Cheapest Electric Cars Under $25,000 in Australia (2026)

A cheap electric car in Australia used to mean a used one. That changed this month. BYD dropped the Atto 1 Essential to $19,990 driveaway, which we covered when it landed in our report on the Atto 1 becoming the cheapest new car in Australia. It is worth being precise about what that number is and what it is not, because the sub-$30,000 EV market is small enough that one price move rearranges the whole thing.

First, the thing that ruins most cheap-EV lists

Two numbers get used interchangeably in this segment and they are not the same number. An RRP is the list price before on-road costs. A drive-away price already has registration, CTP and stamp duty inside it. The gap is typically a few thousand dollars and it moves by state.

That matters here more than usual. The BYD Dolphin Essential lists at $29,990 and the MG4 Urban Essence 43 at $29,990. Same digits, and not the same price at all. The Dolphin figure is an RRP, so on-roads still go on top. The MG4 figure is a drive-away price with the on-roads already counted. Read them as equivalent and you have mispriced the Dolphin by thousands. (As it happens BYD is currently discounting the Dolphin to a drive-away figure too, which we get to below, and that flips the order again.)

So every price below carries its basis. Where a figure is a limited-time promotion we say so and give the dates. Where our record cannot confirm which basis a price is on, we say that too rather than guessing.

The under-$25,000 club: one car

There is no list to rank here, because only one car qualifies, and that is the finding rather than a gap in our data. We checked every battery-electric car on sale in Australia. Nothing else gets under $25,000 on either measure.

1. BYD Atto 1 Essential at $19,990 driveaway (limited offer)

The offer is national, covering all eight states and territories, and the deadline has two parts: you need to order by 15 December 2026 and take delivery by 31 December 2026. It is open to retail buyers only, demonstrators are excluded, allocation is subject to availability, and metallic paint costs extra. Away from the offer the Essential is listed at $23,990 before on-road costs, which is still the cheapest EV list price in the country by a clear margin.

What $19,990 buys is a genuinely small car. It is 3,990mm long, it weighs 1,294kg, and it is a four-seater, so the middle rear position most small hatchbacks give you is not there. The 30.1kWh LFP battery is good for a claimed 220km WLTP. Boot space is 308 litres, expanding to 1,037 litres with the rear seats folded.

The safety record is better than the price suggests. It holds a 5-star ANCAP rating from 2025 covering all variants, scoring 82% adult occupant, 86% child occupant, 76% vulnerable road user and 79% safety assist, and that rating runs to the end of 2031. Warranty is 6 years with no distance limit, with 8 years or 160,000km on the battery and 6 years of roadside assist.

Standard kit we can confirm includes a 10.1-inch touchscreen, Apple CarPlay and Android Auto (wired), adaptive cruise control, autonomous emergency braking, lane-keep assist, keyless entry with push-button start and LED headlights, on 15-inch wheels.

The honest catch is the 220km. That is a city figure, and treating it as one is the difference between this car being a bargain and being a frustration. If most of your driving is a commute and a school run with a plug at home, it is a lot of car for the money. If you regularly drive between towns, look at the next section.

The stretch: $25,000 to $30,000

This is where the choice actually is. Four cars sit between $25,000 and $30,000, and they are meaningfully different from each other, not just different badges on the same idea.

All battery-electric. Prices as recorded on 16 September 2026. A drive-away figure and an RRP are not comparable, see the note above.

2. Geely EX2 Complete at $26,490

Geely's small electric hatch is the newest arrival here and on paper it is well equipped for the money: a 14.6-inch touchscreen, wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, blind-spot monitoring, adaptive cruise, AEB and lane-keep assist, plus 3.3kW vehicle-to-load so you can run appliances off the battery. None of the cheaper cars on this page offer that last one.

It also has the second-biggest boot in the group at 375 litres, or 1,320 litres folded, in a body 4,135mm long. Warranty is 7 years with no distance limit and 8 years on the battery.

One thing to flag honestly. The EX2 has no ANCAP rating on our records, which means untested or not yet published rather than a poor result, and we will not infer one. The $26,490 is a list price before on-road costs, confirmed with Geely Australia, so budget roughly $29,000 driveaway. The 252km claimed range sits between the two Atto 1 grades.

3. BYD Atto 1 Premium at $27,990 before on-roads

The same car as the $19,990 Essential with the range problem fixed. A 43.2kWh battery lifts the claim from 220km to 310km, and power goes from 65kW to 115kW. You also get wireless phone charging, a sunroof, a power tailgate and 16-inch wheels. It keeps the 5-star 2025 ANCAP rating, the 308-litre boot and the four seats.

Worth being clear-eyed about the gap. The Premium is not part of the $19,990 offer, so against that promotional price you are paying roughly $8,000 more before on-roads for 90km of claimed range and some comfort kit. Against the Essential's ordinary $23,990 list price the step is $4,000, which is much easier to justify. Which of those two comparisons is the real one depends entirely on whether the offer is still running when you buy. Compare the Atto 1 against the Dolphin if you are weighing the extra spend against simply buying a bigger car.

4. BYD Dolphin Essential at $28,888 driveaway (limited offer), or $29,990 before on-roads

A size up and a proper five-seater, at 4,290mm long with a 345-litre boot that opens to 1,310 litres. The 44.9kWh battery claims 340km, the most of any car under $30,000 here. It has the biggest screen of the BYDs at 12.8 inches, adds blind-spot monitoring and dual-zone climate control over the Atto 1, and carries a 5-star ANCAP rating, though from 2023 rather than 2025.

