Porsche Taycan Turbo Cross Turismo 2021 Review

The three models in the 2021 Porsche Taycan Cross Turismo range in Australia are the 4, 4S and Turbo. The Turbo S will be along later.

All three have five doors and five seats, the same 93.4kWh (83.7kWh usable) battery pack and permanent magnet synchronous motors mounted on both axles.

The e-motors deliver increasing amounts of torque and power the more money you spend.

The Turbo on test here is priced at $279,000 plus on-road costs, and boasts 460kW (500kW on ‘overboost’) and 850Nm.

With the help of launch control it reaches 100km/h in 3.3 seconds, 200km/h in 10.7sec, 400m in 11.1sec and has a top speed claimed to be 250km/h.

Officially, it consumes 28.69kWh/100km and has a 425km claimed range. We’ll get to our real-world results a bit later on.

In typical Porsche fashion, that astronomical spend isn’t matched by an equally astronomical equipment list. The Porsche argument is the money you spend is rewarded by outstanding engineering.

Given history, this seems a fair contention.

It’s not a pauper pack though. Outside, the Cross Turismo includes 20-inch bespoke alloys, a power tailgate, black cladding for the wheel-arches (it’s an off-roader, remember), a high-gloss black rear spoiler and silver side skirts.

Inside, there’s four-zone climate control, the bucket seats up front are 14-way power-adjustable with heating and ventilation, while the rear seats have heating.

Trimmings are in leather, including the heated sports steering wheel.

LED interior and ambient lighting is part of the package, along with a 16.8-inch digital instrument panel and two separates touch-screens, one above the other in the centre console and centre stack.

The infotainment system includes 14-speaker Bose audio, embedded sat-nav, Apple CarPlay, Android Auto and four USB-C ports.

There is wireless Apple CarPlay (and wired Android Auto) connectivity, but I couldn’t make CarPlay work so I just used a cable. There’s also no wireless smartphone charging pad.

While we’re at it, there’s no spare tyre either, just tyre sealant and an air compressor.

There were more than $40,000 worth of options fitted to the test car including 21-inch wheels ($6770), ice grey metallic exterior ($5000), rear-axle steering ($4300), a panoramic sunroof ($3370), a fourth digital screen mounted in front of the passenger seat ($2150), roof rails ($1220) and a heat pump ($630), which is probably the most important thing of all considering the cabin heating efficiencies it delivers.

So what rivals are there for the Porsche Taycan Turbo Cross Turismo? Well, the Taycan sedan for one. But at this money there aren’t as yet many all-electric models.

If you’re willing to consider ICE (internal combustion engines), the list quickly becomes very, very long.

The Taycan Turbo Cross Turismo comes with a three-year warranty and eight-year/160,000km battery warranty.

The service intervals are long at two years/30,000km. Porsche does not have a national capped-price servicing plan.

There is no ANCAP safety rating for the 2021 Porsche Taycan Turbo Cross Turismo and it’s unlikely there ever will be one.

Euro NCAP crashed the Taycan in 2019 and it got five stars. That’s about as close as we’re probably going to get.

The airbag count is pretty comprehensive; there are front head and knee bags for both passengers, side airbags front and rear and curtain airbags as well. There’s no centre airbag to prevent head clashes between front-row passengers.

Active driver aids include autonomous emergency braking (AEB) with pedestrian detection, adaptive cruise control, lane change and lane keep assist, cross road assist and a head-up display. There is no rear cross traffic alert.

LED matrix headlights are standard, as are ISOFIX child seat mounts for both outboard rear seats.

Like the Taycan, the 2021 Porsche Taycan Cross Turismo is underpinned by its own unique platform dubbed J1 developed with fellow Volkswagen Group member Audi, which uses it for the e-tron GT.

The powertrain drives the front wheels through a single-speed gearbox and the rear wheels through a two-speed ’box and limited-slip differential. The Turbo adds torque vectoring as a further handling aid.

The battery pack is fed by an 800V charging system that Porsche claims can DC fast-charge the pack from five to 80 per cent in little more than 22 minutes; 11kW AC charging takes nine hours and it’s, oh, I dunno, bloody years on 240V trickle charging.

Unlike many other EVs the Taycan Cross Turismo does not have regenerative braking flappy paddles. Instead, you do your braking the orthodox way through the foot pedal, which operates both orthodox friction brakes and the regenerative process.

The regen response can be modified via a button on the dash.

The friction brakes use tungsten carbide rotors that measure up at 410mm front and 365mm rear, clamped by six-piston callipers up front and four-piston callipers at the rear.

The Taycan Cross Turismo is built out of a steel monocoque and many aluminium components and panels. Yet the Turbo still weighs in at a 2320kg unladen.

That’s all encapsulated in a body 4970mm long, 1967mm wide and 1412mm high, rolling on a 2904mm wheelbase.

Luggage space is a modest 405 litres with the rear seats in place, 1171 litres with them folded. Not exceptional, but better than the Taycan that’s for sure. There’s also a small frunk worth 84 litres.

All this is underpinned by double-wishbone front and multi-link rear suspension, three-chamber air springs, adaptive dampers, active roll control (PDCC Sport) and electric-assist rack and pinion steering integrated to work together via Porsche’s 4D Chassis Control.

Finally, you can dial in your preference for how the Taycan Turbo Cross Turismo behaves via a drive mode dial on the steering wheel that allows you to select Range (economy), Normal, Sport, Sport+ and Custom (so you can pick and choose the traits you want).

There’s even a gravel mode that fiddles with ride height, suspension tune and traction systems.

You can also directly dial the dampers up and down between three modes and change ride height. Standard, the Cross Turismo sits about 20mm higher than the Taycan at 148mm – hardly SUV territory.

