Polestar 2 Long Range Dual Motor Review

After several days driving the Polestar 2 Long Range Dual Motor with the Prime Pack, producing 310kW, or 421hp, and 740Nm of torque, including taking it along some properly good country roads I thought the handling was excellent. The steering had a satisfying weight to it. It stayed beautifully composed through quick direction changes and, with more than 400 horsepower going through all four wheels, it could fire itself out of a bend with almost ridiculous ease.

The Polestar 2 is getting on a bit

That sounds harsher than I mean it. The Polestar 2 arrived at a time when Polestar was still establishing itself as something more than Volvo's slightly mysterious performance offshoot. Since then, the brand has changed considerably. We've now got the Polestar 3, Polestar 4 and Polestar 5, while the electric-car market has exploded around it. 

New brands seem to appear every few months. Charging speeds have gone up. Screens have got bigger. Interiors have become increasingly theatrical. And acceleration figures have become increasingly absurd.

Yet after spending a couple of weeks in the Polestar 2, I'm not sure any of that has made it feel irrelevant. If anything, it's made me appreciate how refreshingly uncomplicated it is.

It still looks good

This might be one of the Polestar 2's greatest achievements. It hasn't dated badly.

There are cars launched considerably more recently that already look like products of a very specific moment in EV design.

The Polestar 2 still looks clean and distinctive. There's no fake grille trying to make it look like a petrol car. There's no huge illuminated panel across the front pretending the future has arrived. It doesn't look like somebody has typed "futuristic electric vehicle" into an AI image generator and selected the first result. It's just... handsome.

The proportions are slightly unusual, sitting somewhere between a saloon, fastback and mildly raised crossover, but I've always liked that. The frameless mirrors still look great. The rear light signature is distinctive without shouting. And even after a couple of weeks, I was still looking back at it when I parked. That's usually a good sign.

Then you put your foot down

Let's deal with the performance. You've got two electric motors, all-wheel drive and 421hp. Torque stands at 740Nm. Officially, it'll reach 62mph in around 4.5 seconds. That is more than fast enough. Actually, it's the sort of fast that makes you question why we became collectively obsessed with making family EVs hit 60mph in three seconds.

Plant your foot and the Polestar responds immediately. There's no pause. No gearbox deciding what it wants to do. No engine needing to build revs. It just goes. And while that never really stops being entertaining, it's not the reason I ended up enjoying this car as much as I did.

Find some corners

The best journey I had in the Polestar wasn't a motorway blast or an acceleration run. It was simply driving it along some B-roads. And that's where the car started making much more sense. The steering has enough weight to make the car feel deliberate. It turns in neatly. There's loads of grip. The body remains impressively controlled.

And the all-wheel-drive system means you can use an enormous amount of that performance when you come out of a corner. It feels planted without becoming completely numb. That distinction matters. There are some fast electric cars that feel impressive rather than enjoyable. You accelerate hard, say "wow", and that's broadly the end of the experience.

The Polestar 2 gives you more. You start looking further down the road. You find yourself stringing corners together. And then you realise you're actually enjoying driving an electric executive car weighing comfortably over two tonnes. That was the point where I assumed it had the Performance Pack. It didn't.

And that might be the best compliment I can give the standard chassis.

You don't need the Performance Pack

Let's be clear, the Performance version is still very cool. It gets adjustable Öhlins dampers, upgraded Brembo brakes, extra power and various little visual details. If you're buying a Polestar 2 specifically because you want the most driver-focused version available, I understand the appeal completely. 

But would I personally need it? After driving this, probably not. The regular Long Range Dual Motor already gives you the part I care about. It's quick enough that you'll almost never use everything it has. It already handles extremely well. And you retain the slightly less hardcore character that makes it such a good everyday car.

I think that might make this the sweet spot.

Because most of the time, I wasn't attacking a B-road

Realistically, most journeys aren't like that. They're trips across town. Motorways. Traffic. Long drives where comfort matters considerably more than steering feedback. And this is where the Polestar surprised me again.

