Zeekr on ice: sliding the 500kW 7GT, 8X and 9X above Cardrona

Zeekr flew media into Central Otago in August for a two-day preview. Day one was at Highlands Motorsport Park. Day two was up the Cardrona Valley at the Southern Hemisphere Proving Grounds, where car makers from around the world do their winter development work.

The 7GT was the main reason for the trip. On the snow with it were the 8X and 9X, the two Super Hybrid SUVs confirmed for New Zealand, along with the Zeekr X and 7X we can already buy. Zeekr also brought a 001 FR, which claims 0 to 100km/h in 2.02 seconds. On ice, traction sets the limit rather than power, so no one was able to experience that particular sensation.

A full range, months early

Dane Fisher, who heads local distributor NordEast, says it was the first electrified ice experience in the Southern Hemisphere. He believes it’s also the first time any brand has brought its complete coming model range to a country this far ahead of launch.

“We’ve got the full 2027 model lineup months and months before any other right-hand drive country, and before anyone’s going to see a lot of these products, which I think is pretty bold, courageous and different,” says Fisher.

Michael Jones, Zeekr brand manager for NordEast, says the three new models are locked in. “All three have been confirmed. Configuration regarding battery spec and timing is still being determined, but we’re hoping 9X and GT will be late this year, early next year.” The 8X “is a little bit later, but there are still a lot of moving parts and it’s still very fluid,” he says.

On the snow

The programme was about low-grip handling. We started with understeer and oversteer exercises in the Zeekr X, back to back. Set off at a set speed, turn the wheel hard, and the car pushes straight on whatever you do with the steering. Repeat at low speed with power on mid-corner and the tail steps out instead. Doing both minutes apart, in the same car on the same surface, shows you quickly what a car is doing underneath you.

Next was an S-shaped slide course, left then right, which gets the car swinging like a pendulum. The X was the most fun here. Its short wheelbase makes it lively, and less forgiving once it lets go. The longer cars were calmer through the same sequence. It all happens at low speed, so you can get it wrong safely.

Then the slalom, a long line of cones, first in the 8X, my first drive of Zeekr’s mid-size plug-in hybrid SUV, then in the 7X. The 7X was more entertaining through the cones. I made an absolute dog’s breakfast of my run and may have collected a cone or two. The footage is below.

The 7GT

The 7GT is a lower, wagon-shaped sister to the 7X, which has been on sale here since November. It uses the same 800V architecture but sits around 200mm lower, at a little over 4.8 metres long on a wheelbase just under three metres. It’s been sold in China for more than a year as the 007 GT and reached Europe earlier this year.

New Zealand gets all three grades: a standard range rear-drive car, a long range rear-drive car and an all-wheel drive performance model. The single-motor cars make 335kW and the dual-motor car makes 500kW. Both are up on the equivalent 7X, and the 500kW figure is also up on the 475kW Zeekr sells in Europe.

“The 500 kilowatts is what we are going to get in New Zealand and Australia,” says Kenneth Lu, Zeekr’s director of product and aftersales for Australia. “The performance itself has been tuned to have that peak power.”

Zeekr claims 0-100km/h in 6.5 seconds for the standard range car, 5.5 for the long range and 3.5 for the all-wheel drive. The standard range car has a 75kWh Golden Brick lithium iron phosphate pack. The long range grades get a 100kWh Qilin nickel manganese cobalt battery, quoted at 655km WLTP. Peak DC charging is 450kW, with 10 to 80 per cent claimed in as little as 10.5 minutes on the smaller battery. That’s on chargers considerably faster than anything operating here.

At Highlands the day before, Zeekr ran a high-speed lane change with regen switched fully off. The stability control steps in quickly and obviously, and the car was straight again before I’d finished worrying about it. A gymkhana course in the rain showed the weight. This is a heavy car and it doesn’t hide it through tight switchbacks. On the circuit itself the 7GT was one of the most comfortable cars we’ve taken on a track, with the active damping keeping it settled over kerbs and camber changes.

On the snow, the long wheelbase means the tail takes a moment to come round, and then it really moves.

The cars at both venues were left-hand drive Chinese domestic market examples. Local tuning is still being worked through, so treat all of this as a first impression.

The 8X and 9X

This was my first look at the 8X and 9X in person. Both are striking, the 9X flagship especially, and its design will split opinion. To my eye the front has a hint of Range Rover, though Zeekr would probably disagree.

Both are plug-in hybrids, and the display cars carried 70kWh batteries. That’s big enough to run them as electric cars day to day and use the petrol engine for long trips. Jones puts electric-only range at up to 300km. We’ll know how that holds up once we get one on New Zealand roads.

Price and timing

There’s no New Zealand pricing for the 7GT yet. The 7X runs from $69,990 to $94,990, and in Europe the 7GT costs less than the equivalent 7X. Jones expects it to land around 7X money, since it shares the platform and motor setup. Lu also told us a special edition is under discussion, with one example at the event, but he wouldn’t confirm it for production.

Sliding cars around on snow is a lot of fun, and you learn plenty about traction, stability control and balance. You don’t learn what these cars are like to live with. That will have to wait until the 8X and 9X arrive and we can spend real time in them. Sometimes, though, it’s okay to just have a bit of fun.

This story first appeared in issue 05 2026 of EVs & Beyond magazine, which you can download free here.