This is my first car in my life, so I think it’s necessary to use words to commemorate the whole process from selecting, picking up, to using it. At the same time, I also hope to help friends who are still hesitating about choosing a car, waiting for delivery, or already using the car.

The article is relatively long, and it will take about 15 minutes to read the entire article. You can choose the section that interests you according to the subheadings～

Preface

I’m actually a car novice. Although I got my driver’s license on the summer after the college entrance examination, almost ten years have passed, and I haven’t touched a car and don’t know much about cars. After visiting the auto show during the National Day holiday in 2019, I suddenly became interested in cars and learned a lot about cars on Autohome. I also learned about new energy vehicles from that time.

Do You Need a Car

Firstly, do we need a car? If we figure out this question, we don’t need to worry about whether to buy a car or not.

Actually, I’ve been living in Chengdu for the past two years, and I live very close to my workplace, so I don’t need a car for commuting. However, this year, I returned to Hefei to live, and my company is 10 kilometers away from home. It takes me about two hours to commute every day, which is very long, and I’m not comfortable taking the bus. At the same time, I also want to go self-driving, camping and so on after having a car. On the other hand, I’ve had my driver’s license for almost ten years, and it’s time for me to learn to drive and get a car. So I decided to buy my first car in my life.

Choosing between New Energy and Fuel Cars

At this stage, this question still depends on your own needs. If you have a fuel car at home and plan to buy a second car, then I strongly recommend you to choose new energy vehicles instead of hybrid or range-extended electric vehicles, because electric vehicles are currently very suitable for commuting within cities, and it’s enough to use fuel cars for long-distance travel. Electric car charging is also very cheap, and the electricity bill is only a few hundred yuan a year. Therefore, if it’s the second car in the family, it’s strongly recommended to choose pure electric vehicles.

If it’s your first car and you often have the habit of long-distance travel, then I suggest you buy a fuel car or an electric car company with a self-built energy supplement system or a range-extended electric vehicle.

Of course, if you care about the increasingly high oil prices and the subsequent maintenance costs, it’s still recommended to choose a pure electric vehicle.

Traditional fuel cars are generally far behind new energy car companies in terms of intelligence and automatic driving assistance. If you care about intelligence and automatic driving assistance, and you need automatic driving assistance like me as a novice driver, then I strongly recommend you to choose a new energy vehicle.

Final Choice: Pure Electric VehicleFirst of all, let me explain why I chose new energy vehicles. I have been paying attention to cars for a long time, but due to financial constraints, I did not buy one until June or July of this year. Because gas prices are particularly expensive and maintenance costs are high, the cost of using a traditional car far exceeds that of an electric car. Since I mainly use it for urban commuting and don’t have much demand for range, traditional cars, extended-range electric cars and hybrid electric cars were excluded.

I chose to purchase a vehicle from a self-built energy supplement system enterprise. This narrowed down my options to three: Tesla, XPeng, and NIO.

Tesla has had a self-built energy supplement system for over a decade, and there are basically Tesla charging stations all over the world. In terms of convenience and quantity, they are definitely the industry leader. As China’s first enterprise to build its own charging stations, XPeng has also deployed nearly 600 stations. The deployment of ultra-high-voltage charging stations in the next two years is worth looking forward to, whether in terms of quantity or charging speed. NIO’s battery swap station just broke 700 the other day, and the system of swap station and charging stations supplementing each other is also very innovative.

Why don’t I recommend car companies without a complete energy supplement system? Because the experience of third-party charging stations is not particularly good, and the charging speed is far from reaching the speed of the enterprise’s own charging stations. Some traditional cars also occupy spots without parking locks. Although the number and network of third-party charging stations are huge, I still prefer a better experience with parking locks and the ability to go to the fastest charging station specially reserved for the enterprise.

Why I choose XPeng

Since Tesla, XPeng, and NIO have been selected, I made appointments to test-drive all three cars in person and experience them myself.

XPeng’s store is closest to my home, so I test-drove the XPeng P7 first. The streamlined coupe styling is really good-looking, and I tried features such as intelligent parking, adaptive cruise control, and full-scene voice during the test drive. It also has enough power response for acceleration, as well as Dan’s audio and interior ambient lighting, which I really like. I fell in love with it at first sight. The price is under 300,000 yuan, so I was pretty sure XPeng was the one for me.

