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By Jonathan Crouch

Fiat revives the city spirit of early 500s with this little Topolino. Jonathan Crouch takes a look.

Ten Second Reviewword count: 48

Fiat joins the quadricycle market with its third EV, this little Topolino model. This Italian urban runabout shares its Stellantis design with the Citroen Ami but many city folk will find its looks more appealing. This is the sort of car Fiat ought to be very good at.

Backgroundword count: 138

Traditionally, Fiat has built its brand on cheap, tiny urban cars. Well here's one that really fits that brief, the Topolino. To be strictly accurate, it's not really a 'car'; this all-electric model is classified as a quadricycle. And, continuing on the theme of being strictly accurate, it's not really a Fiat either, produced by Stellantis as a re-branded version of the Citroen Ami and that model's lesser-known stablemate the Opel Rocks-e. But the Italian maker wants you to think of this model as archetypally Fiat, an indoctrination process that starts with the name, 'Topolino' being borrowed from the commonly known branding applied to the original Fiat 500 produced from 1936 to 1955. The looks are very 'Fiat' too, designed to appeal to a wide audience 'including younger customers, families and city lovers'. Let's take a closer look.

Engines and Tech Specword count: 211

You wouldn't expect the Topolino to feature any mechanical changes over its Ami design counterpart - and it doesn't. So there's the same feeble 8.2hp electric motor and an equally restricted 47 mile range from the little 5.4kWh battery. So you won't be tempted to leave the city limits. If you did, there'd rapidly be a long queue behind because the top speed is just 28mph. On the plus side, there's great all-round visibility. As with an Ami, you can drive this Fiat on a moped licence - and at an age as young as 16 (in France and Italy, it's 14). As you'd expect from the diminutive size, the turning circle is outstanding - just 7.2m. To give you a point of comparison, that of a typical supermini is over 10m. A London taxi is rated at 7.6m. The elevated driving position and superb all-round visibility also help in the city and though there's no power steering to ease you into spaces, the vehicle is so light (a typical supermini weighs around 600kgs more) that it isn't really an issue. Still, you might well feel intimidated by trucks and buses, particularly as quadricycles like this don't get rigorously crash tested and don't have to have airbags and camera safety aids.

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