To give car brands more added value, an appealing brand image is crucial, so true luxury cars are a must. Independent brands have been trying to break into the high-end market for many years. In the era of fuel-powered cars, they made little progress due to technological and market barriers from foreign brands. However, the situation has reversed in the new energy era. Independent brands now have many advantages in the research and development of new energy vehicle technology. The improvement in technological level translates to an increase in product strength, which will solidify the foundation for the birth of high-end luxury cars. In the “New Forces of Car Making,” NIO has entered the luxury threshold with higher vehicle prices, making the ES8 the flagship of the NIO family. However, NIO’s ambitions go beyond this. The deepest and broadest model developed by NIO so far has officially debuted in appearance. As the first model in the 9-digit series, NIO officially defines the ET9 as the flagship product of the NIO brand. What are the highlights of this new flagship NIO in terms of exterior design? Let’s take a sneak peek.
Based on the NT2.0 platform, ET9 also has NIO’s mainstream family design language. Compared to any other model, you will find that it inherits the family style design to a high degree. However, as a high-end flagship, it should not be too flashy in appearance. This design maintains the executive feel without being overly exaggerated, keeping NIO’s consistent low-key luxury style.
Under the design concept of PURE-TEC, the NIO ET9 continues to subtract in its exterior design. Although the level of intelligent equipment has reached a new high, functional elements are hidden as much as possible and integrated into the overall design. This design is applied to hidden turn signals, integrated radar and cameras, hidden door handles, concealed wipers, and sensor-activated smart charging ports. The chrome trim is also more subdued in color, making the overall vehicle lines more concise and streamlined, and enhancing the sense of technology.
Following the same design concept of “Design for AD,” the front end of the ET9 roof is equipped with a laser radar and camera in a lookout tower-style and corner-style design. It continues to have the full set of intelligent driving assistance system hardware on the future family NT2.0 platform, self-developed intelligent driving chip, including super sensing system and super computing platform, as well as NIO’s automatic driving technology, fully demonstrating the intelligent nature of ET9 and its attitude born for automatic driving.
The front of the ET9 has the volume and momentum of a flagship car, with a raised hood at the front, giving it a very imposing presence. The new X-bar closed grille and hollow area are more concise, with a more prominent Shark Nose. The lower part of the front face continues to use a long trapezoidal intake decoration, and the familial front end allows you to recognize it as a NIO car at a glance.
The iconic Double Dash daytime running lights are placed at the very front of the hood, with a sharper and more profound exterior contour. The split-type main headlight unit is placed at both ends of the bumper, integrating with the side air intake decorative panel. The main headlight unit adopts a projection lighting method, which can focus on the road or objects ahead, and can also project a light curtain image on the road ahead, the lighting method and effect are stunning, giving it a richer high-tech electric vehicle flavor.
ET9 applies light not only on the main headlamp, but also introduces a new style of welcome light carpet at the car door, with a larger projected area and more sophisticated colors, adding a sense of ceremony to the entry and exit of the vehicle for the driver and passengers.
The new car features a sporty sloping design, with a smooth and clean side waistline, as well as a sharp and uncompromising interior space. The long wheelbase, long rear overhang, slim windows, and 23-inch oversized wheels bring a more pure and coordinated side beauty to the car. With dimensions of 5325mm×2016mm×1620mm and a wheelbase of 3250mm, it also has a hint of SUV flavor in its form.
The rear styling is undoubtedly the focus of the ET9, with its sleek and compact design. The sloping shape brings a sense of dynamism, maintaining a good sense of momentum and leaving plenty of head space for the rear seats. The family-style through-type tail light design further enhances the beauty, and the width indicator light strip is exceptionally slender and pleasing.
Due to the top-notch performance equipment of the NIO family, the ET9’s wheels have also reached the peak of the NIO family, with a very exaggerated wheel size of 23 inches, which is very exaggerated among the global production cars. The rim adopts a dense spoke design, combined with red Brembo custom brake calipers, both visual effect and braking performance are taken into account. As for the tires, the actual vehicle uses a Pirelli P ZERO series tire with a size of 265/40R23, which is a tire positioned for sporty handling.
In terms of power, according to the official information provided by NIO, the ET9 is equipped with a 900V high-voltage platform, with a peak charging power of 600 kilowatts and a 5C charge and discharge rate. The power battery uses 46105 large cylindrical batteries, with an energy density of 292 watt-hours per kilogram. In the motor part, the new car will use NIO’s fourth-generation electric drive, consisting of a front 180-kilowatt asynchronous motor and a rear 340-kilowatt oil-cooled permanent magnet synchronous motor.
The NIO ET9 features a fully integrated intelligent chassis that combines three core hardware systems. The VMC intelligent computing platform and the SkyOS support flexible deployment, allowing for the expansion of new functions and new line control hardware.
ET9 has changed the gear shift to a “hugging” gear, making driving more convenient. The chassis uses the Tianxing Skyride fully active suspension, with each suspension valve body containing a motor with rear wheel steering function. In terms of steering, the new car also features a new black technology: full-line control steering technology. NIO officials stated that when facing parking scenarios, the steering wheel only needs to turn 0.6 circles, without the need for “crossing hands.”
The cockpit section is not officially open for static experience yet. According to current information, the NIO ET9 adopts a whole vehicle intelligent digital architecture. The biggest highlight of the cockpit is that the central control screen has been changed to a horizontal layout, and a 1.4-meter-long “skyline screen” has been added on the central console, with digital skin function, which can achieve LED panoramic digital space, with scene mode of “sky light painting”.
The audio system features 35 custom speakers with 8 headrest speakers, delivering an astonishing 2680 watts of power, with dual amplifiers and 7.1.4 channels, and noise reduction capability up to 800hz.
Because it is a flagship product, the ET9 adopts a four-seat layout, officially called “Sky Island + Executive Bridge Native Four Seats”. The backrest of the rear seats can achieve a maximum reclining angle of 45 degrees, with 16 massage points and a 2-square-meter seat heating area.
The central administrative bridge in the rear row comes with an executive-level table top that can be freely rotated and infinitely adjusted in angle, with a refrigerator with a capacity of up to 10 liters at the bottom. The four side windows are all made of laminated glass, and there are a total of seven sunshades. Editor’s summary: In terms of this brief static experience limited to the appearance, the NIO ET9, apart from its sleek design, maintains a high degree of synergy with the current models in terms of other design elements. The inheritance of this family DNA under the NT2.0 design is very prominent, but the appearance is not its focus. Since it has used the top “9” number sequence, the NIO ET9 will be the strongest masterpiece NIO has produced to date, and it will undoubtedly be at the top of the family in terms of technology, so it is more worth looking forward to more information about its future cockpit.