Electric vehicles are sweeping through the auto industry at blazing speed. General Motors recently stated that they plan to be fully electric by 2035 and not sell any internal combustion engine vehicle after that. But one of General Motors subbrands, Cadillac, is planning to be fully electric in 9 years, by 2030.
This is very ambitious for a brand that as yet doesn't have a single fully electric car in its lineup. But that is soon to change with the 2023 Cadillac Lyriq. The Lyriq is promising to be a great electric car and may yet prove a worthy rival to Tesla's Model S and Jaguar's I-Pace. Not all the specs have yet been released for the Lyriq. We will learn more over the coming few months. But this is likely the shape of things to come.
Here's everything we know about the 2023 Cadillac Lyriq - Cadillac's first fully electric car.
10 Expected Release Date
It seems that the 2023 Cadillac Lyriq is expected to become available in the first half of 2022 — so less than a year from now. So not that long in the future, but still, it's too early to have all the specs released.
Reservations for this 340 HP luxury SUV will be opening in September 2021. Let's see if it manages to follow the footsteps of Lucid and Tesla who have seen their preorders sell out.
9 Expected Pricing
The Lyriq is both a Cadillac and an electric car, so it was never going to be cheap. Cadillac has its base price beginning at $58,795 although this excludes destination freight charges, taxes, license fees, and dealer fees.
That being said, one is likely to be able to take advantage of the $7,500 federal tax rebate — and there has been talk of the federal government increasing that. The government is committed to encouraging the buying of EVs.
8 Expected Range
The 2023 Cadillac Lyiq is expected to come with a decent range of over 300 miles. At this early stage that is not an EPA range estimate but GM's in-house estimate.
If that estimate holds for the EPA range, then it will have a longer range than the Porsche Taycan, the Model 3 Performance, and the Model X. However it will be (much) shorter than the Model S and the Lucid Air — the Lucid Air has 500 miles!
7 SuperCruise
The Lyriq will be taking advantage of General Motor's SuperCruise. While this is not a fully autonomous system, it can still essentially drive itself along the highway. With SuperCruise you can take your hands off the steering wheel.
Currently, the computer system will allow this feature to work on over 200,000 miles of roads across the United States and Canada. These technologies all tend to be much safer and can often compensate for human error in driving.
6 Charging The Battery
The Lyriq is coming with a dual charging package. While at home and plugged in a Level 2 (AC) rate, it will add around 52 miles of range every hour.
Cadillac is saying its DC fast charging can add up to 76 miles of range in just 10 minutes. This is fast, but given that it's a luxury brand, it isn't the best. By comparison, the Lucid Air can add 300 miles of range in just 20 minutes.
5 Uses GM's New Ultium
The Lyriq is among the first vehicles to use General Motors' new EV platform and battery system called Ultium. This platform is designed to be flexible so that GM can build a range of trucks, SUVs, and crossovers from it.
GM states that "Ultium energy options range from 50 to 200 kWh, which could enable a GM-estimated range up to 400 miles or more on a full charge with 0 to 60 mph acceleration as low as 3 seconds."
4 The Interior
As with other Cadillacs, the Lyriq features a snazzy-looking interior complete with a curved 33-inch-diagonal advanced LED screen across the driver's side of the dashboard of the car. So the interior looks great like the car is cutting edge.
Cadillac claims that this LED screen "has the ability to emit over one billion colors." The interior is spacious and feels like the vehicle is representing the cutting edge of technology, just like a next-generation luxury SUV should.
3 Joining The Ranks Of Luxury Electric SUVs
The number of performance electric SUVs is about to explode over the next year or two. Currently, the Jaguar I-Pace is one of the few actually on the road. Electric SUVs are soon to be a very very big business as SUVs are the most popular vehicles in the USA.
But soon we will be seeing the Rivian SUV, the Hummer EV SUV, the Lucid "Project Gravity" SUV, the Volvo C40 Recharge SUV, and the BMW iX xDrive50 among others.
2 Scale Of GM's Commitment
General Motors has announced that it is investing an eye-watering $27 billion investment into electric vehicles in a bid to transform itself and keep itself relevant in the 21st century.
This plan includes an impressive 30 new EVs by 2025 of which the 2023 Cadillac Lyriq is one of the first. General Motors has ceased to invest in the next generation of internal combustion engines. It is now wholly devoted to developing electric and self-driving technology.
1 Shape Of Things To Come
Cadillac now has only around 9 years left to continue selling gasoline and diesel cars as they aggressively transition over to a fully electric fleet. We are likely to see exponential growth in the sales of their EVs, by say 2028 only a few sales will be ICEs.
Furthermore, last year's release of the resigned Escalade SUV is the last new internal combustion engine vehicle that will ever be released by Cadillac. From now on, it's only electric vehicles.
In summary, the 2023 Cadillac Lyriq is shaping up to be a great electric vehicle. But with a range of 300 miles, it underscores how legacy car companies are struggling to catch up with the startups like Lucid and Tesla.