Living with a Volvo ES90: Why Mat Watson gave me a reality check – and why I still think my whinging is justified

I’ve been living with a Volvo ES90 for a few months now, and it’s safe to say I’ve had my ups and downs with this car.

There’s no way to sugar coat it: the ES90 drove me up the wall in the first few weeks. The main source of frustration continues to be the key that is only sometimes recognised by the car, but I also had some ergonomic complaints – and then an over-the-air software update failed and caused a bunch of assistance systems to glitch out.

To be fair, a quick trip to a dealer would have been a mild inconvenience for an owner, but with this car being owned by Volvo UK they wanted to take the car back for their techs to look over, so swapped me into an identical – albeit no longer red – ES90.

Week one with the new car and the brake lights became stuck on for a few hours while it was parked on my driveway, illuminating my living room like a seedy shop window in Amsterdam.

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However, despite all of this, I have started to warm to the big Volvo. In recent weeks, where work has seen me driving plenty of other cars, I’ve actually found myself missing it now I’ve learned to live with its idiosyncrasies.

Volvo recommends downloading the phone app with the digital key, which is a useful failsafe if the regular key fob is playing up, but I have found that if you just tug at the door handles it will wake up and let you in most of the time. Sure, you shouldn’t have to do that, but it’s much easier than having to get your phone out and open the app.

And now I’m used to the poor rear visibility, I’ve learned to just use the wing mirrors to see what’s behind me, like I’m reliving my early 20s driving Tesco delivery vans. And it’s still huge, but now I’m acquainted with the dimensions it doesn’t really cause issues in day to day life.

But it was a certain Mat Watson – my boss who is perhaps better known as the guy who fronts the Carwow YouTube channel – who helped me to see the car with fresh eyes.

He recently took ‘my’ ES90 for a few days to film a review, and while he pointed out many of the same complaints, watching his review confirmed that I’m not suffering from Stockholm Syndrome – the Volvo ES90 is a lovely, lovely thing.

This week I’ve been driving the Honda Prelude, and while it’s a fantastic thing and obviously in no way comparable to the Volvo, for my three-hour motorway schlep home from a photo shoot the other day, I did sit there wishing I had the ES90. Its gorgeous seats, comfortable suspension and class-leading sound system would have been most welcome.

The Volvo’s interior is luxurious, and much nicer than modern Mercedes and BMW alternatives, in my opinion. Sure, the floor is annoyingly high, but my son has acres of space for his child seat so he can barely reach the front seats to kick them. The boot might technically be smaller than alternatives, but I’ve done multiple tip trips and never found reason to complain about its capacity.

I also love the Google-based infotainment system. Okay, it’s not the most responsive touchscreen out there, and the climate control buttons could be slightly better integrated, but you get all the apps you need built in and now it’s set up how I like it I barely change anything.

It’s also surprisingly efficient for such a big, heavy car, which over the past few years of car testing I have come to appreciate more than simply having a massive battery to achieve a long range.

That being said, the ES90 has a big battery too, so you get the best of both worlds. The 300-mile real-world range has been useful for the occasional trip along the south coast to see family in Cornwall, and the fast charging speeds mean topping up to 80% takes less time than a quick toilet stop at the services.

So while I think my frustrations with this car have been justified, and I think you should maybe give it a miss if you have short patience with software glitches, there is a lovely car underneath it all. It’s been nice to get a fresh perspective, particularly after some time apart. As much as I’ve enjoyed driving and poking and prodding a dozen or so cars as part of our annual awards judging this past week, I’m looking forward to getting back behind the wheel of the Volvo ES90 next week.

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