2026 smart #2 Two-Seat Electric City Car: Paris Reveal in October, Australian Launch Reported for 2027 but Not Yet Confirmed

Image credit: smart Australia. The Melbourne mural by artist Georgia Laurie. This is a painting of the car, not a photograph of the production model.

The small smart is coming back. smart has confirmed that its all-electric #2, a two-seat city car in the spirit of the original fortwo, will make its world premiere at the Paris Motor Show in October 2026. Ahead of that, the brand has been teasing it with street murals in six cities, and one of them is in Melbourne. smart Australia has put that campaign on its own media page.

What smart Australia has not done is say the car is coming here. That is the most important fact in this story, and it is easy to miss under the paint. A mural in Melbourne is marketing, not a launch commitment. So this piece is split in two: what smart has actually said, and what has only been reported. Then we look at what a premium two-seat electric car would have to beat in an Australian showroom, and who it would suit if it does arrive.

What smart Has Actually Said

smart Australia's media page carries two pieces on the car. The first, dated September 2025, confirmed the project. It says the #2 is an all-electric two-seater, an ultra-compact car in the A-segment, styled by Mercedes-Benz Design and built on an all-new architecture for ultra-compact vehicles developed in-house by smart. It will be produced in China. And it will be launched in "China, Europe, and other selected global markets". Australia is not named.

The second, dated 4 August 2026, is the mural campaign. It describes murals in Shanghai, Hong Kong, Buenos Aires, Melbourne, Berlin and Paris, and says the Melbourne piece is by artist Georgia Laurie. It says the #2 is "set to make its World Premiere at the Paris Motor Show in October 2026". It talks about an "iconic ultra-compact footprint", "unmatched manoeuvrability" and the brand's safety standards. It does not give a single number: no length, no battery, no range, no price, and no Australian timing.

That is the whole of the official Australian record today. Everything else you may read is either reported by motoring outlets or taken from smart's global statements, and none of it has been published by smart Australia.

What Has Been Reported, and How Far to Trust It

At least one Australian outlet has gone further than smart Australia has. EV Central reported in July that the #2 had been confirmed for right-hand-drive production, and that one smart executive put its chances for Australia at 80 per cent. Its report on 30 September said an Australian arrival is expected in 2027. We have not been able to confirm either point with smart Australia, so read 2027 as a reasonable expectation rather than a date.

On 30 September EV Central also reported technical figures it attributes to smart, released globally ahead of the reveal. They are useful for getting a feel for the car, but by that report the battery, range and charging figures are preliminary, the range has not been certified, the rest are the maker's own claims, and smart says final specifications may differ between markets. They are not Australian specifications.

smart has not published an Australian price. One estimate has been reported by an outlet. We are leaving it out of this piece deliberately: a guessed number printed often enough starts to look like a fact, and the smart range in Australia is priced in a way that makes guessing unusually risky (more on that below). We will print a price when smart Australia does.

How Small Is Small?

The whole point of this car is its size, so it is worth putting the reported numbers against cars you can actually buy. If the reported length of under three metres holds, the #2 would be a lot shorter than anything on sale that we list. Among on-sale cars in our directory with a recorded length, the shortest is the petrol Fiat 500 Dolcevita at 3,571mm, and the shortest electric car is the Honda Super-ONE at 3,582mm, with the Fiat 500e La Prima at 3,631mm. A car under 3,000mm would be more than 57cm shorter than the Dolcevita, more than 58cm shorter than the Super-ONE and more than 63cm shorter than the 500e. That is roughly the difference between fitting nose-in to a gap and not.

The reported 6.95m turning circle is the other number that matters in the city. We list the Fiat 500e at 9.3m and the Hyundai Inster at 10.6m. If smart's figure is confirmed, the #2 would turn in a circle 2.35m tighter than the 500e and 3.65m tighter than the Inster, which is the kind of thing you notice every day in a laneway car park or a three-point turn on a narrow inner-suburban street.

For comparison with the car it echoes, the old smart fortwo coupe we list from 2011 measured 2,695mm. The fortwo rows we hold for Australia run from 2011 to 2014, all petrol, so an Australian #2 would be the first electric two-seat smart in our directory.