Thanks to the air springs it can be jacked up to 179mm or lowered to 138mm. You can even store specific places on the sat-nav where you want to raise the suspension, say for speed humps. Pretty clever.

By the way, it’s in Sport and Sport+ mode where launch control can be engaged and the full 500kW tapped for the best acceleration times.

That launch control function is a great place to start (literally!) when it comes to the 2021 Porsche Taycan Turbo Cross Turismo.

It’s a pretty simple process: just push down on the brake pedal with your left foot and accelerator pedal with your right foot. When the message in the IP says time to go, simply release the brake and keep the accelerator hammered.

The Taycan Turbo Cross Turismo grips and goes with a level of stealth violence that is shocking.

There’s hardly any noise, virtually no wheel slip, it just flings itself forward while the skin on your forehead peels off (or feels like it).

If you pay an extra $1000, it does all this in Sport+ with piped-in audio that sounds like the Starship Enterprise winding up to warp speed.

This is the Cross Turismo’s primary party trick, but it’s got a few more.

That ever-present mountain of torque means the e-motors are always on and ready to go, always eager to unfurl out of a corner and hoover up the next straight.

Then there’s the chassis. The Taycan Turbo Cross Turismo rides impressively well despite its excessive weight and low-profile rubber.

Yes, there’s some bump-thump on craggy surfaces and a bit of tram-tracking, but nowhere near as much as you might expect.

It also handles with great dexterity, changing direction without hesitation pancake-flat (thanks PDCC Sport). Combined with that ever-present powertrain this is a hell of a way to cross country super-fast.

Such is the languidly deceptive speed of this thing – this car is so quiet, especially for a Porsche – you can arrive at corners going a lot quicker than you realise.

Thankfully, the chassis, the regen-reinforced brakes and feel-some steering (once you switch off all the lane assistants) are up to the challenge.

And yet the Taycan Turbo Cross Turismo is also entirely capable of being a city commuter, such is its civility. And yes, we did drive on gravel, just so we could press the button. Nothing strange happened.

Having said all that, for all its impressive behaviours, reducing the interactions to merely throttle and brake make this one of the less involving Porsche driving experiences.

It reinforces why autonomy and electric vehicles are so often linked. Removing the need to manage a cranky internal combustion engine does take us another step towards hands-free driving.

In most circumstances, that’s welcome. But in a Porsche? On a lovely country road? Not so much.

The cockpit of the Cross Turismo is also a different Porsche experience – unless you drive a Taycan.

Four digital screens! We’ve come a long way from a central analogue tachometer and buttons managing controls like air-conditioning. Now the central dial is a power meter and the only obvious button on the dash operates the hazard flasher.

You have to drill down into a touch-screen simply to change the direction of the air vents. It’s just one tiny yet annoying example of the complex operations and immense tunability of all this.

On YouTube a helpful Taycan owner has published a video explaining how to understand the car’s digital instrument cluster. It goes for 20 minutes! And there’s about eight more explainers on his page.

At least stuff like seats, driving position and passenger space all make sense. Up front you sit deep down like you should in a sports car – sorry, crossover – and there’s a similarly ensconced perspective from the rear.

This is a car with room enough for four adult passengers, a bit of stuff and a bit of luggage.

There is a fifth passenger seat middle-rear but it’s pretty bloody crap. While on crapness, the decision to save a few bucks and not flip the lidded bin in the centre console makes it very hard for the driver to plug in cables.

And finally, charging. After a week of widely varying driving, average consumption turned out at 25.3kWh/100km. Yep, averaging under the claim is something not unusual for an electric car.

We never topped up the battery to the full 425km claimed range, opting to bail out in the high 300s as the charging rate slowed to a crawl. So range anxiety remained a bit of a thing.

We spent a lot of time in Range mode, although acceleration was still stunning. It’s not like those stultifying Eco modes in ICE vehicles.

The best recharging rate seen was 152kW on an Evie Networks 350kW DC charger. The Cross Turismo’s claimed top recharging speed is 270kW at 800V chargers, but is limited to 150kW for 400V chargers common in Australia.

We made two visits on the same day to the same charger. In the morning, the Turbo ingested 61.6kWh in 50 minutes at a cost of $36.98. In the afternoon it sucked in 67.8kWh in 38 minutes at a cost of $40.67.

During our time with the Taycan Turbo Cross Turismo we had a power outage at home because of a massive storm that hit the Melbourne area. This caused a failure in the Porsche’s external 240V AC emergency charger and it never worked again after that.

With the nearest high-speed commercial charger 40km away, it was a reminder of how far we have to go with EV infrastructure in Australia. Also, how perilous the supply situation can potentially be.

There is no doubt that the 2021 Porsche Taycan Turbo Cross Turismo is a mighty impressive car.

It’s tremendously fast, handles brilliantly considering its weight and size and is flexible and versatile enough to carry you and your family (of four) every day.

Compared to its in-house rival, the Taycan, it’s a tiny bit more expensive and a lot easier to live with. So it wins that contest, narrowly.

But the Cross Turismo is also very expensive and its sports driving intimacy is curtailed by the lack of an internal combustion engine.

You might scoff at that last point, but this is a Porsche and that stuff matters to this brand. The solution is pretty easy – if you can afford this car then you should be able to stretch to a 911 as well.

That’s a pretty cool garage.

How much does the Porsche Taycan Turbo Cross Turismo cost?
Price: $279,000 (plus on-road costs)
Available: Now
Powertrain: Two permanent magnet synchronous motors
Output: 460kW/850Nm (500kW on overboost)
Transmission: Two-speed planetary gear set (rear axle), single-speed reduction gear (front axle)
Battery: 93.4kWh lithium-ion
Range: 425km (ADR)
Energy consumption: 28.69kWh/100km (ADR)
Safety rating: Not tested