However, it is necessary to shop around before making purchases. So I went to test-drive the Tesla Model 3 high-performance version, and I also liked the interior design very much. Although there are many criticisms of Tesla’s interior online, I like this minimalist beauty. The acceleration and power response are much faster than XPeng’s, which I could clearly feel, but as a novice, I dare not drive it fast so it is not particularly useful for me. I am somewhat skeptical of the pure vision scheme for autonomous driving, but the experience of using it is on par with XPeng. As for the voice control feature, it is not as good as XPeng’s. The price of over 300,000 yuan was a bit high, and the range of the 240,000 yuan standard version was slightly less, so I passed on Tesla.The car I test drove at the auto show was NIO. Unfortunately, the salesperson was not proactive, perhaps because the auto show was crowded. Being a resident of Hefei, where NIO’s headquarters is located, I am somewhat familiar with NIO. Before purchasing, I did my homework and found that NIO’s service is excellent. However, my test drive experience was poor, and I was not allowed to use the automatic assisted driving function. I reported this issue on the NIO app and was invited by their user experience chief to have another test drive. The overall experience was okay, but not great.

Although NIO’s battery swap and upgrade solutions, as well as Battery as a Service (BaaS) offerings, are attractive to me, their SUV is too big for me. The rear seats are comfortable, which is an advantage over the smaller Xpeng P7 and Tesla models. However, as a novice driver, I find it challenging to handle such a large vehicle, and the automatic assisted driving function is not particularly impressive. As such, I did not consider NIO.

As mentioned earlier, I am a novice driver and need assistance in parking, staying in my lane, and highway navigation. Before making my choice, I read a lot of reviews from bloggers on the automatic assisted driving functions of new energy vehicles, such as TechXin, Li Dachui, and 42 Garage, among others. They rated Xpeng’s automatic driving technology as the best in China. Xpeng’s automatic driving technology is the most suitable for China’s road conditions, and their full-stack, self-developed automatic driving technology, combined with the test drive experience of these three companies, led me to choose Xpeng.

In July and August, Xpeng released a new model, the Xpeng P5, which features versatile smart home sedan functions and is equipped with the latest City NGP 3.5 technology, which includes two LiDAR sensors. The price is also cheaper than the P7, so I reserved a P5 with the 600P purple color scheme. After watching the Xpeng P5 launch event on the evening of September 15th, the blind booking price was revealed, and I converted it into a firm booking immediately. Taking all the discounts into consideration, I felt that the 600P was more expensive than the 550P by CNY 12,500. I also wanted to see the real car of the purple version, but the color looked more blue in the pictures, so I was conflicted between the purple and white colors.

Here, I’d like to praise my sales agent, who arranged for me to see the white car upon arrival in Hefei. On September 25th, the purple car finally arrived, and my sales agent picked me up and took me to another store to see the actual vehicle. After comparing the two, I found the purple color somewhat bluish, so I changed my order from the 600P purple to the 550P white. I signed the purchase contract that same afternoon and began the long wait for delivery.

After a long wait for the car, I received the AB plan with the shortage of millimeter-wave radar on October 26th. Although I needed the assisted driving function, I realized that choosing to install the millimeter-wave radar later would not affect the intelligent parking, and it could save 25,000 yuan for the city’s NGP 3.5. It was very appealing to me, so I chose the B plan.

At the end of October, the first batch of blind-order car owners were delivered one after another. I asked XiaoPeng customer service when my car would be delivered. They said it would be the latest in March. I was very angry because I was also a blind-order car owner. Why was I put so far behind? During this period I kept reporting problems repeatedly to sales and customer service.

In mid-November, I asked the customer service again, and they said the car would be delivered in mid-to-late November. I was very surprised because it was earlier than expected. Finally, on November 24th, the delivery status was updated to the car being successfully prepared and shipped that evening. It arrived in Hefei on the 26th. Since the 27th and 28th were weekends, the car was not serviced, and on the 29th, Monday, I was informed that there was a small amount of paint peeling off one of the doors during transport. To compensate me, they gave me 10,000 points and the right to repaint the affected area later, and I accepted this.

I scheduled to pick up the car on December 1st, and went to the delivery center with my family to pick up the car. When I arrived at the delivery center, I saw my car parked in the delivery hall at first sight. The car was very clean, with a bunch of flowers on it, which looked very beautiful. The delivery guy first showed me the car and then I paid the full price, so the process was very quick. At noon, I had a good lunch at the delivery center.

