Peugeot E-Rifter Review 2025

The Peugeot e-Rifter is an EV based on the Peugeot Partner panel van that offers exceptional practicality and a smooth electric motor at a relatively low price. So what's the catch? Well, assuming you're already happy with its lack of style, there's one fairly big one. Allow us to explain in our full Peugeot e-Rifter review...

If you need to carry a lot of people and stuff, you really can't beat a van-based MPV. No, they're not the most stylish sort of vehicle, but if you value practicality above all else, this is where you need to look. Step forward the Peugeot e-Rifter.

Here, we're covering the Peugeot e-Rifter, but it's mechanically identical to the Citroen e-Berlingo MPV, Vauxhall Combo Life Electric and the lengthily-named Toyota Proace City Verso Electric. That's because Peugeot, Citroen and Vauxhall are all part of the huge Stellantis portfolio of brands, which also has an agreement with Toyota to make its van-based offerings. 

Each gets its own styling and the Peugeot e-Rifter is the most distinct in terms of its cabin, using Peugeot's still controversial 'i-Cockpit' layout. This includes a smaller-than-average steering wheel with a high-set digital instrument cluster that you look at above the wheel rather than through. We've never been huge fans, but combined with a much taller dashboard, it makes a lot of sense. 

Anyway, we shouldn't get too caught up in design choices, because what's more important here is the practicality. Even the smaller, five-seater version offers nearly 800 litres of boot space with all seats in place, while the Peugeot e-Rifter Long seven-seater can be configured to carry as much as 3500 litres. 

The current line-up is limited, comprising only one motor/battery option and two trim levels with only one length. The Peugeot e-Rifter Long was discontinued in 2024. The days of there being a diesel and petrol-powered Peugeot Rifter are also long gone, with those cars dropped from the line-up in 2022. 

The same happened to the Citroen Berlingo MPV, which did return with petrol and diesel engines more recently. But before you get too tempted, we should point out that these facelifted versions have a van-style bulkhead separating the front and rear of the cabin, causing practicality limitations and meaning the car is registered as a van. 

While Peugeot has left the mechanical side of the Peugeot e-Rifter largely alone, it did get a small bump in electric range in 2024, plus a smart-looking facelift to bring the MPV into line with the brand's other vehicles. 

Peugeot e-Rifter: Range and charging times

The Peugeot e-Rifter's versatility is compromised by a less-than-brilliant electric range of just 199 miles and only 178 miles if you're looking at an earlier, used version. You'll struggle to replicate those figures in real-world driving scenarios as well.

That isn't a slight on the Peugeot e-Rifter specifically – lab-obtained range figures are usually very optimistic. And so it goes here – during our time with the car, we managed 3.5 miles per kWh, which would give a range of more like 175 miles.

That might not seem too far off the official number, particularly when we mention it involved a lot of motorway miles (something EVs don't excel at in terms of efficiency), but it was at a warm-ish time of year and we ran the car in Eco mode for a lot of it. During winter, even trips of a fairly modest distance might require a stop to charge. 

On that front, rapid charging speeds are fairly modest at 100kW, although the Ford e-Tourneo Courier offers exactly the same capacity.

Assuming conditions are optimal and the charger is capable enough, it takes 38 minutes to take the battery from 0-80%, which doesn't sound so bad, but the Peugeot e-Rifter is flattered in this regard thanks to its small capacity. That 80% won't get you massively far, remember. 

Plugged into a 7.4kW home wallbox, meanwhile, it's six hours and 43 minutes for a full charge from empty. Doing the same with a three-pin plug should be avoided where possible, not least because it will take 22 hours and 30 minutes.

You shouldn't have hugely high hopes for the Peugeot e-Rifter's handling given its panel van origins, but it's not so bad considering.

The low-speed ride is a bit choppy, but it does settle down with speed. And while refinement isn't going to be as good as a similar-sized SUV or car-based EV, wind and road noise aren't too egregious. That's good going when there's no engine noise to mask either. 

The small steering wheel and light steering make for a car that feels easy to manoeuvre, but it is quite vague. In the corners, meanwhile, there is some body roll, but nothing excessive. We didn't experience any traction issues (it's not like the electric motor is pokey enough to overwhelm the front wheels, anyway) and grip levels are perfectly satisfactory. 

All Peugeot e-Rifters are configured the same way, with a 50kWh battery pad feeding a 136PS motor mounted on the front axle. You don't get that full output unless you've set it to 'Power' mode, though, with 'Normal' limited to 109PS and 'Eco' to 82PS.

Progress in the latter setting is, as you might imagine, quite leisurely. But an underpowered but smooth and quiet motor is certainly more pleasant to experience than an underpowered engine you have to noisily thrash if you want to get up to the national speed limit sometime this month. 

The 109PS is a better balance of efficiency and performance while the jump to the full 136PS doesn't feel massive, as even fully uncorked, this is far from a fast car, covering the 0-62mph sprint in 11.3 seconds, onto a top speed of 81mph.

As we often see with EVs, however, instantly available torque (in this case 270Nm) does at least make for a car that's quite sprightly off the line. 

The Peugeot Rifter was tested by Euro NCAP in 2018, achieving four stars out of five. That's quite a long time ago, however. The Euro NCAP tests have become more stringent over the years, so you can't compare that to a more recent four-star test - and indeed - that rating is now considered 'expired' by the safety body. 

