Tested: 2027 Mercedes-Benz CLA350 EV Aims High and Nearly Hits the Mark

The glamour of a Mercedes, the ease and efficiency of an electric drivetrain, and an affordable price tag: That’s the premise of Mercedes-Benz’s entry-level CLA-class, which offers some of the same high-end features found on Mercedes’s big nameplates in a smaller, more cost-effective package. It’s an ambitious goal, and the electric 2027 CLA350 hits some of its selling points better than others, but it doesn’t cross everything off the list.

The CLA’s exterior styling would be most politely described as “ovoid elegance.” Think Fabergé on wheels, with intricately detailed LED headlights and a plethora of three-pointed stars, including a massive, illuminated badge in the center of the grille. If you’re paying to make sure people know it’s a Mercedes, you’re getting your money’s worth; not only is the center badge surrounded by 142 twinkly little light-up stars, but the 18- and 19-inch wheel options, the taillights, and the decklid all don Mercedes’s cosmic callouts too.

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Like a Fabergé, the CLA350 hopes to dazzle with interior details as well, so the cabin features illuminated climate control vents, door panels, and a center console with floating architectural details. Reflecting it all on our tester is a dash-wide Superscreen display, part of the top-range $5850 Pinnacle Line trim package. On cars without the optional passenger screen, there’s a polished star-studded panel on the right side to make sure there’s no corner of the CLA that isn’t glossy and glassy.

The downside of all this sculptural interior design is a loss of cabin space. The door panels and seat controls protrude inward, and the console sits high in the center, its harder plastic points exerting a gravitational pull to elbows and knees. The seats are comfortable and adjustable, but there are so many less forgiving surfaces surrounding the seating areas that the cabin can feel claustrophobic, like trying to sit on the couch in an overly decorated house. There’s a real fear of knocking over a vase. Things don’t improve in the rear seat, which we also found cramped. It’ll do in a pinch, but it is a pinch, especially for tall passengers or bulky child safety seats. Too bad folks can’t ride in the cargo area, which offers a deep-set 10 cubic feet in the rear and a single snack-sized cube in the frunk.

Despite the danger to funny bones, the CLA is an enjoyable driving experience. The 350 is a more powerful version of the 268-hp CLA250+ model, combining a 107-hp front motor and a 242-hp rear unit for all-wheel drive, 349 horsepower, and 380 pound-feet of torque. A two-speed transmission on the rear axle helps make power delivery more efficient, especially during highway drives. At the test track, the dual-motor 350 outran the 250+ with a quarter-mile time of 12.9 seconds compared to the single-motor’s 14.5-second run. It’s quicker from the get-go, taking only 4.3 seconds to hit 60 mph, as opposed to the CLA250+’s 5.8 seconds. Neither CLA is headed for racetrack domination, but the CLA350 makes short work of freeway merges.

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Ride quality isn’t as plush as it is in higher-priced Mercedes offerings, but we found the CLA quiet and comfortable with responsive steering, an easy way to commute. Adjustable brake regeneration settings allow for all manner of operation, from fully fledged one-pedal driving to a barely-there glide. We liked that last choice the best, as it offered a nice mix of brake assist while allowing enough creep to move through stop-and-go traffic naturally. In terms of grip, the CLA came to a halt from 70 mph in 161 feet, and it exhibited some moderate understeer around the skidpad, where it pulled 0.85 g of stick.

Rather than all-out performance, Mercedes’s main focus with the CLA is tech and software. It’s a screen-based cabin, with data spread across a 10.3-inch gauge cluster, a 14.0-inch touchscreen, and (if so optioned) in a head-up display and a second 14.0-inch screen in front of the passenger. We’ve yet to run into a passenger who wants to poke at their unflattering reflection in any of these new passenger-side screens, but if your guests would rather watch Disney+ than converse, that’s now a possibility.

Another trend that’s found its way down the price range is adjustable cabin mood lighting. In the CLA, a pastel glow runs in strips along the dash and doors and circles the air vents in customizable colors. Actual sunlight, if you’re so inclined, can be softly filtered through the panoramic glass roof with the optional $1050 Sky Control electrochromic transparency feature, which adjusts opacity for the whole roof or in stylish striped segments. Other fancy-feeling features include an automatic trunk close (part of the Pinnacle trim), a center airbag, and the option for a 16-speaker Burmester 3D surround-sound stereo.

Many of these high-end additions are welcome, but Mercedes also made some strange decisions here. We would have happily sacrificed the mood lighting in exchange for massaging seats, a standard heated steering wheel, or—perhaps most of all—four window switches, rather than two switches and a toggle to control the rear doors. On the same theme of “just give us a button,” controls for lumbar support and climate settings are buried in the center screen, making adjustments finicky once you’ve embarked.