In the afternoon, I handled the car insurance, and my friend said it would be more convenient to get insurance from the dealership in the first year, so I bought the cheapest Ping An insurance, which cost over 5,600 yuan. Then, the delivery guy gave me the temporary license plate, the reverse charger, and the portable charger that I had pre-ordered. He also explained the relevant functions of the vehicle to me, helped me set up the Bluetooth car key in my phone, and took a photo with the car. After we finished, he drove my car out of the delivery center and the handover process was officially completed, and I applauded for him.On the way home, I accidentally rubbed a tricycle while driving on the narrow road, because I was not familiar with my car. The front of my white car lost a bit of paint. It was heartbroken. After that, I did not dare to drive, I spent half a month practicing reversing at home and driving on weekends. Finally, I drove to work on December 15th for the first time, haha.

Vehicle Registration and Charging

Let me talk about vehicle registration and charging, after all, I hope everyone can avoid the pit I encountered for the first time.

I didn’t choose to spend 600 yuan to have Xpeng register the vehicle for me. After picking up the car in Hefei, I needed to take the bag of documents that were delivered to me to the tax bureau to apply for tax exemption, which only took 3 minutes to complete. After that, I could register the vehicle.

You can first apply for number selection online at 12123. There are two types of online number selections, one is self-selection and the other is random selection. There are 20 chances for self-selection, and once you have made the selections, you cannot select again. Random selection will give you 5 sets of 10 numbers. You can select one number from each set and ultimately select one from the five sets. If you don’t like any of them, you can choose not to select. The final 50 selection 1 will take place at the vehicle management office in person. You need to have a vehicle inspection after making a selection. Since I didn’t make an appointment, I had to wait in line for two hours!

You can make an appointment online in advance, and you won’t have to wait in line if you have an appointment. The process is fast. Be sure to bring the bag of documents that was delivered to you. I didn’t know what the chassis number tracing strip was at first, so when the police officer asked me, I was a little confused. In the end, they dug out a strip from under the passenger seat beside me, and I finally realized that I had it with me in my armrest box. You also need to prepare a reflective vest and a triangle warning sign. After the vehicle inspection, you can go to register the vehicle.

When they asked me where the photo was for the registration, I was stunned. I thought the stickers in the bag were photos so I didn’t bring anything. However, it didn’t matter. They printed a photo on site and processed the driving license. But the on-site photo was definitely not as good as the one given by Xpeng, so don’t forget to bring it! After registering the vehicle, you can choose to pick up in person or have it mailed. I chose to have it mailed. The cost of the license plate was 20 yuan and the postage was 25 yuan, for a total of 45 yuan. It was much cheaper than the 600 yuan charged by Xpeng.

The first weekend after picking up the car, after driving practice, I went to Xpeng’s exclusive charging station to charge. There was a lifting ground lock, and parking was also free. Plugging in for the first time was a bit difficult, and it took me a long time to insert the cable. The charging rate was very fast. It only took more than 30 minutes to reach 90%. When I unplugged the cable, I also took a long time, but fortunately, I succeeded.“`
小鹏自建的桩不用扫码，会直接在 App里扣除电费的。我买车的时候是送了每年 3,000 度电，所以就直接扣除了，大家可以注意一下，电费卡是提车第二天才会生效，并不会当天生效哦，不过现在购买每年只有 1,000 度了，所以大家早买早享受呀，说不定明年就不送电费了。

550P 车型 17 寸轮毂，充满电的三种模式续航如下所示，最符合实际续航的 WLTP 是 465 km，NEDC 是 550 km，CLTC 是 570km。

外观和内饰

提车半个多月，给大白洗了个澡，颜值还是非常好看的，珠光白的车身闪闪发光，黑色的 Nappa 座椅坐起来也很舒服，车里的大屏和仪表盘非常简约，车内没有按键，对新手非常友好，有什么不会的呼叫小 P 就可以帮你完成。

周末的时候，把赠送的睡眠套装铺在车里休息了一会，不得不说，床是真的软，不过收拾起来也很麻烦。中午的时候吃完饭，躺进车里，开着空调，开着香氛，开着音乐，美哉美哉！

续航里程

自己开了半个多月了，新手开车比较慢，用了标准、运动、经济、舒享和单踏板模式，动能回收分别试过低、中、高，开了空调和音乐，能耗均在 11—14 kWh/100 km 之间，大部分都在 12 kWh/100 km，所以以我的能耗比来计算，是可以做到 WLTP 计算模式下的 1：1，NEDC 550 充满换算成 WLTP 大概是在 460，所以我对大白的能耗是很满意的。

