The Hyundai Ioniq 5 N was a revelation. Obviously, with more than 600 horsepower, it was going to be quick, but it ended up being so much more than that. It’s an absolute blast to drive, and a big part of that is because it will trick you with fake shifts. It sounds like a gimmick, but it’s actually legitimately useful on track. If you were hoping Porsche would follow suit and give its future EVs fake shifts, though, we have some bad news. Australia’s Drive reports that’s not going to happen.
Speaking with a group of Australian journalists, development driver Lars Kern said Porsche doesn’t see why its EVs should mimic gas-powered cars:
Obviously, we look into what the competition does, but our perspective on this is always why should we make something worse? I mean because, in like just how it translates power or how power is applied? The electric engine is better than an ICE [internal combustion engine], so we figured there’s no reason to simulate what has been in the past.
We looked at it, but … I don’t see the point of using it to make it feel like a combustion engine because it’s not, so we don’t. We don’t want to fake the combustion engine because we still produce combustion engines, so we don’t we don’t see the point of doing it.
Kern really couldn’t have been much more explicit than that. Unless something changes, Porsche won’t offer fake shifting on future EVs. And it’s not like he’s wrong. Using the fake transmission mode in the Ioniq 5 N makes it a half-second slower to 60 mph than with it turned off. If you want to go around the track as fast as possible, of course, you won’t want to turn it on. If you want to have fun on the track, though, who cares about a half-second here or there? It sounds dumb in theory, but the fake shifts really do make the Ioniq 5 N a more engaging car.
We’ve reached out to Porsche PR to confirm Kern’s comments and will update this post should they get back to us. Hopefully, the folks at Porsche eventually change their minds. It makes sense that they care so much about lap times, but sometimes having fun is just more important.
