Xpeng X9 Performance Review: The Starship MPV Built for the Back Seat

The Xpeng X9 is the first people mover I’ve driven that makes strangers wind down their windows at the lights to get a better look.

I’m a van man. Always have been. So when Xpeng confirmed the X9 for Australia, this was the car I wanted the keys to most.

Most luxury MPVs chase the boxy, upright, steam train look. The X9 ignores all of that and goes straight for sci-fi spaceship. It works. Nothing else on Australian roads looks like it, and the road presence is enormous.

After time behind the wheel of the flagship X9 Performance, my view is simple. This is a brilliant car for the people in the back and a slightly frustrating one for the person driving it.

Price and Variants

The X9 comes in two grades. The front-wheel drive Standard Range starts at $89,900 and the all-wheel drive Performance tested here is $109,900, both before on-road costs.

Both share the same body, 20-inch aluminium wheels on 235/50 R20 Michelin e.Primacy tyres, dual-chamber air suspension and active four-wheel steering. Even the centre caps are shared, and they stay upright no matter which way the wheel turns. The difference is all in the powertrain.

	X9 FWD Standard Range	X9 AWD Performance
Price (before on-roads)	$89,900	$109,900
Drive	Front-wheel drive	All-wheel drive
Motors	Single (front)	Dual (front and rear)
Power	235kW	370kW
Torque	450Nm	640Nm
0-100km/h	8.2 seconds	5.9 seconds
Battery	94.8kWh LFP	110kWh NCM
Range (WLTP)	535km	580km
AC Charging	11kW	11kW
DC Charging (peak)	537kW	542kW
V2L	Up to 6kW	Up to 6kW
Boot (all seats up / third row folded)	721L / 2,554L	721L / 2,554L
Towing (braked / unbraked)	1,500kg / 750kg	1,500kg / 750kg

Warranty is split across several areas. The vehicle is covered for seven years and unlimited kilometres, the high-voltage powertrain for eight years or 160,000km, paint for five years and unlimited kilometres, and there’s a separate seven-year, unlimited-kilometre anti-corrosion warranty on top.

Size and Practicality

The X9 measures 5,320mm long, 1,990mm wide and 1,790mm tall on a 3,160mm wheelbase. That’s roughly Kia Carnival height and width, but about 150mm longer nose to tail.

You feel that length in the third row. It’s the best third row I’ve sat in. Adults get electric seat adjustment, seat heating, their own speaker, a coat hook and a vanity light. Knee room gets a little tight, but a button behind the second-row seat shuffles it forward and solves that instantly.

Families get ISOFIX on both captain’s chairs and both third-row outboard seats, plus top tethers. That’s four child seats with ISOFIX, which is excellent.

The boot is the party trick. Even with all seven seats in use there’s 721 litres behind the third row, thanks to a deep well that drops well below the seat line. Press the buttons and the headrests retract and the seats fold forward. Hold the button for two seconds and they unlatch and fold backwards into that well, filling the void and leaving a completely flat load floor.

That opens up 2,554 litres. Three-row EVs usually struggle to fold flat because of the battery and rear motor packaging underneath, and Xpeng has solved it in a dual-motor car. Add the ability to drop the air suspension for loading, a 12V socket, bag hooks and a small underfloor tray, and the X9 is as practical as any MPV on sale.

The Second Row

This isn’t a second row. It’s a five-star hotel suite.

The captain’s chairs are wrapped in full-grain Nappa leather (my car had the Coffee interior, with Rose Brown and Meteorite also available). They get full power adjustment, power leg rests, lumbar support, heating, ventilation and a massage function with multiple programs and strengths. Each seat has its own 60W USB-C port, wireless charger and cup holder, plus a fold-out tray.

The reason the front centre console is so shallow sits between the front seats: a fridge and warmer compartment the rear passengers can control. There’s dual-zone rear climate control, a large sunroof with a powered shade and manual sun blinds on the side windows.

Then there’s the screen. A button on either door folds down a massive cinema display from the roof. YouTube and Spotify are built in, and you can download Disney+, Apple TV, Prime Video and more. My car didn’t appear to have a SIM fitted, but it connects to Wi-Fi or a phone hotspot. It’s a touchscreen, but a remote stored in the front console means nobody has to smudge it.

