When this car first launched there were six engine options. BMW has seen fit to ditch diesel and the least powerful petrol, so now there are only four.
They consist of two petrols and two PHEVs. The least powerful petrol is the 1.5-litre 220i – a 168bhp three-cylinder unit.
The more powerful 223i is a 2.0-litre four-cylinder engine that delivers 215bhp and a warm-hatch baiting 0-62mph time of 7.0sec. It’s also claimed to be able to crack 150mph, which boggles the mind just a little.
It’s quite an eager powertrain, accepting revs happily while remaining smooth and a lot less vocal than many rival engines when worked hard.
Then there are the PHEVs. The 225e has 242bhp and the 230e gets 322bhp. They use the same 1.5-litre petrol engine, but the 230e gets a more powerful electric motor.
Both are fast and four-wheel drive, with the latter completing the 0-62mph sprint in 5.5 seconds.
The brakes for the PHEVs are a bit tricky as they lack strong initial response that inspires confidence and suffer from a long pedal action that often results in you having to apply sudden inputs at the last moment because the car isn’t slowing as you’d expected. Still, there’s nothing wrong with the outright stopping power.
As before, and as elsewhere in plug-in hybrid land, it’s the integration of the various drive systems that’s key to usability and here’s where the PHEVs score well.
In normal driving, the electric motor assists the petrol engine, filling a torque gap while the engine spools from low revs, assisting performance when you ask for full acceleration, and pitching in to drive on EV power alone whenever it can, even once any initial battery charge is depleted.