Great Wall Motors launched ORA, a new EV brand, on the 2018 Beijing Auto Show. ORA is the English name, written in capitals. The Chinese name is Ola. ORA is the fourth brand under Great Wall Motors, after Great Wall, Haval, and WEY. ORA will make electric cars only, aimed at a young audience.


Naturally, as the company is wont to do, Great Wall immediately started to complicate matters: ORA will have two lines of vehicles, the iQ line with normal sized cars, and the R line with city cars. The first iQ will launch this year, the first R will launch next year via a new dealer network, separate from the other brands. 

Great Wall says all ORA cars are based on dedicated electric platforms. Great Wall has established a new design center for ORA, separate from the other brands. And that is a real separations, because the center is not in China, but in Yokohama, Japan.


The iQ5 measures 4445/1735/1567 mm, wheelbase 2615 mm. A single electric motor over the front axle delivers 161 hp, good for a 150 km/h top speed and a 0-100 km/h in 8.9 seconds. Range is 350 kilometers. It will have Level 1 autonomy.


Great Wall hasn’t said anything about price yet, but looking at the specs, the rather basic interior, and the target audience it is going to be cheap. Perhaps around a 100.000 yuan for this one, after subsidies. It is a nice looking car, modern enough, but somehow the proportion don’t seem totally right. Bigger wheels would help.


This little blue fellow is the ORA R1. It looks totally different than the iQ5, there are no similarities in the design at all. The R1 will be the first car of the R city car line, scheduled to launch in 2019. It has four doors and four seats, and looks a little bit too much like a Smart. Great Wall has gifted us the English name of the design language for the R line cars: “Simplicity & Rich message than complexity with less message”. 

The design language doesn’t have a Chinese name, they use the English name in the Chinese text. They also say that the design of the R line cars was mostly drawn in Yokohama.


The R1 measures 3480/1660/1560 mm, with a 2575 mm wheelbase. It will have Level 1 autonomy, a range of 300 kilometers, a 100 km/h top speed, and do 0-50 km/h in 6 seconds.

But the one we want is the ORA R2. Very different design again. It looks much more concept car than the R2, but ORA says it will launch in 2019 as well. It is a beauty. The production car won’t differ much, but the suicide doors will be deleted.


The R2 measures 3520/1660/1500 mm, and wheelbase is 2485 mm. It will be positioned above the R1, with more luxury and with Level 2 autonomy. It will have a 350 kilometer range, a 100 km/h top speed, and it’ll go from o to 50 km/h in 5 seconds.

ORA is an interesting new EV brand aimed at young people, but their target group is ill-defined, their design language is inconsistent, and they are in dire need for a native-English speaker, a marketing company, and a PR company.