Sub-$50K Deepal S05 coming to Australia late in 2025

Deepal is set to expand its Australian presence with the late 2025 arrival of the S05, a compact electric SUV that should slide in below $50,000.

The five-seat, five-door S05 will undercut the $53,900 (plus on-road costs) S07 the brand launched with early in 2025, providing an EV rival to the likes of the Geely EX5, Leapmotor C10, BYD Atto 3 and Kia EV3.

At 4620mm long and 1900mm wide it’s larger than many compact SUVs, in some ways straddling the mid-sized SUV segment.

“We will also be bringing the S05 – which is a slightly smaller SUV to the S07 – to the Australian market later in the year,” said Cormac Cafolla, general manager of Deepal Australia. Deepal is imported into Australia by Inchcape, which also looks after Subaru and Peugeot.

The lower price point and focus on technology – including updated driver assistance systems in response to early criticism of the S07 – should make the S05 the fledgling brand’s top-selling model.

While Deepal is part of Chinese-based Changan Automobile – one of China’s biggest manufacturers – Australian-delivered S05s will be sourced from a new factory in Thailand.

The full electric (BEV) version of the S05 will be the first to hit Australian shores and will likely arrive in both single-motor rear-wheel drive guise and dual-motor all-wheel drive, although Cafolla said details were yet to be confirmed.

Deepal is also exploring a range-extender hybrid variant that would use a small four-cylinder engine to create electricity and extend the driving range.

“We’re very excited about S05,” said Cafolla, adding that the brand is exploring a range of drivetrain options.

“There’s an appetite to bring in a range that allows to offer a number of different derivatives.”

The S05 will benefit from extensive engineering work currently being undertaken to address criticism about some of the advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS), most notably the driver monitoring system.

On the S07 the car can beep and bong far too much, prompting drivers to disable the system.

Deepal acknowledged the system needs work and that it would be making changes, including local testing and validation on Australian roads.

“We’re currently bringing over some engineering vehicles to allow us to do testing on the road,” said Cafolla. “In the next couple of weeks we will have a team of between four and seven engineers come to Australia to do the real-world testing. That will test all of the system set-ups and that gives us time before we bring the car to market for launch to make sure that sensitivities, system set-ups and everything is conditioned to what the expectation of the Australian consumer is.”

Deepal says it will change some of the triggers and the volume and intensity of warnings to improve the usefulness of the system.

“We also will look at the tone of the beeps, the number of beeps, as well as some of the systems connected with lane keep assist and other elements to deliver a more suited driver experience … without deprioritising safety.”

Cafolla says the plan is to release updated software via an over-the-air update within weeks.

“It’s undergoing final validation and testing at the moment,” he said. “The plan is then to deploy it to a select number of VINs in the coming weeks.

“Subject to our feedback and our engineering feedback locally from the Inchcape team, we’ll then decide as to whether or not it needs further adjustment or some tweaking.”

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