Design Driven: DS N°8 – Less than the sum of its (well-designed) parts?

For the DS N°8 to make the final top ten in CDN’s 2025 Production Car Design of the Year awards from a fifteen-strong shortlist is no mean feat. Our hard-to-please professional car designer judges variously praised its “avant-garde” design (GM’s head of global design Bryan Nesbitt) and “unique proportion and silhouette” (Genesis US studio chief designer John Krsteski).

The French premium fastback crossover EV eventually placed ninth – as featured in the Car Design Review 12 yearbook – so when we were invited to get behind the wheel of the DS N°8 on British roads in early 2026 for up-close evaluation and real-world driving we jumped at the chance.

Exterior 

The early good news is that the DS N°8’s ‘fastback’ design still impresses in the metal, away from the carefully lit glitz of the motor show and is arguably the first model from the DS stable to have a consistent and stand-out exterior character. For some recent rival model context, at 4,829mm long, 1,900mm wide, 1,580 high and with a 2,900mm wheelbase, the DS N°8 is bigger than the Kia EV4 Fastback – 99mm longer, 40mm wider, 100mm taller and with 80mm more space between its axles. But it’s quite a bit smaller than the Volvo ES90’s 5000mm length (-171) and 1942mm width (-42), although still a fair bit higher (+34).

To these eyes, the DS N°8 design is quite colour sensitive though. Lighter colour models and two-tone versions contrast well with the gloss black pillars, spoiler and sills to aid graphic balance and slim the body sides, but in darker hues, the exterior looks bulkier and more anonymous. DS’s PR department calls the N°8 an SUV coupé but despite all-wheel drive options, it doesn’t seem to lean much into the ‘S’ or ‘U’ in SUV. It’s more about premium details. 

The new DS naming and graphic design strategy backs up that premium – or even luxury – aspiration, now calling the car ‘N°8’ rather than simply ‘8’ in linewith previous models. It’s a clear nod to French luxury fashion brand Chanel and its long-held and very successful perfume range nomenclature – right down to the elevated small ‘o’ next to the capital ‘N’ in copy (the ‘o’ replaced by a small diamond on the boot lid).  

But DS doesn’t have the same consistent logo history – and not even across this N°8 model’s exterior. For instance, compare the vertically elongated and more 3D-looking liquid metal-style silver badge on the gloss black C-pillar with the horizontally squished version on the front grille (which can also sport a thickly outlined light border too). Or above that grille badge, atop the bonnet the addition of the trim level badge (in this case Étoile). Or at the back of the car the removal of the old DS logo and substitution of a new ‘DS Automobiles’wordmark with an odd font featuring ‘open’ D, A, E and O lettering. Collectively, it’s a muddled combination of branding that lacks consistency and feels overdone. 

Interior 

The nagging feeling that the DS N°8 lacks the marketing clarity of Chanel N°5 to which it seems to aspire, is only reinforced on the inside. The Étoile trim version has perforated and complex stitched faux suede seat upholstery in a muted mid-blue, accented by satin silver and knurled elements. None of the materials are cheap, but they don’t convince together. Then there’s the X-shape spoked steering wheel, which is certainly different, but not necessarily elegantly executed, projecting more Star Wars than Yves Saint Laurent. Having to accommodate needlessly big and bulky gloss black steering wheel-mounted controls for volume, cruise control and so forth, doesn’t help. The regular stalks for indicators and windscreen wipers also feel overly large and inelegant. 

The instrument panel has a smart concave frame within which sits the elongated and horizontal 16-inch centre screen and the floating centre console below features an intriguing thin-lined exploding motif on its surface, with room for drinks and storage underneath. It’s dramatic, unusual anddistinctive. 

The large speaker panels for the 3D Focal stereo high-up within the front of the door cards are also striking, the long panoramic roof let’s in plenty of light and below the rear hatch, an accessible boot offers a decent 580-629 litres (with plentiful underfloor storage for recharge cables and more). The IP’s software is hard to master quickly though. As just one example, it took an age to find out how to turn off the heated seats within the menu. I succeeded eventually but had a hotter rear for much longer than I required. These things should be easier. 

Driving

The DS N°8 has various drive modes accessible via a button press – as so many modern cars do – but in Sport mode the car’s ride just felt lumpier, notdynamic, and from a driver’s perspective, like sitting detached on top of everything rather than being part of the action – like say in an Alpine A390 (also billed as an SUV coupé or crossover). 

Of course, the DS isn’t supposed to be as sporty as Alpine and only offers 230hp in its base front-wheel drive (FWD) model, and 245hp and 350hp in higher-power FWD and all-wheel drive (AWD) variants. What DS is supposed to be about is the art of serene journeys and to that end the N°8’s long range 97.2 kWh battery affords an excellent 466-mile range (with a smaller 74kWh unit offering 342 miles).  

Conclusions

Despite the claim that the DS N°8 is “the purest expression of the French Art of Electric Travel” and nods to French-ness in everything from the trim names – Pallas, Étoile and Jules Verne – to the Chanel-aping name and logo design, the car itself is assembled in Italy (no doubt due to manufacturing capacity efficiencies across the Stellantis Group to which DS now belongs).  

Overall, the N°8 or indeed any other DS models don’t feel sophisticated oraccomplished enough to rub shoulders with the best French fashion brands. Or start at more than £50,000 and finish at nearly £70,000. Yes, the N°8 has some well-designed details and decent materials here and there, but the overall lack of coherence in their execution – before throwing in the DS’s questionable historic beginnings trying to turn one of Citroën’s most iconic models into a brand in its own right – conspire to make the N°8 far less than the sum of its parts. Which is a real shame, because we so wanted to like it, based on that striking exterior silhouette.