Disclosure: Chery Philippines lent us the 2024 Chery Tiggo 8 Pro e+ PHEV unit for seven days with a full tank of gas, a 70% charge on the battery and access to its RFID cards. 

Plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEV) are the happy medium between a fully electric vehicle and an internal combustion engine.

These give you the flexibility to travel on electric power alone, without worrying about where to charge next, thanks to the engine being on standby to keep you moving and to charge the battery.

Enter the Chery Tiggo 8 Pro e+ PHEV, which is the newest variant of the Chinese carmaker's seven-seater crossover.

Subtle styling

On the outside, the Tiggo 8 Pro e+ PHEV looks like any other SUV available in the market.

It has a broad front fascia with its new grille design and sleek LED headlights. Its body cladding and slightly flared wheel arches also maintain an athletic look. 

At the rear, the Tiggo 8 Pro e+ PHEV has a unique look with Porsche-like design elements, especially its LED taillights. Although the badging is long, it gives off a premium vibe, considering all the letters need to spell out the model and variant names. 

Aside from this, the Chery SUV also has a power tailgate available, making it easy to retrieve items from the car's cargo area.

One thing we did notice, though, is its 18-inch wheels, which look relatively small on the SUV compared to its other variants. Regardless, it's a well-designed package with puddle lamps on the side and the Chery logo to help you see better while getting in or out of the car at night.

Premium interior

The Tiggo 8 Pro e+ PHEV has a spacious and premium interior.

It has a multi-layer dashboard design that houses its two massive screens and large horizontal air vents. The crossover also has soft-touch materials with piano black plastic on the center console.

While these are great to look at, these smudge very easily. 

The Tiggo 8 Pro e+ PHEV also has power-adjustable seats with a memory function to help you quickly get in and out of the SUV. These even move backward when exiting the car to give you as much room as possible, which is a nice touch. 

As with many Chinese cars, room in the back is superb as there is plenty of legrom, headroom and elbow room to spare, even for taller or horizontally challenged individuals.

The seats are soft and supportive, with ventilation and heating for the driver and front passenger. It also has a panoramic sunroof, which lets natural light into the cabin and ambient lighting to help set a mood.

Overall, it's a premium affair that's befitting its relatively expensive price tag, which I will discuss later.

High tech

Technology is overflowing in the Chery Tiggo 8 Pro e+ PHEV as you get not one, but two 12.3-inch displays.

The first is the digital instrument cluster, while the second is for the infotainment system, which comes with Apple CarPlay and Android Auto as standard and even functions as a display for the 360-degree camera.

Aside from this, you also get a digital display for your automatic climate controls, which takes a bit of time to get used to as it uses capacitive buttons.

It just means that there isn’t much in the way of a tactile feel, but it looks good and gets the job done. It also comes with an ion filter to maintain clean cabin air. 

Great power

Under the hood, the Chery Tiggo 8 Pro e+ is powered by a 1.5-liter inline-4 turbocharged gasoline engine mated to two electric motors.

Its total output is 324 PS and 545 Nm of torque, which is already a lot for a car of its size and outpowers most of its body-on-frame rivals. The electric motors produce around 94 PS and 155 Nm of torque each, which is more than enough to power the car in electric-only mode. 

As a plug-in hybrid, the Tiggo 8 Pro e+ PHEV has a 19.27-kWh battery for around 75 km of electric-only driving range. Chery says charging the battery will take about three hours with the AC charger. 

The automaker also claims that the SUV has a 950-km hybrid EV range. However, with our driving and a quick trip to Tagaytay, our estimates put it closer to around 850 km.

With great power comes great responsibility

Because of the immense grunt, you must carefully manage the throttle if you want to be smooth off the line.

If you even floor the accelerator pedal for a second, the turbo spools up and the electric motors come online instantly to deliver tire-shredding performance.

It will rocket you from 0 to 100 km/h in less than 8 seconds, but the tires will beg for mercy all the way to it. The tires will chirp even at speeds above 60 km/h if you floor it.

That said, accountability lies on you to reign in all that horsepower and torque. However, overtaking is a breeze with the Tiggo 8 Pro e+, which is a plus in our book.

Verdict

The Chery Tiggo 8 Pro e+ PHEV is priced at ₱2,698,000, which is a lot, but is about the same for vehicles in its class like the Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV.

It also matches the price of internal combustion rivals like the Kia Sorento and the Hyundai Santa Fe.

Regardless, the fact that the Tiggo 8 Pro e+ is a PHEV is its strongest selling point, giving you up to 75 km of range without using a drop of fuel. That's enough for a daily commute and can even save you a bit of gasoline on a road trip, as the SUV can run at high speed with just the battery. 

And the best part is that you can charge the battery at home, saving you hundreds of pesos that you would have spent on gasoline for even a regular hybrid vehicle.

The Tiggo 8 Pro e+ PHEV is also well equipped for its price point, with a premium interior that can fit seven people and a bit of luggage. It's an attractive offering that gives you the best of both worlds when getting your feet wet in the EV lifestyle.

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