Standard-fit safety equipment includes autonomous emergency braking, lane keeping assistance, speed limit assistance and a driver attention monitor. You need to upgrade to the top-spec GT if you want adaptive cruise control with lane positioning.

The Peugeot e-Rifter can only tow 750kg, regardless of whether the load is braked or unbraked. Tow bar preparation is a £250 option.

The Peugeot e-Rifter's practicality varies depending on whether you've opted for the e-Rifter Standard or the e-Rifter Long, although you can now only buy the latter used. As you've hopefully gathered, the Long is... the longer one. It measures 4755mm in length, compared to 4405mm for the standard car. 

We'll start with the Peugeot e-Rifter Standard, which offers an impressive 775 litres of boot space even with all seats in place, assuming you're going up to the load cover, or 1355 litres loaded up to the ceiling. You can also open the rear windscreen independently of the rest of the tailgate, should the need arise. 

The rear seats fold easily and neatly into the floor (in either a 60/40 split in the Peugeot e-Rifter Allure, or as three individual seats in the GT model), opening up a whopping 3000 litres of boot volume. You can also fold the passenger seat fully forward to fit things up to 2700mm in length (3050mm in the Long). 

The Long has an extra row of seats and boot space is quite limited with them in place at just 209 litres. Once removed, there's 1050 litres of boot space or 1900 litres if packed up to the ceiling. With the middle row folded you get 3500 litres. 

Being based on a van with a high ceiling, it probably shouldn't come as a surprise that headroom is excellent for all those on board. Rear legroom for middle-row passengers is good and although it's a bit tighter in the Long's third row, it's roomier back there than in most seven-seater SUVs.

These are the obvious benefits of basing an MPV on a van, but there's another, perhaps unexpected plus point. Because the dashboard is quite tall, Peugeot's quirky i-Cockpit layout works better than in other models, which often force you to put the steering wheel lower than you're used to to stop it obstructing the high-set instrument cluster. Here, you can have the steering wheel higher and still get a perfectly good view of the digital dials. 

You should temper your expectations in this regard, given the Peugeot e-Rifter's van roots. It's somewhat utilitarian, with tough, hard-wearing materials that are designed more for work than family life.

That does mean the cabin should stand up to abuse well and there are some plusher materials in the Peugeot e-Rifter that you won't find in the Peugeot Partner panel van, with the GT further enhanced with a leather steering wheel and floor mats. Everything seems put together well enough.

All versions of the Peugeot e-Rifter have a 10.1-inch touchscreen infotainment system. It's nothing particularly fancy, but it gets the job done, with an easy-to-understand menu system and pleasant-looking graphics. It's reasonably responsive, but a bit laggy when switching between functions. 

There are two USB-C sockets in the front, but none elsewhere. You'll need to use one of those if you want to enable Apple CarPlay or Android Auto, as the wireless versions of those systems are not offered here. 

The Peugeot e-Rifter Allure only gets a basic sound system with two speakers (plus a couple of tweeters), but this is upped to four in the GT. The latter isn't a premium-branded setup, but we were impressed with its quality and punch. 

Like most EVs, the Peugeot e-Rifter is only eligible for the lower electric car grant (ECG), but we aren't going to complain, because the car was good value as it was. Now costing £30,850 in Allure trim and £33,900 as a GT, the former trim name seems especially apt. 

You can pay even less than that for a pre-registered example, with potential savings in the thousands. Or, you could get the Peugeot e-Rifter as a company car and enjoy its low Benefit in Kind (BiK) company car tax rate of 3%, which will give very low monthly payments.

To put the above figures in some sort of context, the closely related Citroen e-Berlingo is slightly less at £29,740 with the ECG applied, while the Ford E-Tourneo Courier is in between the two at £29,940, helped by it being one of only a few EVs to apply for the full £3750 grant.

You won't get out of paying car tax with the Peugeot e-Rifter, with the VED exemption for EVs ending in April 2025. With that in mind, it's the same £195 to tax the Peugeot as it is any other vehicle. At least it's well below the £40,000 threshold for the government's premium car tax supplement, which EVs are now liable for as well. 

Based on the average cost of electricity in the UK, it should cost about £14 to fully charge the Peugeot e-Rifter from empty. Assuming you can get about 150 miles from that full charge, that works out at around 10p per mile. You could pay a fraction of that if you can get on a variable tariff that offers a lower off-peak per kWh rate and time your charging sessions accordingly. 

Rapid charging should be avoided as much as possible, because it can cost as much as 90p per kWh. The e-Peugeot Rifter's modest range might make that difficult, mind. 

The Peugeot e-Rifter is offered in two trim levels – Allure and GT. 

The Peugeot e-Rifter Allure comes with the following equipment as standard:

• 10-inch touchscreen infotainment system
• 10-inch digital instrument cluster
• Apple CarPlay/Android Auto
• High beam assistance
• Cruise control 
• Manual air conditioning

Upgrading to the Peugeot e-Rifter GT adds the following into the mix: 

• 17-inch alloy wheels
• Additional speakers
• Heated leather steering wheel
• Dual-zone climate control
• Heated, electrically adjustable mirrors
• Parking camera
• Adaptive cruise control