Renault brought back the 5 as an affordable EV and won Car of the Year 2025

Carmakers had been abandoning small cars for larger, more profitable SUVs, and Renault's boss Luca de Meo admitted Europe had fallen well behind Tesla and Chinese brands such as BYD. His answer was to revive the original Renault 5 — the boxy but cheap runabout beloved by cost-conscious families in the 1970s and 80s — as a modern electric city car, telling the BBC he wanted to prove that small electric cars could be popular and profitable, and to give people a chance to afford the new technology.

The new 5 was unveiled in February 2024, priced from £25,000–30,000 in the UK, and de Meo was upfront that making money on it would be difficult. It shared its AmpR Small platform with the sports sibling Alpine A290, spreading development cost across two brands while keeping the entry price low.

The bet landed. In January 2025 a 60-strong jury made the Renault 5 (with the A290) Car of the Year 2025, scoring 353 points against 291 for the Kia EV3. In France, in a 2025 market that fell 5% to its weakest volume in 50 years, the R5 was the success of the year: registrations up 281%, dominating the electric rankings, second place overall in December — and Renault's chief later said compact EVs like the R5 now earn higher margins than the Megane EV did.

Car of the Year 2025 with 353 points; France's EV best-seller, up 281% in a market at a 50-year low; Renault says compact EV margins now beat the Megane's

Heritage did the marketing: the original 5's status as a beloved cheap runabout gave the EV attention no launch budget could buy.

Affordability was the strategy rather than a constraint — a deliberate counter to the industry's expensive-SUV drift, aimed at first-time EV buyers.

One small-car platform spawned both the Renault 5 and the Alpine A290, sharing development cost across two brands and two price points.

Moving before Chinese EV makers scaled in Europe gave Renault a defensible home turf; de Meo openly framed the car as the answer to Tesla and BYD.

When the industry runs from a segment, your past can make it viable again: heritage gives a small, affordable product the attention that launch budgets cannot buy.

The R5 became one of Europe's best-selling electric cars and helped Renault Group overtake Stellantis in its home market for the first time in 2025, even as BEVs reached 20% of French registrations in a collapsing overall market. The R5 handed Renault its eighth Car of the Year title, one year after the Scénic, and by 2026 management said the compact EV line had turned the small-car segment from a money-loser into its higher-margin business.