看到 P7 车主每周都有能耗报告，也希望小鹏的技术大大能够给其他车型也做个能耗报告！

昨天把电充满，WLTP 显示 465 km，今天跑了告诉去巢湖玩耍，能耗是 12.4 kWh/100 km，还是非常的低，昨天冲完到今天去巢湖的来回，总共跑了 206.2 km，剩余续航 264 km，总共可以跑 470.2 km，比昨天充满显示的续航还多，所以按照我的驾驶习惯，我对大白的续航是非常非常的满意，并不存在什么虚标的情况～当然每个人的驾驶习惯不同，所对应的续航也不同，因人而异啦～
“`

My favorite feature so far is the Smart Parking. The parking lines in my garage are unclear and I cannot park properly, but the car can recognize and park the car perfectly every time, even better than me ha ha ha ha! I hope that more assisted driving functions will be unlocked after the millimeter-wave radar is added next year, such as NGP for highways and cities, as well as memory parking function.

Practical Accessories

After purchasing my car, I have been paying close attention to accessories, and I also want to @Miss Queeine to share some useful and affordable accessories that she introduced me after receiving her car. I would like to share them with everyone now.

Floor mat: At the time, there were no P5 floor mats in the mall, so after purchasing the car, I pre-ordered the official floor mats from XPeng’s after-sales service. I also used them on the same day I picked up my car. The price of 780 RMB is a bit expensive, but I used my points to redeem them. They are very comfortable to step on, and the opening molds are also suitable for the car, so I recommend buying them.

Window tint: Window tinting is essential for anti-explosion, heat insulation and sun protection. I compared various brands and eventually bought the Quantum Film Zundiamond series during the Double Eleven sale for 2,910 RMB. Later, I asked the shop owner about it and found out that the film is made of metal, which may affect the signal of Electronic Toll Collection (etc). Therefore, I returned it. The XPeng App’s Pengyue Nanoceramic Film was made by Kangde Xin and does not affect the signal, so I went to the official flagship store and asked for the same film for 1,300 RMB during the Double Twelve sale. It was worth it. When applying the window tint, I also asked the technician to help me attach the license plate, and I gave them good feedback!

DDPai mini3: The official mall is currently out of stock, so I purchased it during the Double Twelve sale at XPeng’s official flagship store. The parameters and pixels are sufficient. The shop owner also sent me a 30cm short cable, so I can use it without wiring by connecting it to the USB port beside the rearview mirror. It is clean and beautiful, and the shop owner also provided installation service. I recommend it.

Electronic ETC: A little gadget that I really like, currently out of stock on official website, will buy it when it becomes available. It can be charged through the 3-pin socket beside the rearview mirror without needing to insert a card. It looks better than other ETCs given by banks and other places, with a simple and beautiful appearance. Highly recommended.

Key Case: Official key case was given upon delivery, won’t comment on how good it looks, but it’s free so why not haha.

Wireless Microphone: I exchanged my points for an official microphone, it’s an entertainment artifact that can be charged when relaxing.

Parking Plate: I chose the QR code parking plate without any numbers because it has better privacy protection and won’t leak my phone number. Got it from PDD, only 2 yuan and free shipping, recommended purchase.

Formaldehyde Remover: Since there is already an air freshener and air purifier in the car, I cannot smell any strange odors. However, I tested the formaldehyde and it exceeded twice the limit. Therefore, it’s recommended to open the windows for better ventilation. I purchased the Green Space formaldehyde remover and it feels pretty good, you can buy it according to your needs as well.

Screen Protector: Choose a tempered glass one to protect the instrument panel and central control screen.

Cup Holder Pad: 16 pieces in a set, can prevent dust and dirt from entering the storage compartment of the car. Recommended purchase.

Anti-Collision Stickers: 6 strips, 4 for the doors and 2 for the rearview mirror. Those who are familiar with driving know the importance of these stickers, it’s up to you to decide whether you need them or not.

Headrests and lumbar supports: Nappa leather is very comfortable. Personally, I don’t need them, but armrests are available for the rear seats and the front passenger seat, depending on your needs.

Tips: For reference only. We do not recommend links. Purchase according to your own needs.

Conclusion

I am very satisfied with XPeng’s cars. From the perspective of range, appearance, interior, intelligence, and autonomous driving assistance capabilities, this is the most intelligent family sedan that best fits my expectations. However, everyone has their own opinions, and it depends on your own requirements. At least for now, the XPeng P5 is perfect for my requirements in a sedan. I think it is the best car for me at this time.

Consider your own needs, balance your budget, and choose the car that best suits you. I hope that my article can help you, and I look forward to being a XPeng friend with you. I am Milu, see you next time! Bye.

This article is a translation by ChatGPT of a Chinese report from 42HOW. If you have any questions about it, please email bd@42how.com.