Where It Would Sit in the smart Range

smart in Australia today is an SUV brand. Its website lists three models, and on 1 October 2026 it showed these starting prices, all before on-road costs:

That is why guessing the #2's price is hard. A two-seater has less car in it than a five-seat SUV, and smart's release describes an all-new architecture built specifically for ultra-compact vehicles, so it would be natural to expect it under the #1. But smart also calls the #2 its "halo product" and keeps using the word premium, and EV Central has reported that smart executives do not want it seen as a candidate for Australia's cheapest EV. Those two pressures point in different directions, and until smart Australia prices it, nobody outside the company knows where it lands.

What It Would Be Up Against

The awkward truth for a two-seater is that the small electric cars on sale in Australia already seat four or five. Here is the field a #2 would walk into, on the figures we list.

The Hyundai Inster is the obvious benchmark: a small five-door EV with a back seat, from $37,500 before on-road costs for the Standard Range, at Hyundai Australia's list price as we checked it on 4 October 2026. We list the Standard Range at 327km WLTP from a 42kWh battery and the Extended Range at 360km. That is more range than the #2's reported target, in a car that carries more people.

The BYD Atto 1 sits at the budget end of the small EV market, as covered in our Atto 1 news story. The Fiat 500e and the MINI Cooper SE are the cars closest to what smart is aiming at: small, style-led and premium-leaning, with four seats. We list the 500e at 311km WLTP from a 42kWh battery and the Cooper SE at 400km from 54.2kWh. We have not quoted prices for the 500e or Cooper here because we have not yet rechecked those rows against the manufacturers; the comparison below shows the figures we currently list.

And at the premium end, there is the Volvo EX30 Plus Single Motor, which we list at $49,990 before on-road costs with 462km WLTP. It is a much bigger car than a #2, but it shows what small-and-premium money buys in Australia today.

So the #2 cannot win on seats, and on the reported target it will not win on range. What it can win on is size, turning circle and design, and the question is how much Australian buyers will pay for those. That is not a criticism. The original fortwo never made sense on a spec sheet either; it made sense in a tight car park.

The Small EVs on Sale Now, Side by Side

The smart #2 is not in the comparison below: it has not been revealed or priced, and we hold no row for it. What is in it are small electric cars you can buy today, plus the smart #1. Pick any two.

Range, Charging and the Novated Lease Question

If the reported 300km WLTP target holds, the #2 is a city car and makes no pretence otherwise. For most inner-city driving that is plenty: a week of short trips and a weekend run to the beach, charged once. It is the wrong car for regular highway trips between cities, and nobody should buy it expecting to do that. If you want to see what a given WLTP figure turns into in winter or at 110km/h, our range estimator will do the arithmetic once smart publishes a certified number.

On tax, as general information for the 2026-27 financial year: battery-electric cars priced under the luxury car tax threshold for fuel-efficient vehicles, which is $91,661 for 2026-27, currently qualify for the fringe benefits tax exemption on a novated lease. The government has announced that from 1 April 2027 the full exemption will be limited to electric cars at or under $75,000, with a reduced benefit above that. We do not know the #2's price, so we cannot say where it lands, but with an arrival reported for 2027 the date your lease starts could matter as much as the car. Check with your lease provider at the time, and treat this as general information, not tax advice.

What smart Has Not Told Us Yet

• Whether it is coming to Australia at all, and when. smart Australia has not said.
• A price, and on what basis it would be quoted. smart Australia currently lists its models before on-road costs.
• Certified range, battery and charging figures. Everything in circulation is preliminary and global.
• Dimensions, weight and boot space for the production car.
• An ANCAP rating. There is none, and we hold no rating for the #2. smart's talk of "no compromise on safety" is a claim, not a result.
• Warranty, servicing and equipment for any Australian version.

The Paris reveal should fill in a good part of the global picture. It will not by itself answer the Australian questions, and those are the ones that decide whether this car makes sense here.

Who It Would Suit, and Who It Would Not

It would suit the inner-city driver who rarely carries more than one passenger, parks on the street or in tight apartment car parks, charges at home or work, and wants something that feels special rather than simply cheap. It could also make sense as a second car in a household that already has a bigger vehicle for family trips and long drives.

It would not suit anyone who needs a back seat even occasionally, anyone who drives long distances regularly, or anyone buying purely on price per kilometre of range. For those buyers, the four and five-seat small EVs already on sale are the more sensible answer, and some of them cost less than smart's current entry car.

If a two-seat smart is what you have been waiting for, there is no order to place and no price to budget against yet. Watch for the Paris reveal in October, and then for smart Australia to say whether, when and for how much. We will add the #2 to the CarSorted directory as soon as smart Australia confirms it, and in the meantime our city cars guide covers what you can buy now.