The 2022 BMW iX3 is a fully electric SUV, which unlike other versions of the X3 is available in two-wheel-drive only. Let's see if it makes a great BabyDrive when we put it through our testing…
Let's start with the all important rear seats! There are ISOFix points in the two outer rear seats and top tether anchorages on the back of all three rear seats.
Legroom is good in the iX3 and we could fit a 182cm passenger in front of a rear facing child seat.
Storage throughout the BMW iX3 is good. In the back there are two cup holders and a lidded storage tray in the central seat fold down arm rest, map pockets and door bins that will hold an iPad and refillable water bottle.
In the front, there are two cup holders which can hold a reusable or disposable coffee cups. A wireless phone charging pad is also included. The glove box and central console box are a practical size for family life too.
The door bins in the front are even more generous for holding a water bottle and iPad.
The BMW iX3 does family comfort very well. My favourite of these features is in the front of the BMW iX3, Â the adjustable headrests! You can easily bring them forward or back depending on if you have a ponytail or not.
While we are talking about comfort, in the back, there are air-conditioning vents and temperature controls in the back of the central console box which are necessary for keeping rear passengers comfortable while driving.
When it comes to boot storage, the BMW iX3 is practical for families too and holds thirteen shopping bags from empty. This is comparable to similar-sized luxury electric SUVs like the Jaguar I-Pace, which also holds thirteen and the Audi e-Tron, which holds fifteen shopping bags.
This EV model I am testing has a smaller boot than the petrol or diesel X3 (in my measuring it held one bag less) and the plug-in-hybrid model has the smallest boot of all.
Your family dog will fit nicely in the boot or a twin or double pram will fit in the boot with a with a couple of bags of shopping.
For those with modular single or double prams, they fit well in the boot too with six shopping bags around them.
The BMW iX3 officially has a 460km battery range, which we found to be very accurate which took away all range anxiety. It is said to charge from 10-80% in just 32mins which is pretty fast and perfect for a family highway stop. It also comes with five years of unlimited Chargefox public charging, which is very generous too.
The BMW iX3 is a smooth and quiet car to drive and being fully electric it has all the lovely benefits of being nice and quiet, being able to drive your kids to sleep or being the parent taxi service without churning through fuel or polluting the air around you. And with the five years free with Chargefox, you could potentially pay for no ‘fuel'!
The media system in the BMW iX3 is very modern and in-depth it does have Apple CarPlay, which is handy to access your phone's communications, listening and navigation apps while driving. I also found the built-in sat-nav really nice and easy to use.
A surprise feature which I enjoyed during my week with the iX3 is the Caring Car mode where you can choose either Vitalise or Relax settings. Vitalise is good for long motorway journeys where you need to stay awake and it blows cold air through the vents and plays uplifting vitalising music.
Relax plays more chilled out music!
You can also control or preset your charging too through the media screen.
The cameras are excellent in the BMW iX3 which made parking nice and easy with three child seats in the back.
The battery range is clearly displayed in the bottom left of the driver display screen and you have a great seatbelt removal visual in this screen too.
I LOVED driving the BMW iX3 as it is a great EV with quick acceleration and feels light and fun to drive.
Ths iX3 has a slightly smaller boot than the petrol or diesel X3 but is still a practical size for a family SUV. From empty, it will hold thirteen shopping bags (one less than the petrol or diesel X3). This is comparable to similar-sized luxury electric SUVs like the Jaguar I-Pace, which also holds thirteen and the Audi e-Tron, which holds fifteen shopping bags.
The twin stroller fits in the boot of the BMW iX3 with two shopping bags.
A modular, tandem stroller fits in the boot of the BMW iX3 with six shopping bags around it.
The boot space and its functionality are really important. I like to have a big boot space and little side wells or areas I can divide things into. So something I don’t want to move around while I’m driving such as Bub’s lunch bag or her wet swimming gear can be sectioned off in a little well where it’s not going to spill or get squashed by the rest of the things in the boot.
