In today’s highly digitized and electrified world, enthusiasts find themselves lost or excluded in an alien landscape.

Especially for those that grew up driving very analog cars that required your full attention  from the 70’s up until the early 20-teens, many of today’s cars simply focus on maximum efficiency, outright speed, power or whatever other absolutes but feel sterile. The joy of interacting with a tactile machine that feels like an extension of your body is lost. Motoring and mobility is becoming a very black and white world where everything feels generic, featureless and inert.

Life should, as many a sage would say, be lived in different shades of gray. It is these varying degrees of intensity that provide meaning, context and fullness to an experience that ultimately leads to joy.

Feeling the progressive throttle, the gradual increase in steering effort as you wind in more lock, the added heft needed to step on the brakes, the tactility of rowing through the gears, and with it, the ever increasing rate of acceleration.

In a very electrified and highly digitized motoring landscape of today, is there anything remotely analog left for enthusiasts?

Thankfully, companies like Porsche continue to soldier on, catering to discerning enthusiasts who look for sheer driving pleasure more than absolute maximum performance metrics and outright peak figures.

Instead of impressive but ultimately callous pursuit of outright horsepower and top speed, Porsche focuses on effectively utilizing every available resource to efficiently accelerate, brake and steer their vehicles for the highest possible performance. This is Porsche Intelligent Performance, a core philosophy.

Instead of focusing on attaining the maximum, be it speed or power, the boffins at Zuffenhausen focus on making the most involving, most balanced and best handling, as well as enjoyable vehicle ever, regardless of where you are in the world. Always a true Porsche to the very core.

While other manufacturers focus on delivering the greatest possible advertised range as well as the most advanced autonomous driving features and assistance, Porsche has focused on endowing the Taycan, its first fully-electric vehicle, with a proper soul, and an analog one at that.

The Taycan’s haunting silhouette is inspired by the 911. It’s a four door coupe but feels like a proper sports car thanks to its swoopy, sensual low-slung body style. Sharing its platform, internally designated as the J1 with Audi’s e-Tron GT, it’s an all-new 800 volt architecture from the Volkswagen Group.

There is also a crossover body style called a Cross Turismo which is essentially a shooting brake or wagon with the added versatility of adjustable ride height but over a greater range, giving it almost crossover SUV-like versatility. We drove an earlier variant of this in Singapore back in late 2024.

In the base variant rear-driven and refreshed 2025 model year Taycan, range has improved to an impressive 610 kilometer range with the now standard and larger 105kw/h gross battery capacity, previously known as the optional Performance Plus Battery.

The base Taycan’s rear-drive motor is now more powerful, producing 429hp, 29hp more than the previous model. This improves 0-100km/h times to ~4.8 seconds with launch control engaged. The rear motor is also more efficient and receives updated thermal management contributing to range improvements.

It’s a realistically achievable range but EV pundits will say it’s laughably small given how expensive the Taycan is and how big its battery is. And that is precisely missing the point. Porsche isn’t competing on range. If range is your sole deciding factor on buying an electric vehicle, look elsewhere.

Also new for the refreshed 2025 model year Taycans are standard two-stage dual-valve dampers for the adaptive air suspension. An optional active ride suspension is available, allowing for individual damper control and thus eliminating traditional anti-roll bars.

The exterior also sees redesigned front and rear fascia, particularly the front and rear LED lamps.

Inside sees a revised dash and infotainment system with a standard driver assistance control stalk.

A 710-watt 14-speaker Bose surround sound system with subwoofer is now standard. The previous model made do with 10 speakers.

The 4-zone climate control system provides unmatched comfort especialy for rear passengers who can now control then own environment better.

There’s two-tone black and red leather seats grip you firmly in place, yet still provide good comfort for long drives.

The Taycan after all is a gran turismo; one should be able to reach, say Baguio, a popular benchmark for range and performance in Philippine car culture, immersed in the Taycan’s style and comfort.

Despite the Taycan’s versatile design brief, and its ability to be used everyday, just like any Porsche mainstream model, it also remains to be a very emotional purchase, one that encourages you to go for a drive and enjoy every single moment behind the wheel. Few, if any, other vehicles, electric or otherwise will call out to you the same way a Porsche does.

How do the improvements affect the Taycan’s driveability? It’s quite dramatic: ride improves significantly as it’s far less stiff, and much more compliant over the rough stuff  even with huge 20-inch wheels and tires. It also feels less nervous at higher speeds and fast sweepers. Yet it retains the trademark Porsche firmness that gives you confidence to push harder, brake later and dive into corners headlong.

The Taycan shines on long drives. You seek the longer, twistier and curvier drive home rather than the boring highway simply because the corners give you the opportunity to feel the Taycan perform.

Turn-in is crisper with less understeer and powering out of corners and the rear feels more adjustable with the throttle. Steering feels lighter, but still retains the same levels of feel and feedback. Overall comfort has vastly improved.

The earlier models felt more sports car in ride and civility whereas this refreshed model feels so much more useable on a daily basis.

All these improvements in comfort and refinement mean the Taycan becomes an even more convincing daily-drive proposition. Because after all, the best Porsche is the one you will use the most often.

The brakes in particular are more impressive than ever. Always a strong Porsche suit, the regenerative braking can now harvest as much as 320kw, aiding stopping performance and making energy recuperation and overall efficiency even more impressive.

Dare I say it, but the Taycan is the one true focused driver’s car in the EV sector: while everyone else tries to build a lifeless, soulless, sterile, one-trick pony EV that has either massive acceleration or a very impressive but often realistically unachievable advertised range and nothing else, the Taycan shows that electric vehicles can still be highly enjoyable, desirable, balanced and memorable cars to drive. It need not be a limp, lifeless and soulless experience.

The steering? Like a proper Porsche, alert but not nervous. The handling? Precise, confident and poised even under pressure. Honed at the legendary Nurburgring, it delivers the goods. The overall feel? Like a living, breathing entity with warmth and emotion. The Taycan has the ability to build a real emotional connection with you, the driver.

The Taycan isn’t your typical electric vehicle that focuses solely on the cold hard numbers game, particularly its range. You buy a Porsche Taycan if you want to feel alive yet drive electric.

The Taycan proves that even with an electric heart, it thankfully retains a truly analog soul.