The Porsche Taycan is my biggest disappointment this decade

[jdirik]

In general this is true und people have also a subjective view. However if I compare my 1.5 year Taycan ownership with my previous 2013 Audi S6 nearly 10 year ownership I can say I already had more safety callbacks and other issues. An active downgrade (the infamous 22KW charger) and lots of problems that just take some time to get diagnosed and finally Fixed (the satnav with the necessary preheating of the battery for fast highpower charging is problematic since Juli of this year. A posting in the german pff forum yesterday claims a fix is scheduled for Q2/2026 which I hope is not true.

However not all is bad, if the car runs it is really a blast to drive. If it doesn’t a gratis rental is supplied (not always EV, but this time I am on a base eMacan which is good). Going back to ICE for the daily driver, NO NO NO, won‘t happen.

I find it a real pity that Porsche does not ramp up better dealing with issues. On one Side they are having a hard time convincing people buying their cars on the other Side the service expectations of the owners are not met. Every time the quarterly Porsche magazine arrives at my footstep I do not know if I should be happy or cry.

Or as we say in germany: there is room for improvement.

It seems Porsche believes the Taycan owners are not worth taking care of and keeping happy.

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[Dabz]

Most of my car's depreciation was on the one previous owner buy I paid £50k (including 2 years Porsche Warranty and 2 free services) for an amazing car that brings a smile to my face every time I drive it.

I think this is where some of the differences of opinions come from. For 50k it's an amazing car, and an absolute bargain. For those who paid £120k for the same car because they bought brand new, it's still an amazing car but owes them more. Clearly the best bet is to buy nearly-new when someone else has swallowed the depreciation, and that probably plays in to satisfaction levels too

 

[Horizontally Opposed]

After 17 years in various BMW M3's and M4's, I bought my Taycan Turbo in November 2021. With a few thousand miles, and a few months old...obviously I had to pay well over the odds, at a time when nobody could produce any chips to build new cars.

Let's get this out the way...it looks great...I've no complaints about the pace and handling.

However...for a car that cost the best part of £150k...it is a total disappointment.

1) The ICE, sat-nav, all of that...so much better in a BMW. Stop asking me to log in, forgetting, then sometimes connect my phone, sometimes don't.

2) My car can't keep the windscreen from steaming up without full effort...in really icy conditions the centre of the screen might just stay condensated.

3) All the cameras have stopped working (I'm sure Porsche will sort this for a few thousand and at least 2 months notice to book it in)

4) There is a suspension creak on the left front that is a design fault, but Porsche still want £3k to fix it. Also, they couldn't look at it at all for 5 weeks.

5) It gets recalled for something or other, approximately 3 weeks...tbh I don't even bother booking it in.

6) Nobody else has got a ramp for it (alright not Porsche's fault, but it still grates)

7) The software is woeful...try switching the adaptive regenerative braking on...then having to set that every time you want it, as it forget every time it is restarted.

8) Although it only has 35,000 miles now, I think it is currently worth about £7.50. Ok again not Porsche's fault. but at least if it wasn't such a piece of crap that is going to go wrong more and more, I could just keep it longer.

Is it me...Have I just had a one off experience...or is this what Porsche Taycan ownership is like in general?

You make some good points, but this comes down to what each of us prioritizes and in what order.
I had BMW for maybe 10 years, until about 2016. Then switched to Porsche. To me, there is a world of difference in build quality between the two, BMW not in the same league with the P cars.

 

[Scandinavian]

You make some good points, but this comes down to what each of us prioritizes and in what order.
I had BMW for maybe 10 years, until about 2016. Then switched to Porsche. To me, there is a world of difference in build quality between the two, BMW not in the same league with the P cars.

I do not agree with you at all. My M5 had a much better build quality than my Taycan. Absolutely carefree ownership. Needed service every two years and ran like clockwork.

My wife’s i4 has served us for two years nearly and no issues, no recall, no squeaks, rattles etc. And absolutely no issues with any connected service.

Normally an Aston Martin was considered a garage queen, mostly the old Vanquish, but Taycan beats that by a furlong

 

[Caraholic]

I will say while I do love the car no other car has beaten me down so much. I am truthfully at the point of just throwing in the towel. Tired of dealing with the constant issues. Now on my first Taycan I just said well guess I got a lemon. Two years of ownership with one year of that it being in the shop for a multitude of issues. Now that I’m on my second taycan the inverter failed 8 miles into my first drive. Just kind of had enough at this point. While it’s an amazing car it’s just not worth the headaches anymore. I will never recommend anyone to ever purchase this car unless they can write the entire purchase off and not care. Even then you have to be okay with not having the car for unknown periods of time. This is only ever a lease recommendation from me.

