No doubt there are a many Nissan fans looking forward to the arrival of the first fully electric version of the popular Micra early in 2026. My daughter learned to drive in a 07-registered Micra, but then then a few years later Nissan made the car slightly larger.
In 2010, Nissan were the first company in Ireland to introduce an electric car that taxi drivers took a liking to. Sales of electric cars were very poor back then and I remember at a launch of one of their new cars, James McCarthy, the CEO of Nissan in Ireland, urging the authorities to allow electric cars use the bus lanes to try and make them more popular.
I do remember seeing some taxi drivers use the Leaf in Dublin city; it was small, but the drivers seemed to manage around the city centre where there were very few chargers at that time. In 2018 we got the second version of the Leaf where the range was 378km and the cost was around €28k. At that time Nissan were hopeful that toll charges would be reduced for electric cars, but like the bus lane idea, that proposal also seemed to fall on deaf ears.
For their next electric car, Nissan went really big when they introduced the Ariya. It was probably a bit too expensive at a time when people were looking for cheaper EV’s and it didn’t sell very well in Ireland.
Last week I got to drive sporty version of the Ariya which is called the Nismo.
In 1984 when Nissan Motorsports International Co. Ltd., better known as NISMO, was founded in Omori, Tokyo, marking the beginning of a new era for Nissan’s racing activities. Born from the merger of two of Nissan’s motorsports arms, the Advertising Division based in Omori and the Special Car Testing Division in Oppama, NISMO was established to consolidate and elevate the company’s racing capabilities, while also bridging the gap between race cars and production vehicles.
Now Nissan have added the Nismo touch to their Ariya; my test car came in Stealth Grey with a lot of attractive red touches. You get a red line all around the bottom of the car, the O in the name Nismo on the back of the car comes in red and there are several touches of red stitching inside the car also.
The start/stop button is naturally in red. At first, I wondered if the controls on the dash for the A/C worked as the surface where they were located is hard, but they do work perfectly.
There is plenty of storage places in the dash and I really liked the high driving position. It’s a very large motor, but definitely a bit thirsty. Officially with an 87kWh battery you should get around 400km on a full charge, but probably not in cold weather like we had last week.
It’s a really classy looking motor, but with a starting price of €68,495, it might be too expensive for first time buyers who want to make the switch to a fully electric car. But if you had Nismo posters on your bedroom wall as a child, and now earn good money, maybe this is the time to experience the real Nismo.