It’s not that these controls aren’t usable, but using them inspires a slight resentment toward the designer every time. The most egregious of these in-screen interfaces is the lack of a “skip track” option on the steering wheel. Instead of subtly passing over Cardi B’s WAP while ferrying your mother to her chiropractor, you’ve now got to scramble into the settings, or even worse, shout at the voice control to fast forward before Mom asks what WAP stands for. That is not a luxury experience.

If the CLA falls short on the infotainment user experience, it makes up ground when it comes to charging and range. Both CLA variants use an 800-volt architecture with an 85-kWh nickel-manganese-cobalt (NMC) battery and a 320-kW DC fast-charge peak rate. We haven’t had a chance to do our real-world range test on the 350 yet, but it’s EPA-rated at 312 miles of range, and Mercedes says it should recharge from 10 to 80 percent in about 22 minutes. The 250+ model beat its official range estimate in our testing, so we wouldn’t be surprised if the 350 impresses as well.

The CLA delivers handily on the promise of electric performance and efficiency. Glamour is more subjective, but the CLA offers numerous options for interior materials and additional cosmetic packages to set it apart from the average transportation pod. At its starting point, it’s even affordable, but our test car’s reasonable $51,950 base price shot up fast with add-on features. It’s a rough world when $67,980 (as-tested) is an entry-level price and doesn’t even get you leather upholstery. It’s no S-class, but what do you expect from the opposite side of the alphabet?

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2027 Mercedes-Benz CLA350 4Matic Electric
Vehicle Type: front- and rear-motor, all-wheel-drive, 5-passenger, 4-door sedan

PRICE
Base/As Tested: $51,950/$67,980
Options: Pinnacle Line package, $5850; AMG Line Plus w/ Night package, $3300; Digital Extra: MB.Drive Assist, $1950; Manufaktur Alpine Grey paint, $1750; 19-inch AMG Multi-Spoke wheels with matte black accents and summer tires, $1100; Sky Control panoramic roof, $1050; Burmester 3D surround-sound audio system, $880; carbon-grain aluminum trim, $150

POWERTRAIN
Front Motor: permanent-magnet synchronous AC, 107 hp
Rear Motor: permanent-magnet synchronous AC, 242 hp
Combined Power: 349 hp
Combined Torque: 380 lb-ft
Battery Pack: liquid-cooled lithium-ion, 85 kWh
Peak Charge Rate, AC/DC: 9.6/320 kW
Transmissions, F/R: direct-drive/2-speed automatic

CHASSIS
Suspension, F/R: struts/multilink
Brakes, F/R: 13.0-in vented disc/12.9-in disc
Tires: Michelin e.Primacy 2
F: 225/40R-19 93W MO
R: HL255/35R-19 99W MO

DIMENSIONS
Wheelbase: 109.8 in
Length: 185.9 in
Width: 73.0 in
Height: 57.8 in
Passenger Volume, F/R: 59/38 ft3
Trunk Volume, F/R: 1/10 ft3
Curb Weight: 4736 lb

C/D TEST RESULTS
60 mph: 4.3 sec
100 mph: 11.1 sec
1/4-Mile: 12.9 sec @ 108 mph
120 mph: 16.2 sec
Results above omit 1-ft rollout of 0.3 sec.
Rolling Start, 5–60 mph: 4.4 sec
Top Gear, 30–50 mph: 1.8 sec
Top Gear, 50–70 mph: 2.9 sec
Top Speed (gov ltd): 131 mph
Braking, 70–0 mph: 161 ft
Braking, 100–0 mph: 334 ft
Roadholding, 300-ft Skidpad: 0.85 g

Interior Sound
Idle: 38 dBA/2 sone
Full Throttle: 72 dBA
70-mph Cruising: 69 dBA/24 sone

C/D FUEL ECONOMY AND CHARGING
Observed: 99 MPGe

EPA FUEL ECONOMY
Combined/City/Highway: 118/120/115 MPGe
Range: 312 mi

Like a sleeper agent activated late in the game, Elana Scherr didn’t know her calling at a young age. Like many girls, she planned to be a vet-astronaut-artist, and came closest to that last one by attending UCLA art school. She painted images of cars, but did not own one. Elana reluctantly got a driver’s license at age 21 and discovered that she not only loved cars and wanted to drive them, but that other people loved cars and wanted to read about them, which meant somebody had to write about them. Since receiving activation codes, Elana has written for numerous car magazines and websites, covering classics, car culture, technology, motorsports, and new-car reviews. In 2020, she received a Best Feature award from the Motor Press Guild for the C/D story "A Drive through Classic Americana in a Polestar 2."  In 2023, her Car and Driver feature story "In Washington, D.C.'s Secret Carpool Cabal, It's a Daily Slug Fest" was awarded 1st place in the 16th Annual National Arts & Entertainment Journalism Awards by the Los Angeles Press Club.
 

Instrumented Tests