Urban Rebel is baby Cupra EV

Brand's entry-level EV due in 2025 with new platform, 231bhp and 273-mile range

- FELIX PAGE

The Cupra Urban Rebel EV, revealed at last year’s Munich motor show as a racy supermini with an outlandish, touring car-style aero package, has evolved into an ultra-compact urban SUV for production.

Expected to be priced from around the £17,000 mark, the Urban Rebel will be Cupra’s third production EV, following the existing Volkswagen ID 3based Born hatchback and dramatically styled 2024 Tavascan crossover into dealerships in 2025.

It has similarly aggressive design cues in keeping with Cupra’s extant billing as the Volkswagen Group’s accessible performance brand.

However, while the original Urban Rebel concept highlighted that “racing is at the core of Cupra’s DNA”, the one revealed here is a much closer preview of the car that will go on sale in three years.

The Urban Rebel is the first of three technically identical entry-level EVs due from the Volkswagen Group, with closely related but differently styled siblings on the way from Skoda and Volkswagen.

Together, the three cars will essentially replace the Seat Mii Electric, Skoda Citigo-e iV and Volkswagen e-Up at the entry points to their respective makers’ growing EV line-ups.

All three will be built at a dedicated new factory in Martorell, Spain, and sit atop a specially adapted version of the MEB platform that’s currently used by every Volkswagen Group bespoke EV bar the Audi E-tron, E-tron GT and Porsche Taycan.