{"id":300204,"date":"2026-02-16T01:54:12","date_gmt":"2026-02-16T01:54:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/300204\/"},"modified":"2026-02-16T01:54:12","modified_gmt":"2026-02-16T01:54:12","slug":"leapmotor-t03-shows-an-electric-car-can-offer-urban-efficiency-at-a-price-that-rivals-the-cheapest-petrol-hatchback","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/300204\/","title":{"rendered":"Leapmotor T03 shows an electric car can offer urban efficiency at a price that rivals the cheapest petrol hatchback"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-91174671_secondary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom4 indo-1d70522a_marginleft0 indo-1d70522a_marginright0 indo-1d70522a_margintop4\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\" data-testid=\"title-summary\">\nThe list of the cheapest new cars for sale offers a reality check, with electric cars now dominating the top five &#8211; so is it worth taking one for a spin?\n<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Geraldine Herbert test drives the Leapmotor TO3. Photo: Paul Herbert-Kane\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/668b11d6-7e94-49c5-b45c-7ccc85cd4a7f.jpg\" loading=\"eager\" width=\"100%\" data-testid=\"article-image\"  \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_caption1 indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_secondary indo-66f0fec7_regular indo-1d70522a_marginbottom0 indo-1d70522a_marginleft0 indo-1d70522a_marginright0 indo-1d70522a_margintop3 indo-b48c4984_left\" style=\"color:var(--color-grey-60)\">Geraldine Herbert test drives the Leapmotor TO3. Photo: Paul Herbert-Kane<\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_primary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom0 indo-1d70522a_margintop0 indo-b48c4984_inherit\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\">There is still a general belief among some people that electric cars are wildly expensive, a certain financial folly dreamed up by policymakers and people who alphabetise their recycling. And yet, a quick glance at the cheapest new cars for sale currently presents quite the reality check.<\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_primary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom0 indo-1d70522a_margintop0 indo-b48c4984_inherit\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\">Take the current top five. At the top of the list sits the Dacia Spring at about \u20ac15,990 \u2013 an electric car with a range of over 200km. Right behind it is the BYD Dolphin Surf Active at \u20ac17,985 \u2013 another electric car. Next in the list is Dacia\u2019s Sandero from \u20ac18,890, and after that you arrive at the Leapmotor T03 at \u20ac18,950, our test car this week, and the Kia Picanto now nudging over \u20ac20,000. Small, solid, petrol hatchbacks used to be the \u2018cheap seats\u2019 but increasingly aren\u2019t.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The list of the cheapest new cars for sale offers a reality check, with electric cars now dominating&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":300205,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[72,7781,61,60,6361],"class_list":{"0":"post-300204","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-geraldine-herbert","10":"tag-ie","11":"tag-ireland","12":"tag-life-magazine"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/300204","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=300204"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/300204\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/300205"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=300204"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=300204"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=300204"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}