The 2023 Cupra Born is consummate city car, being a fully electric five-door hatchback.  It’s proof that good things come in small packages.  It’s not a hot hatch and it doesn’t pretend to be, but a hatchback doesn’t have to be hot to be charming, useful and practical – and that’s what the Cupra Born is. It’s not a car for screaming around a racetrack. It’s a car for taking things easy, for relaxing and enjoying, and for being laid back.

The first question that most people ask when hearing about the 2023 Cupra Born (apart from questions like “what sort of car is it?”, “how much does it cost?” etc.) is why it has that name.  According to the people at Cupra, the name was originally “El Born” (Cupra is a Spanish marque). It doesn’t refer to the idea that this is a newborn concept, but this hatchback is named after a suburb of Barcelona. Now, El Born in Barcelona is a trendy downtown area that’s good for shopping and cafes, with plenty of history and some small streets.  Apparently, the name of the suburb (and the name of the car) meant “place for jousting” in the Medieval Catalan language.  However, the 2023 Cupra Born is more about small-scale trendy urban living than tournaments featuring Spanish knights like the fictional Don Quixote.  The 2023 Cupra Born won’t be tilting at any windmills, given that most windmills in today’s Spain are the turbines providing the electricity that powers the Born. 

The 2023 Cupra Born isn’t a big car, clocking in at a shade over 4 metres long, 1.8 metres wide and 1.54 metres tall on its perky 19-inch alloy wheels (the alloys’ styling is rather nice).  Nevertheless, it seats five well and has 385 litres of luggage space in the rear. The exterior styling is modest and minimalist, somewhat like a smooth pebble on the seashore, if it wasn’t for the pleasingly angled lights and the discreet roof spoiler. A pleasing colour palette is on offer, in which the ubiquitous black is nowhere to be seen. Instead, the designers have opted for several greys, white, red and medium blue.

Powered by a 77 kW-h battery-powered permanent magnet engine delivering 170 kW of power, the Cupra Born can do the 0–100 km/h sprint in a mere 7 seconds.  This battery unit has a driving range of 511 km (under ideal conditions) and reasonable charging times, with AC fast charging taking a shade shorter than the typical working day (7 hours and 46 minutes for 0–100% charging) and DC extra fast charging taking 26 minutes for topping up from 10% to 80% – long enough to pick up a coffee and/or your groceries. This electric motor talks to the rear wheel drivetrain via a single-speed reduction gear transmission. Independent front and rear sport suspension keeps you travelling comfortably.

Driving the 2023 Cupra Born is made easy with a good suite of driver aids.  It’s fitted with rear and side parking sensors as well as front, side and reverse cameras for those who like to do their own parking, but it also has self-parking ability for those who never learned how to parallel park properly.  Blind spot warnings and driver fatigue alerts round things out.

It’s kitted out with a good set of airbags all round, and top-notch seatbelts for everybody.  Active safety features include a crash avoidance system with automatic braking, collision mitigation (including for vulnerable road users such as pedestrians, cyclists and horse riders), rear cross-traffic alerts, forward collision alerts, lane keeping assistance and lane departure warnings and a side door exit warning. The vehicle itself is keep nicely under control if things get hairy by the ABS brakes (complete with braking assistance and EBD), the electronic stability system and the rollover stability system. The Hill Hold vehicle control is also very useful, whether you’re driving over undulating terrain or merely driving out of a multistorey carparking building.

The interior of the Cupra Born is upholstered in cloth, with some wee touches of leather here and there, like on the steering wheel.  Dual-zone climate control and snazzy ambient lighting help you make the interior of the 2023 Cupra Born just the way you want it.  You get to control what comes out from the seven-speaker audio system via the full-colour multifunction touchscreen display panel – and it’s got some voice recognition ability as well if you like that sort of thing.  Smartphone charging can be done via cable or wirelessly, although remember that this charge will come out of the Born’s battery and reduce the driving range. It also talks to your smartphone via Apple’s CarPlay and Android’s Auto apps.

The current 2023 Cupra Born models include:

• 2023 Cupra Born

For any more information on the new 2023 Cupra Born or, for that matter, any other new car, contact one of our friendly consultants on 1300 303 181.  If you’d like some fleet discount pricing (yes even for private buyers!), we can submit vehicle quote requests out to our national network of Cupra dealers and come back with pricing within 24 hours. Private Fleet – car buying made easy!