What 2,351 MOT tests in 2025 say about buying one used — and, just as important, what they cannot tell you.
Judged against every other electric car of the same age — at 3 years old — this one passes its MOT first time 89.2% of the time, against 87.2% for the electric fleet. That is 2.0 points better, and it is a real gap rather than an age effect: we weighted the comparison so both sides have the same age mix. And whatever the MOT record says, it tells you nothing about the battery — no record does. Only a physical test measures that.
Battery warranty terms per model year — years, mileage cap, capacity-retention threshold, and whether it transfers to a second owner — have to be traced to the manufacturer’s own published documentation, row by row, and dated. That table has not been built.
We will not sell you a battery state-of-health figure we have not measured. Ours would be a guess, so we are not selling it. Where a physical test is worth its roughly £100, we will say so plainly.
| Advisory category | Items | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Tyres | 497 | 76.7% |
| Brakes | 58 | 9.0% |
| Identification of the vehicle | 35 | 5.4% |
| Non-component advisories | 23 | 3.5% |
| Suspension | 20 | 3.1% |
| Road Wheels | 9 | 1.4% |
Advisories are warnings. These are the items that actually failed a test — the ones that cost money before the car can be driven away.
| Failure category | Items | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Tyres | 158 | 74.9% |
| Suspension | 13 | 6.2% |
| Visibility | 10 | 4.7% |
| Brakes | 8 | 3.8% |
| Body, chassis, structure | 7 | 3.3% |
| Road Wheels | 7 | 3.3% |
| Identification of the vehicle | 5 | 2.4% |
| Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | 2 | 0.9% |
You will read everywhere that electric cars destroy tyres — heavier, and all the torque at once. It is true of some and not others, and the only fair way to look is at cars of the same age.
At three to five years old, tyres are 71.4% of this model’s top advisory items. Petrol hatchbacks of the same age average 40.0%. So it is well above them.
| Model, aged 3–5 | Tyres as a share of top advisories |
|---|---|
| EQE electric | 71.4% |
| Golf petrol | 51.4% |
| Fiesta petrol | 44.9% |
| Focus petrol | 43.7% |
| Astra petrol | 32.2% |
| Corsa petrol | 27.6% |
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