Mercedes EQE 350 4MATIC SUV Road Trip Review: Real-World Efficiency and the Charging Stop That Surprised Me
I took a Mercedes-Benz EQE 350 4MATIC SUV on a long road trip across Romania, on two-lane national roads and the A7 highway. Here's the efficiency I logged on every stretch, how automatic battery preconditioning works and how fast it charged at the only stop.
Is a big, heavy luxury electric SUV only good for the city? I hear that question a lot, so I answered it with a real road trip. I left my home city in northeastern Romania one morning and drove to the town of Câmpina in a Mercedes-Benz EQE 350 4MATIC SUV, with luggage and passengers on board: two-lane national roads as far as Focșani, then the A7 highway. I reset the trip computer at departure and logged the efficiency on every stretch. Every efficiency, range and charging number below is what I read on the dashboard, and you can watch the whole drive on my Mașina Timpului channel.
The test car: what Mercedes says
The EQE SUV is the SUV version of the EQE electric sedan from "Mercedes-Benz", and it rides on the same dedicated EV platform as the EQS. It's 4,863 mm (191.5 in) long, with a 3,030 mm (119.3 in) wheelbase and a drag coefficient starting at 0.25, which is excellent for an SUV. According to the official launch data, the EQE 350 4MATIC has two electric motors, one per axle, with 215 kW (288 hp) and 765 Nm (564 lb-ft). It DC fast charges at up to 170 kW and goes from 10 to 80% in about 32 minutes. A heat pump is standard, and Navigation with Electric Intelligence plans charging stops for you. At launch, Mercedes quoted WLTP consumption of 18.5–22.5 kWh/100 km for the EQE 350 4MATIC SUV. In the current French spec sheet, the same version is listed with 235 kW and 90.56 kWh of usable battery, so newer cars got a little more power.
As far as I understood, my car was a 2024 demo vehicle, painted in a green that looks black depending on the light.
Four regen modes and a quiet "co-pilot"
The first thing I showed on the road was regenerative braking. The car has four settings: strong, standard, no regen (the car simply coasts) and intelligent regen. I left it on intelligent and I loved it: on a straight road, when I lift off the accelerator, the car coasts freely without wasting energy. If a car appears ahead, it starts braking and recovering energy on its own until it stops behind it, without cruise control switched on. Going downhill, it holds the speed limit for that stretch. Mercedes calls this radar-based recuperation.
At departure I had 89% battery, and the dash showed a range of 368 to 476 km (229 to 296 miles). The navigation immediately planned a single stop, in Focșani, where it expected me to arrive with 35%, for about 18 minutes of charging. I left everything exactly as the car suggested to see if it would keep its promise. I also ran wireless Android Auto from my phone along the way.
On the national road: efficiency stretch by stretch
After the first hour, with the drive out of the city and through several villages, I had covered 53 km at an average of 52 km/h, using 21.7 kWh/100 km (about 2.9 mi/kWh). When I reached half battery, after 165 km and 2 hours 26 minutes of driving, consumption was still 21.7 kWh/100 km, and the car estimated 245 km left. That works out to roughly 490 km (about 305 miles) on a full battery with my driving style.
About 22 km before the charger, the car started battery preconditioning by itself and showed an icon on the screen. The estimated charging power jumped right away from 80 to more than 100 kW. After 3 hours 5 minutes of driving, consumption had dropped to 21.1 kWh/100 km, and I rolled into Focșani with 34%, practically exactly what the navigation had predicted at departure.
The Focșani charging stop
This is where the surprise came. Charging started modestly at around 33 kW, then climbed fast: 51, 54, past 100 and up to 139–143 kW. In 18 minutes I added 39.6 kWh and reached 75%. Honestly, after 9 or 10 minutes I could have driven on without worry, but we stayed longer for lunch, so I moved the car off the charger so I wouldn't block it.
On the A7 highway
On the highway I drove half the time at 120 and half at 130 km/h (75 to 81 mph), with 19°C (66°F) outside. Consumption settled around 28 kWh/100 km, or 28–29 at 130 km/h. One thing I liked: after charging, the battery stays warm on a long drive, so at 55% the car showed it could charge right away at 129 kW without another preconditioning cycle. I also noticed how much consumption drops when you drive behind another car at the same speed, keeping a safe following distance.
From Focșani to the Ploiești ring road I averaged 96 km/h and 27.2 kWh/100 km. From the start to that point, over 404 km (roughly 230 km of national road and 170 km of highway), the average was 23.9 kWh/100 km at an average speed of 77 km/h. At the finish in Câmpina I had covered 439 km (273 miles) in 5 hours 51 minutes of driving, and the last 205 km leg from Focșani, mostly highway, ended at 26.7 kWh/100 km. Câmpina sits at roughly 400 m above sea level and my starting point at about 60 m, so the whole trip was uphill. To see how it did on the way back, mostly downhill, read part 2 of my Mercedes EQE SUV test.
What it means for drivers
A premium electric SUV can handle a 400+ km (250+ mile) road trip across Romania without stress, with a single short stop. On national roads, moving with traffic, I stayed within the WLTP range Mercedes quotes, while on the highway consumption rises, as it does for any big car. Three things impressed me most: navigation that predicted my arrival charge almost to the percent, automatic preconditioning and the charging speed. My advice: let the car's navigation plan your stops, use intelligent regen and drive at 120 km/h on the highway if you want lower consumption. If you can charge at home and set off with a full battery, a coffee break is all you need to get anywhere in the country.