From that screen you can trigger Zero Gravity mode. The seat reclines, the leg rest extends and the front seat moves forward to make room. At 178cm I had headroom to spare and legroom I couldn’t use. It’s one of the most comfortable seats I’ve sat in, in any car.

Front Cabin and Technology

The driver gets a 17.3-inch infotainment screen running a Qualcomm Snapdragon 8295, and it’s properly quick. The digital driver display is highly customisable, the front seats are heated, ventilated and massaging, and there are headrest speakers that carry phone calls and driver assist alerts.

The head-up display is the best in the business. It shows indicators, which few cars bother with, and it puts the reversing camera up there too. Slot it into reverse and you never need to look down. I haven’t seen that anywhere else.

The 27-speaker X-Opera sound system lets you mute individual rows. Kids want their playlist, you mute the front. Kids are on iPads, you mute the back. Simple and genuinely useful in a three-row car.

The dashboard is the deepest I’ve ever seen. From the driver’s seat, at full stretch, I couldn’t reach the HUD opening. The air vents are hidden and adjusted through the screen, and that reliance on the touchscreen is a fair criticism. Add a column shifter that puts the indicators on the left, a separate front sunroof and the largest vanity mirror I’ve seen in a car, with auto lights.

At night the ambient lighting runs from the front row through to the third row with a customisable two-tone gradient. There are cornering lights and a puddle-light walkway when you step out.

Charging

Xpeng claims up to 542kW DC from the X9 Performance’s 800V silicon carbide architecture. I took it to Melbourne’s fastest public charger, a 350kW Tritium unit with a reputation for being out of action, and plugged in at 60 per cent around 11:30pm.

It worked. With no preconditioning, it pulled 230kW almost immediately and climbed to 276kW. It went from 60 to 80 per cent in six minutes before tapering at 80. Start from a lower state of charge with a warm battery and I reckon it would max out that charger.

On the Road

The Performance name is poetic licence. It’s quick for an MPV and quick off the line, but this is a big, heavy people mover, not a performance car.

The air suspension has three settings: Comfort, Normal and Sport. Comfort feels like floating across the seven seas. Even in Sport the body wallows over small bumps and cracks and takes a long time to settle at speed. Keep it in Sport and it’s bearable. The chassis is clearly tuned to keep the middle row calm, and the front row pays for it.

Steering is good. Traction is not. The AWD system has a heavy front bias, so in Sport mode the front tyres spin up off the line almost every time before the rear motor steps in. The hard-compound Michelin e.Primacy tyres don’t help. It’s the same story on most cars I’ve driven on them, which is why I put standard Michelin Primacy tyres on my own BYD Seal. A softer compound would fix most of this.

The four-wheel steering changes how the car turns and takes real getting used to. I found myself three-point turning into car parks. Then I tried the auto park, and stopped bothering.

It’s the best auto park I’ve used. It identifies spaces, you tap one, and it swings this 5.3-metre MPV in on the first go, faster than I can do it myself. In a car this size, that’s a feature you’ll use every day.

Safety

The X9 carries a five-star ANCAP rating under the tougher 2026 criteria, covering both variants. Crash Protection and Post Crash both scored 91 per cent. Safe Driving scored just 56 per cent, with ANCAP calling out key controls that rely too heavily on the touchscreen. That lines up with my hidden-vent gripe.

The Verdict

Xpeng has built a passenger’s car, and a brilliant one. The design, the technology and the practicality are right up my alley, and the second row sets a new benchmark for the segment.

The ride and the badge let it down. At $109,900 the Performance adds speed an MPV doesn’t need and pushes the price well into Denza D9 and Zeekr 009 territory. The $89,900 Standard Range keeps nearly all of the tech and luxury, and that’s the one I’d buy.

With Xpeng’s reinvigorated, factory-backed distribution model now rolling out, the X9 has the product to pull buyers out of Carnivals. Whether Xpeng can get enough of them onto driveways is the next test.