BMW i4 falls short with four-star ANCAP safety score

The BMWi4 electric car has fallen short of the expected result in ANCAP safety testing, managing four stars out of five. It’s the sole tested BMW on sale here without a five-star score.

The i4 did well in adult occupant protection (87 per cent) and child occupant protection (89 per cent), and managed a middling score for vulnerable road user protection (71 per cent). 

But it fell down in the safety assist assessment with 62 per cent, below the five-star threshold. It failed to pass both the ‘AEB – Junction Assist’ and ‘Lane Support Systems’ tests.

The overall result is based on the car’s four-star score from Euro NCAP testing, which is aligned with ANCAP. And here’s where the story gets more interesting.

ANCAP claims to have offered BMW Australia the chance to submit a local-market i4 for further testing with a chance at five stars, because in this market the car comes with more advanced driver-assist systems as standard than it does in Europe.

Yet it claims BMW declined, hence it was stuck with a mirrored Euro NCAP score.

“A four star safety rating also carries through from European testing to battery-electric BMW i4 vehicles sold in Australia and New Zealand,” ANCAP said.

“BMW advised ANCAP that the AEB and lane support systems fitted to locally-specified vehicles is of a higher standard than the systems tested in Europe, yet BMW did not put the vehicle forward to ANCAP for verification testing to confirm performance of these systems.”

We have reached out to BMW Australia for further clarification.

Australian BMW i4s come with the following standard safety equipment.

• Autonomous emergency braking
  • Car-to-car
  • Vulnerable road users
  • Junction assist
• Forward collision warning
• Lane-keep assist
• Speed limit recognition
• Lane departure warning
• High-beam assist
• Driving Assistant Professional
  • Adaptive cruise control with stop/go
  • Steering and Lane Control Assistant (semi-autonomous mode)
  • Evasion Aid
  • Front cross-traffic alert

MORE: Here’s how ANCAP is making crash tests harder from 2023