I’m Ready For The Porsche 718 Boxster To Go Electric

The Porsche Boxster and Cayman as we know them aren’t long for this world. Next year, the fourth generation of Porsche’s compact sports car will be revealed, and it will only be available as a fully electric vehicle. The current internal combustion 982 generation of Porsche 718 will remain on sale in the U.S. for another year or so, it’s already getting discontinued in Europe. After spending a few days with a 2024 Porsche 718 Boxster Style Edition, featuring a manual transmission and turbocharged four-cylinder engine, I’m ready for the Boxster to go electric.

Porsche received some of its most negative headlines in decades when the 718 family made the switch to four-cylinder engines in 2016, so much so that Porsche reinstated the flat-6 in the GTS model four years later. I thought the flat-4 was honestly pretty nice in high-powered GTS form, but it’s less enticing in the base Boxster. I think it sounds good, at least in Sport Plus mode, though yes, you’ll probably think it sounds like a Subaru. And despite having “just” 300 horsepower and 280 pound-feet of torque it’s plenty quick — Porsche quotes a 4.9-second 0-to-60-mph time with the manual.

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Problem is, the four-cylinder just doesn’t have a lot of personality, no matter if you’re puttering around town or revving it out in the canyons. It’s perfectly fine, especially for the customers who are buying a base Boxster, but it’s not a powertrain I’ll miss when the Boxster goes electric. In fact, going electric will open up new realms of performance possibility for the 718 beyond just being a lot quicker. The entry-level model will surely be a single-motor setup with the motor placed at the rear axle, while higher-power versions should get a dual-motor setup that will give the 718 rear-biased all-wheel drive for the first time. (Porsche basically confirmed this with the Mission R race car concept and the Cayman-based GT4 E-Performance prototypes.) What’ll really be interesting is the rumored model that will see two motors placed at the rear axle, for rear-wheel drive that has individual torque vectoring that will allow for handling you just can’t get in a gas car.

If I were buying a new 718, especially a non-GT model, there’s absolutely no way I’d go for the standard 6-speed manual transmission that this Boxster is equipped with. Don’t get me wrong, the Boxster’s manual is fantastic. The length of the throw, the notchiness of the shift action, the clutch pedal and feel, the shifter itself; all are excellent. On the best canyon roads that Los Angeles County has to offer, the manual is a joy. But in the other 90 percent of driving that I do in the city, manuals are (to me) a nightmare, even with the Boxster’s rev-matching and anti-stall tech. It’s just a pain in the ass, and it makes me not want to use the car for regular car stuff — and being good at regular car stuff is partially why the 718s are so beloved. They’re cars you want to drive all the time, not just as a weekend toy, so going for the optional 7-speed PDK dual-clutch automatic would be a no-brainer for me, and the electric model will be even better in that regard. There will be no vibrations or noise at idle, no wasted gas while sitting in traffic, no droning on the highway. I’ve driven the Rimac Nevera and Pininfarina Battista, and yeah the absurd speed of those EVs’ powertrains is amazing, but it was the vastly better daily driver qualities versus other ICE supercars that really sold me.

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Some of the biggest worries I see online about the electric 718 surround its weight. At just 3,036 pounds with the manual transmission, the current base model 718 Boxster is a featherweight in terms of modern sports cars, and the electric model will surely be heavier. It won’t be as bad as people are expecting, though — I’ve heard the target is somewhere in the realm of 3,600 pounds. That’s not bad at all, certainly a lot lighter than most other performance EVs and only a couple hundred pounds more than a base 992.

More important than the weight itself will be the weight distribution. The 718 Boxster has a 45/55 weight distribution thanks to the mid-mounted engine, which is a big reason behind its characteristic handling. Instead of using a flat skateboard-style battery pack like most other EVs, the electric 718’s batteries will be stacked behind the driver where the engine would go, potentially in a T-shape with other batteries occupying the center tunnel space. That’s a similar setup to the Rimac Nevera, and it’ll help give the 718 EV the weight distribution and mid-engine handling characteristics the Boxster is known for. The powertrain packaging could give the electric 718 more cargo space, too.

Photo: Daniel Golson/Jalopnik

Another big cause for concern according to online commenters is the electric Boxster’s range, but this four-cylinder is already prepping Boxster customers for that. With a full tank of gas this Boxster’s gauge cluster indicates that I have a range of just 220 miles, and while it’s rated at 25 mpg highway and 20 mpg city by the EPA, good luck matching those figures in regular driving in a city like LA. Even if the 718 EV has an EPA range of around 250 miles, I think that’s plenty for the vast majority of use cases, and if it’s anything like the Taycan, the official ranges will be very easy to exceed in the real world. It’ll have 800-volt fast-charging capabilities like Porsche’s other EVs too, so an electric 718 should be able to charge to 80 percent in less than 20 minutes.

Visually, the current Boxster’s cabin still looks great, but it’s a let down in terms of interior packaging and technology, and it just feels old. While I like the pop-out door pockets, there’s basically nowhere in the dashboard or center console to put my phone or keys, and the under-armrest storage is measly. The pop-out cupholders suck, which likely makes the car a non-starter for a lot of customers. Porsche does make some of the best seats and steering wheels in the business, and the interior feels well-built and of high quality, but it just doesn’t measure up to newer Porsches or models from other companies.