It is a brilliant motorway car. I've done several longer journeys in it and it simply settles down. There's very little noise. The seats are excellent. The driving position is comfortable. There's huge performance available whenever you need to move past slower traffic.

And despite having the sort of power output that would once have been reserved for serious performance cars, it doesn't constantly encourage you to drive it like an idiot.

You can simply cruise. Turn on the Adaptive Cruise Control. Put some music on. And cover distance.

Although Tesla still does one thing better

Having spent quite a lot of time with the Tesla Model 3, one difference became pretty obvious. Lane centring. Tesla's system feels very determined to keep the car perfectly positioned between the two white lines. The Polestar's Pilot Assist isn't quite as assertive. There were occasions where I felt the car drifting closer towards a lane marking than I was comfortable with before it made a correction. And when you've got a lorry sitting next to you, you definitely notice.

This isn't autonomous driving and I'm not suggesting you should ever simply leave the system to get on with things. You're responsible for the car. But when comparing two driver-assistance systems directly, the Tesla feels more confident at maintaining its lane position. Adaptive cruise itself worked really well. It's specifically the steering behaviour I'd like Polestar to improve.

370 miles changes the conversation

Earlier Polestar 2s weren't exactly bad when it came to range, but the latest Long Range Dual Motor has become a much more convincing long-distance EV.

Official range is now up to 370 miles WLTP.

And that matters. Because suddenly the car isn't asking you to choose between performance and usability in quite the same way. You've got 421hp. You've got all-wheel drive. You've got 740Nm. And you've still got an official range starting with a three.

For someone regularly covering longer journeys, that makes an enormous difference.

The Long Range Single Motor goes further again, at up to 409 miles officially, and if I were spending almost my entire life on motorways I'd absolutely understand choosing that one. But I'd miss the Dual Motor.

Charging is good rather than groundbreaking

Peak DC charging speed is 205kW, with a 10 to 80% charge taking around 28 minutes in suitable conditions. That's perfectly usable. It just isn't headline-grabbing anymore. The latest 800-volt EVs are beginning to make 200kW sound almost ordinary, which is frankly ridiculous considering how quickly the technology has moved.

But I don't think I'd dismiss the Polestar because of it. A 28-minute motorway stop is manageable. Particularly when you've potentially covered several hundred miles before needing one. And the Google integration makes charging considerably easier. Tell Google Maps you're heading to a rapid charger and the car can start preparing the battery before you get there. 

That's the kind of technology I like. Not flashy.Just useful.

Google built in still works brilliantly

The Polestar 2 was one of the first cars that made me think manufacturers might finally stop building terrible infotainment systems. Google Maps is built in. Spotify can run natively. The navigation understands the battery. You can see estimated charge on arrival. It can help with charging stops. And the whole thing is relatively straightforward.

There's an 11.2-inch portrait display in the middle and, importantly, a proper driver's display behind the steering wheel. That last point matters more to me than perhaps it should. I've lived with the Tesla approach of putting virtually everything on the centre screen and you get used to it. But I still prefer having my speed and navigation directly ahead of me. Sometimes conventional is conventional because it works.

The interior is beautifully built, but...

I'm slightly conflicted about the interior. Quality? Excellent. Everything feels substantial. The controls feel properly damped. Materials feel good where they matter. Nothing about it suggests somebody has been desperately trying to shave pennies off the production cost. And after spending plenty of time with it, the whole car still feels incredibly solid.

But visually? It's a little bland. Particularly in darker specifications. There's a lot of charcoal. A lot of grey. A lot of Scandinavian seriousness.

The panoramic roof that comes as part of the Prime Pack helps enormously because it floods the cabin with light. But personally, I'd love slightly more colour or contrast. That's entirely subjective, obviously. Some people will think it's beautifully restrained. I occasionally found myself wishing Sweden would loosen its tie slightly.

Prime Pack makes a lot of sense

This particular car has the Prime Pack, and it's probably how I'd want a Polestar 2 specified. It effectively combines the Pilot, Plus and Climate Packs, along with rear privacy glass. Which means you get most of the useful stuff.

