Lexus NX450h+ F Sport review: ‘This car has exactly the same charisma as my fridge-freezer’

This plug-in hybrid is a Prius on stilts, an Uber taxi with a fancy nose job. Let us count the ways it annoyed me.

The Lexus NX450h+ F Sport

If you are interested in electrical appliances such as the car I’m reviewing today, you will be delighted to hear all about my new fridge-freezer. It’s a Liebherr IXCC 5155 Prime BioFresh NoFrost with a hefty GTIN, a 70-litre freezer compartment and a maximum energy consumption of just 181 kWh/a.

This is the kind of language you need to use and understand when reviewing plug-in hybrid cars such as the Lexus NX450h+ F Sport. Let’s start with the headlines. Battery charging is achieved in just 2.5 hours using a 230V/32A connection and the 6.6kW on-board charger. And in the combined WLTP cycle, you can get an EV range of up to 98km in city driving. Which is great, probably, but of more importance to people like me is: this car has rubbish door handles.

The door handle itself doesn’t move or do anything. But located on its inside ridge is a small button. Push it and nothing happens. So you push it again. Nothing happens again. Then a bus goes through a puddle and splashes you – I was in Manchester, so it was raining – and then a cyclist shouts at you for being in the road.

Lexus says this system is supposed to put you in mind of the sliding doors you find in Japanese houses and hotel rooms, but it doesn’t. Because sliding doors in Japan actually work.

2022 Lexus NX 450h+ F Sport

And I haven’t got to the real problem yet, which is trying to open the door from the inside. You push what looks like a handle but it isn’t a handle. It’s a switch. And it’s supposed to open the door. But if sensors detect an approaching cyclist, it stays shut. And as there’s always an approaching cyclist these days, you have to assume that once you arrive at your destination, you will be stuck in the car until 4am.

These are the car’s good points. When it was delivered to my house I took it round to my garage and spent a few moments loading various things I’d need for the aforementioned trip to Manchester. I then brought it round to the house and loaded my suitcase. I then waited for my partner Lisa, who managed to get out of the front door in a new record of 45 minutes, and when we got back to the car, the doors were all locked. And the keys were still in the ignition.

It turns out that the Lexus has a very small conventional battery for starting the proper engine, and this had somehow gone flat because the proper engine wasn’t on. I’ve no idea why, and nor do I know why the last thing it would do with its final amp is lock me out. It’s a bit like a dying man using his last breath to set fire to his house.

2022 Lexus NX 450h+ F Sport

Eventually, having got the boot open using swearing, I climbed over the back seats, retrieved the keys, climbed back out of the boot and used a proper car – my old Range Rover – to jump new life into the crappy little battery.

I guess at this point you’re expecting me to keep kicking the Lexus. But it was a pretty decent long-distance companion. Quiet, smooth and economical. That’s it, though, because after the motorway slog it got annoying again. The infotainment centre beeped every time I pushed any of its ­“buttons”, which aren’t buttons, obviously, because that’s so, like, old-fashioned. And then the car beeps whenever it thinks you’re going to have a crash, which is ­always. It took me two days to work out how to stop it doing this, and then I wished I hadn’t bothered because when it’s not beeping it makes a sort of whistly squeaking noise, as if there’s a mournful postman in the engine bay.

The NX is a Prius on stilts, an Uber taxi with a fancy nose job. And to me, it’s not just filled with annoying electronic idiosyncrasies and rubbish door handles, it’s an affront, because it is just a white good that has exactly the same charisma as my fridge-freezer. Go ahead and buy one if you want something that keeps you dry when it’s raining and is great at fuel efficiency.

But be aware that the day will come when I’ll come bombing up behind you in my Triumph Dolomite Sprint, its little single-cam engine buzzing away and its 16 valves chattering like a flock of geese at a drinks party. And I’ll switch off my overdrive and tear past wearing a smile so bright you could use it to illuminate a medium-sized city.

I know we are told that cars can no longer be fun and that ­everything must be done to ­remove them from our roads. But I’m nearly 63 years old. And I’m starting to miss them.

Lexus NX450h+ F Sport

ENGINE: 2.5-litre, four-cylinder petrol, plus electric motor

FUEL ECONOMY: 1.3l per 100km (claimed)

PRICE: From $90,923
RATING: Two stars