BYD Seal First Drive Review

They say, the third time's the charm, and this is the third all-new offering from BYD here in India. It's called the Seal (as it’s the second car from BYD’s new ‘ocean series’ after the Dolphin), and it's an all-electric premium sedan. With three variants on offer, the starting price for the Seal is Rs 41 lakh. But does the Seal pack in the necessary charm to woo the buyers of other premium sedans viz. BMW 3 Series and Mercedes-Benz C-Class? Let's find out.

With a low-slung nose, 4.8m length, and a notchback-like silhouette, the Seal has a good mixture of contemporary yet conventional design. Then the elongated wheelbase and low height with clean sheet metal work add to the Seal’s styling. As we have seen with the Atto 3, there are a lot of interesting details sprinkled all around. Be it the sleek headlamps, gills on the side skirts, pop-up door handles, character lines on the bonnet doors and fenders, race-car-like diffusers at the back, and the five-petal-shaped 19-inch aero wheels, they all make the BYD Seal a very handsome looking sedan and it does manage to turn heads effortlessly.

Now the Seal is a low-slung car so getting in takes a tad bit extra effort than you would in a normal sedan. And the party piece (like the rotating screen) aside, the cabin of the Seal makes you feel like you are sitting in a much more expensive sedan. Where the fit and finish are impressive, the concoction of materials used inside this sedan is well executed as well. With soft-touch materials used at all the right places; even the plastic feels smooth and nice with the appeal of a futuristic cabin.

What surprised me the most was its overall in-cabin ergonomics. Not only is the visibility all around phenomenally good, but the buttons and controls are also easy to reach and get comfortable with. The centre console does have a lot of buttons for a car that has kind of eliminated all the buttons in favour of a large screen, but these buttons are useful ones, especially on the go. Coming to the front seats, they are one of the best one this side of the supercar territory. We experienced good seats in the Atto 3, but the Seal takes things many notches higher. They feel more like a