Photo: Daniel Golson/Jalopnik

It’s bad on the tech front, too. At this point, the current 718’s infotainment system is like three generations behind, and while it’s very simple and easy to use, that doesn’t mean it’s actually any good. Despite having nearly $20,000 in options and a hard “NAV” button on the dash, this Boxster doesn’t actually have navigation equipped. It has Apple CarPlay, at least, but I have to use a wired connection through a USB-A port, and the system crashed on me multiple times. “Isn’t it great to have real buttons though,” I can hear you saying, and while Porsche’s buttons do have great tactile feel, I’d be totally fine without most of them. The backup camera is bad quality, and the graphics in the small gauge display look old too. Judging by the most recent spy photos, the electric 718 will have an interior in line with the Macan EV, which will mean a fantastic infotainment system, a lovely digital gauge cluster, vastly improved ergonomics and storage, and a much more modern overall design. Finally!

I doubt there will be anything to worry about with the exterior styling front, either. I’m a really big fan of Porsche’s latest design language, which is a bit techier and more flat, angular and squared-off than what we saw from the brand in the late 2010s. I think the Taycan and new Macan EV look especially good, and that Mission R is freakin’ hot. Basically, take that concept, make it 20 percent less concept-y and remove the race car bits, and that’s what the electric Cayman should look like. The camouflaged prototypes that have been running around for the past few years have a great stance and proportions, and it still looks like, well, a Boxster. It should even stick with big intakes ahead of the rear wheels like on all the generations before it.

The Mission R concept is a good preview of what the electric 718 will look likePhoto: Porsche

Hopefully Porsche offers similar packages like this Style Edition on the new car, too. Introduced in 2022, it brought the incredible Ruby Star Neo paint to the 718, pairing it with white wheels and white stripes. I’m always a fan of any pink car and any car with white wheels, and that combo pairs well with the Chalk leather and contrasting stitching covering most of the interior. Porsche has seriously expanded the availability of its Paint to Sample and Sonderwunsch customization programs in recent years, so expect the electric 718 to be available in an even bigger range of colors and options than the current model.

More than anything else, it’s driving the 2025 Porsche Taycan that has me the most excited for the electric 718. Every version of the Taycan is fantastic, from the base rear-wheel-drive car to the 938-hp Turbo S, and the new Turbo GT model set a new benchmark for electric performance. I tell naysayers all the time that before they completely write off EVs, they need to drive a Taycan — I think it’s impossible not to have fun in one. If Porsche can make a first-generation electric sedan this good, there’s no way it can mess up an electric sports car. I wouldn’t fret about the lack of engine noise. I think Porsche’s spaceship-like EV sounds are great, but the 718 might not even need them. The Mission R and GT4 E-Performance produce natural noises from their electric motors that sound not only awesome, but distinctive and exciting.

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Now I know you’re gonna yell at me about how much better the six-cylinder versions of the 718 are than the four-cylinder Boxster I drove, and I agree. The already discontinued Cayman GT4 is one of the best-driving sports cars of the modern era, and while I haven’t experienced them from behind the wheel for myself yet, I know the Cayman GT4 RS and Boxster Spyder RS models are even better. Even the more basic GTS 4.0 models are excellent and full of character thanks to that lovely flat-six. There are so few cars like the 718 family left on sale, and none are as well-rounded.

Porsche will continue building the current gas-powered 718s until mid-2025, so if you just can’t handle the idea of an electric 718 and you want to drop (probably well) over $100,000 on a new Porsche sports car with an internal combustion engine, you’ve gotta put in an order now, or you’ll be stuck buying a used 718 or going for a new 911. Luckily, the current 992 generation is incredible, and the 911 is gonna have gas engines well into the next decade. There certainly are people out there who prefer the mid-engine models to its bigger siblings and will be sad about that, but it makes sense. The 911 is outselling the 718 by nearly four times in the U.S. in 2024 so far, and last year the Taycan outsold the 718 by nearly double the amount of cars.

Photo: Daniel Golson/Jalopnik

There will surely be an increase in price when the electric 718 comes out (and thus more complaints), but as with the Macan EV, which at its cheapest starts at around $12,000 more than the base gas Macan, it will be warranted. Yes, the 718 is Porsche’s “entry-level” sports car, but it’s still quite pricey. The cheapest Boxster starts at $76,895 and is pretty bare-bones in terms of equipment; my test car rang in at $94,440, which included standalone options like blind-spot monitoring and keyless entry that are standard on most Hyundais. I expect the electric 718’s base price will rise to the high $80K range, but its level of standard equipment should be much greater. Current six-cylinder GTS 4.0 models are past the $100,000 mark to start anyway, and the typical Porsche customer adds quite a lot of money in options, so I doubt buyers of the 718 EV will feel the sticker shock.

Look, I could be wrong. Maybe the electric Boxster will come out and it’ll be ugly, bad to drive and a sales flop. But I highly doubt that will be the case. I really do think the 718 family going electric will be nothing but a good thing, and I bet most normal buyers of the current Boxster and Cayman will feel the same way. I’ve already talked about how I’m ready for electric vehicles to take over, and I can’t wait for the Boxster and Cayman to be the first true EV sports car. If any company can nail it on the first go, it’s Porsche.