Centurion: AfricUpdate – News Desk
Chinese tech giant Xiaomi will be bringing the top-end version of its first electric vehicle – the Xiaomi SU7 – to South Africa. Announcing the SU7 Ultra’s impending entry into the local market, Xiaomi South Africa described the car as a “symbol of where technology and performance meet. With its high-performance electric powertrain, intelligent driving features, and refined design, it’s the kind of vehicle that feels at home both in the city and on the open road,” Xiaomi said.
The impressive four-door fastback was launched in December 2023, less than three years after Xiaomi announced it would enter the electric vehicle market. It has been an enormous success for a maiden car, accumulating over 75,000 “locked-in” orders within a month of its launch. Eight months later, that number grew to over 248,000. Excitement over the car quickly stretched beyond the borders of its home market. Ford CEO Jim Farley made headlines after he revealed the US automaker had one specially imported to test in the US.
Farley told The Fully Charged Podcast that after six months of driving the SU7, he did not want to give up the car. A much faster and more powerful SU7 Ultra variant joined the original three-model lineup late last year. It features a triple motor powertrain with 1,139kW power output and 1,770Nm torque. It can accelerate from standstill to 100km/h in a staggering 1.98 seconds and has a top speed of 350km/h. It takes 5.86 seconds to reach 200km/h, less time than the latest Golf GTI takes to reach 100km/h.
The SU7 also holds the record for the fastest lap of any production car on the famed Nürburgring Nordschleife. In June 2025, a model with the optional track package clocked a time of seven minutes and 4.95 seconds to pip the Rimac Nevera and Porsche Taycan Turbo GT. On the practical side, the SU Ultra’s 93.7kWh battery supports a WLTP range of 540km. With a maximum DC charging speed of 490kW, the battery can be filled from 10% to 80% in 11 minutes.
Several car reviewers have likened the SU7’s design to the Porsche Taycan. Developed under the codename MS11, the vehicle’s design team was led by former BMW designer Swayer Li. The interior includes a 16.1-inch infotainment touchscreen and a 7.1-inch digital instrument cluster, which can fold closed when the car is turned off. Its biggest showpiece is a 56-inch augmented reality heads-up display reflecting off the windshield for navigation guidance.
The system is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 8295 chip running a modified version of Xiaomi HyperOS, the same operating system used on the company’s smartphones, wearables, and IoT devices. This enables direct mirroring of Xiaomi smartphones and tablets, providing access to all the apps and features you would have on the smartphone on the car’s display. Another standout feature on the dashboard and screen is built-in mounting points for accessories like dashcams and phone holders.
Entry-level models get a driver-assistance system called Xiaomi Pilot with support for 16 functions, while higher-end models get an autonomous driving system called Xiaomi HAD. The latter supports supervised autonomous driving on highways and in urban areas, hands-free parking, and remote car summoning. This system relies on two Nvidia Drive Orin X chips with 508 teraflops of computing power, paired with a LiDAR system, 11 cameras, 12 ultrasonic sensors, and three millimetre-wave radars.
Farley believes Xiaomi’s success with the SU7 could be partially attributed to its familiar standing in the tech market. It could also leverage this advantage in South Africa. Xiaomi is the third biggest smartphone brand in South Africa. In Q2 2025, it accounted for 12% of sales, three percentage points higher than at the same time last year. Xiaomi has yet to confirm the South African launch date and pricing for the Xiaomi SU7 Ultra. It is also unclear if the more affordable Standard, Pro, and Max derivatives will be available.
Pricing in its home market starts from 215,900 Chinese yuan (R526,680) for the entry-level Standard model and goes up to 299,900 yuan (R732,200) for the Max version. The Ultra model carries a much heftier price tag of 814,900 Chinese yuan (R2 million). South Africans can expect all local pricing to be substantially higher due to high import taxes on electric vehicles.
