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Three years after Tesla started taking $1,000 reservations for its Model 3, Volkswagen is racking up similar orders for its upcoming ID 3 hatchback in Europe.
Perhaps not to the degree, sure. Tesla amassed 180,000 orders for its "affordable" long-range electric car in one day in the US, while VW took 10,000 first-day deposits on the day it opened reservations for the ID 3 hatchback.
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Still, the advanced orders are a hopeful sign for VW, after Tesla, Nissan, GM, and other automakers got a head start in building long-range electric cars.
Volkswagen said the orders exceeded its expectations, and said that in some cases its computer systems couldn't keep up with the deposits.
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The company is booking reservations for the first edition of the ID 3, the ID 3 1ST, which comes with the long-range 62-kilowatt-hour battery pack, as well as 2,000 kwh of free public charging at Ionity fast charging stations around Europe.
The 62-kwh battery is expected to give the ID 3 a range of 260 miles on the notably generous European WLTP driving cycle. A shorter range, 48-kwh, is expected to deliver closer to 200 miles.
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VW says the ID 3 will go into production by the end of 2019—about six months later than its original estimate—and the first cars will be delivered in Europe in mid-2020.
Volkswagen has no plans to sell the ID 3 the US, though it does plan to import future electric cars based on the ID 3's platform to the US, starting with the ID Crozz later in 2020.