 

[KLHubb]

I love my 2020 Taycan 4S....five years of great performance and no problems...

 

[tophamn]

.... My M5 had a much better build quality than my Taycan.

I can add that my previous car, a Panamera Turbo-S, had much better build quality than my Taycan: better materials, better design, rock-solid fit and finish (I never had any squeaks or rattles in the cabin) - it just seems to be engineered to a higher standard. Sitting in a Panamera is a lovely place to be but the Taycan beats it hands-down for handling and sheer driving pleasure.

 

[tycanmt]

Software guy here. My 2021 bought CPO early 2025 after all the recall work was done has worked flawlessly. However, I share your frustration about the software. The thing is: this general "software enchittification" syndrome applies to pretty much everything today. Point of sale terminals, web sites, phones, cars: they all have mountains of buggy and bad UX software. Seen from "the other side" where I sit -- this is because almost nobody wants to pay to have proper working bug free software. The move fast and break stuff people took over.

 

[tigerbalm]

The software is indeed a disappointment but I've learned to live with it. The lag in responsiveness is the most inexcusable 'feature' to me,

While there may be an element of underpowered hardware underlying the laggy responsiveness, the main reason is the docker-based architecture they chose for this version of the PCM in 2016.

Despite nearly a decade of iOS and Android, Porsche decided to ignore the experiences that Apple and Google had delivered and went their own direction – and it was always doomed to deliver clunky "apps", with bloated memory usage and slow loading times.

It wasn't even a compromise, reading Porsche Engineering magazine from the time it was being developed, they were very proud of the architecture. It had one "benefit" from Porsche's perspective, each app could go its own way and not necessarily adhere to a standard set of APIs and system subsystem functions – like an Apple or Google app needs to.

But still nearly a decade after Apple rolled out the App Store, Porsche decided to ignore that direction and spin their own doomed approach.

The people responsible would have used an iPad for five plus years – seen the approach and the lack of laggy interface – then seen the PCM prototypes and still said: yep, that's great!

 

[V8Turbo1974]

Sorry to hear of these woes, and I hope my “new to me” 2020 4S is still goes as well as the first 5k/4 months has gone. I think the build quality of all new car isn’t great, it reminds me of 1990s French cars, not a Toyota in reliability. I also own a TVR Cerbera, so if my Porsche works and gets to the destination with a similar number of parts, then it’s already ahead of the TVR .

 

[Boss Hogg]

Keep in mind this was Porsche's first EV, most traditional manufacturer's first EVs have been sub standard, comparing to ICE cars is not realistic. The service and communication experience is the most disappointing aspect, this should be the easy part, especially for a luxury brand.

J1.2 PCM is much better, by no means market leading, Porsche really should roll the same software to J1.1 cars FoC or even for an upgrade fee, like you can add a modern Porsche radio/satnav to an older vintage model.

 

[Tango22]

What's the deal with the 'ramp' issue? I've only had my 2024 GTS since August, so still learning about its nuances.
Does it need some sort of special ramp so say for example, tyre garages can fit new tyres to it? I vaguely recall seeing mentioned somewhere that there is a specific jacking process needed before you can remove a wheel? Or maybe I just made that up!

 

[EXOTIC3]

Over the years, BMWs have been the worst cars I’ve owned,m overall, including Alpina versions.
The software in the Taycan isn’t great same with my Lucid. The car with the best software hands-down is Tesla.

 

[BigBob]

What's the deal with the 'ramp' issue? I've only had my 2024 GTS since August, so still learning about its nuances.
Does it need some sort of special ramp so say for example, tyre garages can fit new tyres to it? I vaguely recall seeing mentioned somewhere that there is a specific jacking process needed before you can remove a wheel? Or maybe I just made that up!

Mines had new tyres and not from the porsche dealership as didn't want to pay the PAT. That went up on a lift at a suitably grubby tyre shop that black circles uses.

I think he/she probably means there are no independent service centres who can fix the things.

 

[tigerbalm]

Mines had new tyres and not from the porsche dealership as didn't want to pay the PAT. That went up on a lift at a suitably grubby tyre shop that black circles uses.

I think he/she probably means there are no independent service centres who can fix the things.

Got my centerlock wheels swapped over to winters recently and my first time bringing any of my Porsche's to a local tyre shop that talked a good talk re: handling centerlocks.

While we got there in the end, I defo had to fight hard for it to be done correctly: (a) car lifted up while wheels being tightened, (b) 600 Nm of torque applied to the centerlock nut and (c) releasing the pressure 45 degrees and tightening again to 600 Nm.

Hmmmmmm .... might pay the Porsche tax next time. My issue there isn't so much the cost, but the queue to get in.

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