• Pilot Assist.
  
• Adaptive cruise.
  
• Blind-spot monitoring.
  
• 360-degree cameras.
  
• The panoramic roof.
  
• Electric front seats.
  
• Digital Key.
  
• A heat pump.
  
• Heated steering wheel.
  
• Heated rear seats.
  
• Hands-free powered tailgate.
  
• And the Harman Kardon sound system.
  

That last one deserves special attention.

The Harman Kardon system might be my favourite option

I listen to a lot of music in the car. And I don't mean gently in the background. The Polestar has had everything thrown at it.

• Pop.
  
• Country.
  
• Classical.
  
• Podcasts.
  

Songs I know every word to and probably shouldn't be singing quite so loudly while sitting in motorway traffic. And the Harman Kardon system is excellent. There are 13 speakers, 600 watts of amplification and a proper subwoofer. But the numbers aren't really important. It's the clarity that stands out. Voices are crisp. There's depth without everything becoming muddy. And with something more detailed, particularly a classical piece, you can actually hear the separation between instruments. For me, that's exactly the kind of luxury feature I use constantly. Far more than another animated lighting sequence or screen gimmick.

Some small things I really like

• There's no conventional start button. Get in. Press the brake. Select Drive. Go. At the end, put it in Park and leave. Simple.
  
• There's Digital Key, allowing your phone to act as the key. 
  
• The panoramic roof gets a little projected Polestar logo at night, which serves absolutely no practical purpose whatsoever and therefore I naturally quite like it.
  
• There's a hands-free powered tailgate.
  
• The boot floor can fold upwards to create a divider complete with bag hooks.
  
• And there's a front storage compartment beneath the bonnet. That's where your charging cables should live.

Again, incredibly simple.

But it means when you've filled the rear boot with luggage you don't arrive at a charger and discover the cable you need is buried underneath absolutely everything you own.

Little bits of thoughtful design like this make a difference when you're actually living with a car.

It isn't perfect inside

Practicality is probably one of the places where the Polestar 2's age becomes more obvious. The boot itself is useful because this is a proper hatchback rather than a conventional saloon. You've got around 407 litres of rear storage, increasing to more than 1,000 litres with the seats folded, plus another 41 litres at the front.

But rear passenger space isn't enormous. There's a noticeable tunnel running through the centre of the floor, which seems slightly odd in an EV now that we've become used to completely flat interiors. T

he centre console up front also takes up a fair amount of space.

Again, none of this would stop me wanting the car. But newer dedicated EV platforms have moved the game on when it comes to packaging.

So which Polestar 2 would I actually buy?

This is where things get interesting. If range was everything, I'd choose the Long Range Single Motor. Up to 409 miles is hard to argue with. If I spent my weekends doing track days or desperately wanted the most serious chassis hardware available, I'd go Performance. But I don't. I want a car that's enjoyable when the road gets interesting, comfortable when it doesn't, quick enough to be entertaining and capable of covering long distances without turning every journey into a charging strategy.

Which brings me straight back to this one. The Long Range Dual Motor. I didn't miss the Performance Pack. For several days, I actually thought I had it. And that probably tells you everything.

Final thoughts

The Polestar 2 is no longer the exciting new arrival. It's now the established one. The model that's been around while the rest of the Polestar family has grown up around it. Usually that means a car starts feeling dated, but I'm not sure the Polestar 2 does.

Its charging speed is no longer class-leading, there are roomier EVs, some have more dramatic interiors, and there are smarter driver-assistance systems. But none of those things fundamentally change what this car gets right.

It still looks good. It feels beautifully made. It's easy to live with. It's capable of proper long-distance travel.

And, perhaps most importantly, it's one of those electric cars that proves performance doesn't have to mean simply launching violently away from traffic lights.

Find a decent road and there's actually a car underneath all the technology. And after two weeks with it, that's what I'll remember most. Not the screen. Not the range figure. Not even the 421 horsepower.

That's a pretty good place to leave it.