The Dolphin is also running its own drive-away offer, and it is the one most lists are missing. BYD has the Dolphin Essential at $28,888 driveaway nationally, on the same timetable as the Atto 1: order by 15 December 2026, deliver by 31 December 2026. That is a real discount against the $29,990 list price rather than the same money relabelled, and it matters for the ranking, because it lands the Dolphin under the MG4 Urban below on a like-for-like drive-away basis. Charging is the slowest of the group in peak terms, at 60kW DC and 7kW AC.

5. MG MG4 Urban Essence 43 at $29,990 driveaway

The most car here for the money. It is the biggest vehicle in the group at 4,395mm, and the boot is not close: 480 litres, against 345 for the Dolphin and 308 for the Atto 1. It also charges fastest, at 82kW DC peak.

Equipment runs to wireless CarPlay and Android Auto, a 360-degree camera (the only one under $30,000 that has it), blind-spot monitoring, adaptive cruise, AEB and lane-keep assist. ANCAP is 5 stars from 2025, with the strongest safety-assist score in this group at 82%.

Two caveats. The $29,990 is a Victorian campaign price running 1 to 30 September 2026, so it is promotional in the same way the BYD numbers are, it expires sooner than they do, and it is state-specific rather than nationwide. And MG's headline 10-year, 250,000km warranty does not extend to the battery, which is covered for 7 years or 150,000km. Read those as two different warranties, because they are. Compare the Dolphin against the MG4 for the head-to-head this section really comes down to.

Just past $30,000

These missed the cut but are close enough to be worth a look, especially if you want an SUV body or more range than the cheap end offers.

GWM sells on drive-away pricing, so the drive-away figure is the one to use for those two. The ORA 5 and the Atto 2 have no ANCAP rating on our records. The Aion UT does not either.

If range is what you are actually buying, this bracket is where it gets cheap: the ORA 5 claims 435km and the Aion UT 430km, roughly double the $19,990 Atto 1, for a few thousand more. Atto 1 against the Aion UT and Aion UT against the MG4 are the two worth running.

The differences that actually matter

"No data" means our record does not hold the figure, which is not the same as a zero or a no. ANCAP ratings are never inferred from a related model.

Range

The spread is 220km to 340km, and the $19,990 car is at the bottom of it. Every figure here is a WLTP claim, which is a laboratory number, so the useful way to read them is against each other rather than as a promise. The practical line is around the 300km mark: below it you are buying a car that wants a home charger and a short commute, above it occasional longer trips stop needing planning.

Battery and charging

All five use LFP chemistry, which is the cheaper, more durable and slightly less energy-dense option, and it is the main reason these cars exist at these prices. LFP is also happy being charged to 100% regularly, which suits a small battery.

DC peak speed is where the MG4 separates itself at 82kW, against 60 to 65kW for the rest. On AC, the Atto 1 pair and the MG4 take 11kW, the Dolphin 7kW and the EX2 6.6kW. If you are charging overnight at home on a standard wall box, the AC figure is the one that affects your life and the DC figure is the one that affects road trips.

Boot and seats

This is the biggest real-world gap on the page and it does not track price. The MG4 Urban's 480 litres is 56% more than the Atto 1's 308, and the Atto 1 is a four-seater on top of that. If you carry people or things with any regularity, the cheapest car here is the wrong answer and the extra $10,000 buys something categorically different rather than just nicer.

Warranty

MG's 10 years and 250,000km is the longest headline in the group, but it comes with the shortest battery cover at 7 years or 150,000km. Both BYDs run 6 years unlimited on the car with 8 years or 160,000km on the battery, and Geely offers 7 years unlimited with 8 on the battery. On an EV the battery warranty is the one that carries the money, so the headline number is not automatically the better deal.

Safety

The Atto 1, Dolphin and MG4 Urban all carry 5-star ANCAP ratings, tested in 2025, 2023 and 2025 respectively. The Geely EX2 has no ANCAP rating on our records, and neither do the Atto 2, the Aion UT or the ORA 5 in the section above. That means untested or not yet published rather than anything about how they would perform, and we do not carry a rating across from a related model to fill the space.

The novated lease angle

Every car on this page is a battery-electric vehicle priced nowhere near the luxury car tax fuel-efficient threshold, which for FY2026-27 sits at $91,661. That means they all currently qualify for the FBT exemption on a novated lease, and unlike a lot of the EV market they also sit comfortably under the $75,000 cap that applies to the full exemption from 1 April 2027. A lease signed on one of these cars is not exposed to that change.

It is worth running the numbers, because on a cheap EV the exemption is proportionally a very large saving. Our novated lease calculator will do it, and the novated lease guide covers what changes in 2027 and why the date you sign matters.

So which one

If the $19,990 offer is live when you are buying and your driving is genuinely local, the Atto 1 Essential is very hard to argue with. It is the cheapest new car in Australia and it is a 5-star one, which is not a sentence that has been true before.

If you need a back seat that takes three, or a boot that takes a pram, the Atto 1 is the wrong car and the choice is between the Dolphin at $28,888 driveaway and the MG4 Urban at $29,990 driveaway. Those two are genuinely comparable numbers, which is rare on this page. The Dolphin is cheaper and claims more range, the MG4 has a far bigger boot, charges faster and holds the stronger safety-assist score. We would take the MG4 for the 480-litre boot, but it is close enough that the Dolphin's extra 24km of claim and $1,100 saved is a fair argument.

And if the offers have ended by the time you read this, the picture changes: at $23,990 before on-roads the Atto 1 Essential lands close to $27,000 driveaway in most metro postcodes, at which point the Atto 1 Premium and its extra 90km start to look like the sensible version of the same car. We keep the prices on this page checked against the manufacturers, so the figures above are what they were on 16 September 2026.

For the wider view, our cheapest electric cars in Australia guide ranks the top 10 across a broader price range, and best electric cars under $50K picks up where this page stops.