Hooks for securing shopping bags to are also favourites of mine, I like being able to secure the bag containing more fragile things like eggs so they don’t move around on the journey.
I measure the boot space in freezer shopping bags, prams and dogs. Not because I think all there is to a mum’s life is food shopping, prams and dogs. (Although it can feel like it sometimes!!) But because these are visually mesurable items we can all associate with. For me, the car company boot measurement of litres is not an amount I can easily visualise and 400L in one car may differ in usability to that in another due to the configuration or shape of the space.
A single pram fits in the boot of the BMW iX3 with five shopping bags beside it.
The compact stroller fits in the boot of the BMW iX3 with ten shopping bags beside it.
You can fit a medium size dog in the boot of the BMW iX3.
The boot floor of the BMW iX3 is flat and carpeted – perfect for an emergency nappy change!
How good is storage inside the 2022 BMW iX3?
The storage inside the 2022 BMW iX3 is practical for families. With two cup holders in the front central console that will hold a reusable and disposable coffee cup and in front of them is a wireless phone charging pad.
The central console storage is quite deep with a USB-C charging socket inside.
The glove box will hold an iPad and wallet with the manual.
The front door bins will hold a large refillable water bottle with plenty of room for your iPad behind it.
Storage in the second row is good too, with door bins that will also hold a large refillable water bottle and slightly less room for an iPad than you get in the front.
There is a fold-down armrest in the central seatback of the BMW iX3 with a lidded phone tray and two cup holders that will hold a reusable or disposable coffee cup or a refillable water bottle fits in them too.
In the back of both front seats are net map pockets that will hold but not conceal an iPad. There is a small shelf and two USB sockets in the back of the central console box too.
BabyDrive Indepth - Noise
How noisy is the 2022 BMW iX3?
The BMW iX3 is a lovely quiet car to drive. The media system is easy to navigate and includes Apple CarPlay.
The camera image is lovely and clear and you have different angles to view from too.
‘Caring Car' mode was a surprise for me in the BMW iX3.
You can choose either Vitalise or Relax. Vitalise is good for long motorway journeys where you need to stay awake and it blows cold air through the vents and plays uplifting vitalising music. Relax mode is a gentle flow of air and plays more chilled-out music!
The digital driver's display in the BMW iX3 tells you your battery range which is really useful, as well as the speed limit and seatbelt removal visual too. You can choose what information it shows, so I have mine set up to clearly show the sat-nav and my speed.
The doors and windows of the iX3 close gently, so they are not baby waking.
The doors close quite easily with a gentle close, which was surprising for a car of this size. With baby asleep you can get in and out without worrying the doors will be too noisy. The same for the windows their mechanism is not too noisy and I didn’t notice them having a loud opening or closing sound.
With baby asleep you want to be able to get in and out without worrying the doors will be too noisy and wake Bub up!Â
Road and wind noise are pretty non existent in the BMW iX3, you feel cocooned from from the outside world and being an EV there is no engine noise to disturb your journey either. The drive feels robust as you'd expect from a luxury brand car.
You can lock the doors and windows from the driver's door control panel.
BabyDrive Indepth - Car Seats
How many child seats fit in the 2022 BMW iX3?
There are top tether anchorages in the back of all three rear backrests of the BMW iX3. (There are also anchorages for something else in the tops of the outer rear seatbacks and could be easily mistaken for top tether anchorages, so be careful.)
There are ISOFix points in the two outer rear seats of the BMX iX3, that are within plastic guides and nice and easy to connect to.
Legroom is good in the BMW iX3 and with a rear-facing child seat installed in the second-row, we could just about fit a 182cm passenger in the front.
Posting Bub into their child seat was easy from outside the iX3 as the doorways are nice and wide and inside the ceiling is quite high so it is easy to post them in from inside too.
Australia being a country of weather extremes; blazing sun and torrential rain, mean you may find it easier to put Bub into their seat from inside the car sometimes. If it’s hot you can get the air-con going, cool the car down and not stand out in the sun while you fasten them in or shelter from the rain and not get soaked yourself whilst you’re doing it. So it is important to test whether Bub can be easily installed from either direction!
