speed limit signs correctly more than 90 per cent of the time, and one surprise slowdown to 60km/h on the highway (it was reading the off-ramp sign) was enough for me to turn this off and never put it back on.

Oh, if only the overspeed alert would default to off. It chimes incessantly if you go even slightly above the speed limit. It’s also a pain to turn off: you have to go into the vehicle menu, then driver assist, then scroll all the way down, then press another button, then confirm. That means it’s hard to turn off on the fly, so you need to make turning it off part of your pre-flight checks.

Also, don’t yawn, or the driver attention monitoring will chide you, and then get it in its robot mind that any time you open your mouth subsequently it’s a great big yawn and you’re about to fall asleep at the wheel.

Then there’s the rear cross-traffic assist, which slammed on the brakes as I was reversing down my fairly long driveway one day because a car was driving past on the street. The forward collision warning was also sensitive.

The adaptive cruise control and lane-centring work well enough, though. Thank heavens for little miracles.

One absolutely daft move by Geely was to remove physical headlight controls entirely. Instead, you go diving into a touchscreen menu, select which setting you want on, and then push a slider to confirm the change. Jeez, what’s next, making us do a Captcha?

Now, to be fair you probably won’t be adjusting your headlight setting all that often – and we wish people would just leave their cars’ lights in ‘Auto’ mode so they don’t drive around with just the DRLs on – but to make such a simple process needlessly complicated like this is ridiculous.

Enthusiasts will be turned off by the EX5’s driving dynamics, but average punters may also be turned off.

To see how the Geely EX5 lines up against the competition, check out our comparison tool

What do you get?

There are two members of the local EX5 lineup.

2026 Geely EX5 Complete standard equipment highlights:

• 18-inch alloy wheels with 225/55 Giti tyres
• Tyre pressure monitoring
• Tyre repair kit
• Automatic LED headlights
• Automatic high-beam
• Active grille shutter
• Privacy glass
• Heated, power-folding exterior mirrors
• Rain-sensing wipers
• V2L functionality
• Keyless entry and start
• 10.2-inch digital instrument cluster
• 15.4-inch touchscreen infotainment system
• Wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto
• Satellite navigation
• Geely Connected Services
  • Voice assistant
  • 4G network connection
  • Over-the-air software updates
  • Geely Application Store
  • Online media streaming
  • Remote vehicle functions
• 6-speaker sound system
• 15W wireless phone charger
• 6-way power driver’s seat (fully reclining)
• 4-way power passenger seat (fully reclining)
• Heated front seats
• Seat position memory
• Tilt and telescopic steering wheel adjustment
• Flat-folding, reclining rear seats
• Customisable drive modes
• Second-row storage drawer
• Cargo blind
• Automatic climate control with rear air vents
• Heat pump

Geely EX5 Inspire adds:

• 19-inch alloy wheels with 235/50 Goodyear tyres
• Panoramic sunroof with power sunshade
• Power tailgate
• 13.4-inch head-up display
• Ventilated front seats
• Front seat massage function with six modes
• Power leg rest for front passenger seat
• 16-speaker 1000W sound system
• 256-colour ‘dynamic’ ambient lighting

Is the Geely EX5 safe?

The Geely EX5 has a five-star rating from independent safety authority ANCAP, based on testing conducted in 2025.

Standard safety equipment includes:

• Adaptive cruise control
• Autonomous emergency braking (front and rear)
• Blind-spot monitoring
• Driver fatigue monitoring
• Evasive Manoeuvre Assist
• Lane-keep assist
• Emergency lane-keep assist
• Multi-collision braking
• Occupant detection alert
• Safe exit warning
• Rear parking sensors
• Surround-view camera with 3D view
• Traffic sign recognition
• Front, front-side, curtain and front-centre airbags

The Inspire also includes front parking sensors.

How much does the Geely EX5 cost to run?

Geely offers seven years of capped-price servicing, with services costing between $171 and $303 – apart from a big one at four years at $671.

Commercial-use coverage is limited to seven years/150,000km for the vehicle and eight years/150,000km for the battery.

There’s 12 months of complimentary roadside assistance, rising to seven years if you service within the Geely network.

To see how the Geely EX5 lines up against the competition, check out our comparison tool

CarExpert’s Take on the Geely EX5

If you believe driving should be an enjoyable experience and have both an aversion to repetitive chimes and a love of buttons, look somewhere else.

In short, this is not an enthusiast’s purchase by any stretch of the imagination. For those who just need a well-priced, A-to-B EV, though, the Geely EX5 is tempting.

The EX5 is sensational value for money, with decent range and performance plus a comfortable, spacious and well-appointed interior. It also feels solidly built.

It has its flaws, but it’s not surprising to see why the Geely has soared up the sales charts in such a short space of time.

Interested in buying a Geely EX5? Let CarExpert find you the best deal here

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MORE: Explore the Geely EX5 showroom