There is plenty of room to feed Bub in the back of the BMW iX3 if you only have one child seat installed. There is just about enough room for me (162cm in height) to sit between two child seats also.
BabyDrive Indepth - Drive & Comfort
How comfortable is the 2022 BMW iX3? And How good is the 2022 BMW iX3 to drive?
The front cabin of the 2022 BMW iX3 is an enjoyable place to be! The seats are lovely and comfortable and easily adjustable using the controls on the side of the seat base.
Their best feature is the adjustable headrests…
…meaning I could wear a ponytail or what ever hairstyle I liked while driving. Woo Hoo!
I had spent hours styling my hair this morning to get this ponytail just right too… said no new mum ever!!!
For a mum travelling in the back with Bub, the seats are extremely comfortable too. The central seat has a firm backrest where the fold down armrest is. Legroom is good in the back and I had plenty of legroom behind a 182cm driver and I'm 162cm.
For the first year of my Bub's life when we would go out as a family, if I wasn’t driving, I would travel in the back with Bub so it’s important to check the back seat comfort as you may be spending a lot of time in them! They were never something I gave any thought to before but I definitely notice a good or bad back seat now!
The steering wheel is fully adjustable in/out and up/down.
Across the front dashboard, there are four air conditioning vents, they can be easily controlled using the buttons on the central dash, below the media screen.
In the second row, there are air-conditioning vents and controls in the back of the central console box and two USB-C sockets. I could reach the vents to adjust them for my children while driving.
Visibility in the BMW iX3 is good, it has great acceleration and is nice and smooth and quiet. I found it to have a small turning circle making it easy to maneuver and park. Great for the school run!
When maneuvering or parking, the visibility out the windows and excellent camera image really helped.
One thing I have noticed since being a mum is I hate it when I reach a destination or get home from being out and Bub has either done really well in the car or she is screaming her head off and I have done really well to keep it together for the entire journey (usually the latter!!) and it takes 10 minutes to park the car! It can be really stressful. The BMW iX3, was easy to park in our tight apartment block carpark.
Scoring a total of 93% or 35.4Â out of 38 for adult occupancy. Broken down into 7.34Â out of 8Â for the full-width frontal crash test, 7.42Â out of 8Â for the frontal offset test. Full marks for the side impact test and for the pole test.
For Child Occupancy protection the BMW iX3 scored 41.2 out of 49 which is 84%. ANCAP said of the testing:
In the frontal offset test, protection of the neck of the 10 year old dummy was rated as marginal. Otherwise, protection of both child dummies was good or adequate. In the side impact test, protection of both dummies was good for all critical body areas.
Seven airbags come as standard in the BMW iX3; Dual frontal, side chest, side head-protecting (curtain) and driver knee airbags are standard.
As standard, the BMW iX3 comes with active bonnet, antilock braking system (ABS), autonomous emergency braking (AEB) City/Interurban/Vulnerable road user, automatic headlights, automatic high beam, automatic emergency call (eCall), blind spot monitoring (BSM), electronic brake-force distribution (EBD), electronic stability control (ESC), emergency brake assist (EBA), emergency stop signal (ESS), forward collision warning (FCW), fatigue detection, daytime running lights (DRL), hill launch assist, pre-crash systems, reversing collision avoidance, speed assistance – automatic / intelligent speed limiting (ISA) / manual speed limiting / speed sign recognition & warning and tyre pressure monitoring system (TPMS).
Some of these safety features are also features that drive me crazy as a mum! Like the lane departure and forward collision alert or the parking sensor beeping sound. I want all the safety technology AND to be able to mute the sound when Bub’s asleep!
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About Tace Clifford
Tace Clifford founded BabyDrive in 2017 after discovering a huge information gap in mainstream car reviews that left new parents and expanding families in the dark when it came to one of the biggest purchasing decisions of their lives.
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ERM…fast facts box. Fuel use 460L/100km? Typo methinks.
Haha that’s the battery range, the graphic hasn’t updated!!