Confucius says, “The journey of 1,000 miles begins with one step” and for the automotive company, Deepal there have been many steps on their journey to Australian soil. Deepal is an independent brand within the Chinese Changan Group, and has links to Thailand, with Inchcape, the importer behind Subaru and Peugeot in Australia, being appointed as the Australian distributor for Deepal.
The first Deepal available in Australia is this S07, a rear-wheel drive mid-sized SUV. The S07 is powered by a single Permanent Magnet Synchronous motor that has 160kW of power and 320Nm of torque with a single speed transmission. This offers decent acceleration in this more than two tonne SUV, at 0-100 km/h in 7.9 seconds. On smooth roads the S07 drives nice enough, but on bumpy roads though the S07 bobbles and sometimes it feels like the S07 pitches and dips from the front to the rear.
The S07 has a 79.97kWh Ternary Lithium battery and has a claimed range of up to 475km with a claimed consumption of 18.6kWh/100kms (WLTP). For my week I calculated my usage to be 21.7kWh/100km and this would have given me a maximum range of 369km. Despite this the on-board computer told me the range would be the exact same figure as the WLTP when the battery was 100%, coincidence or not? The drive modes available include Eco, Comfort, Sport, and Customise and unbeknown to me I spent the week in Eco mode as this is the one that the vehicle defaults to. Under Customise menu you can adjust Acceleration mode, Steering mode, Energy Recuperation level, Brake boost mode, ESC off, Hill Decent mode, and Parking mode.
The charge port located on the passenger side of the vehicle at the rear and there is no light adjacent to the plug to indicate that charging is occurring, only an indication on the driver’s dash including the charge time remaining. The claimed charge time for an 11kW AC charger is 8 hours and for a DC charger (92kW max rate) it’s 35 minutes for a 30–80% charge.
When you approach and unlock the S07 the door handles do not automatically pop out and this is annoying as they can be tricky open and you have to guess each time where to push them to unlock. The interior of the S07 is futuristic looking and although it looks nice you can smell the price point of the vehicle. One love or loathe feature that the S07 has is push buttons to exit all of the doors.
On the interior the 15.6-inch floating centre infotainment screen dominates the dash and there is no driver’s dash, only a head-up display on the windscreen in front of the driver. One cool feature of the infotainment screen is it auto rotates towards the passenger if they are in the vehicle by themselves and then returns to the driver’s angle when they get in.
All functions of the vehicle are controlled from the screen, down to the adjustment of the side mirrors, and it does get bad fingermarks on it as a result. The first thing you will need to do though to get access to the sat nav or Bluetooth is to accept the Privacy Policy, which is many pages long. Being the type of person I am I read the Privacy Policy and decided not to accept it as it does say that data from the vehicle can be shared with third parties. This apparently does not include the video, audio, and pictures that are captured from the internal and external cameras as it says that this data is only stored locally in the vehicle.
The infotainment screen had a major glitch during my week driving the S07 and went into ‘wobble mode’ like your smartphone does when it allows you to move the icons around. I worked out that I had to delete all of the short cut icons along the bottom of the screen and re-drag them back into place. Another thing that bugged me was I had to press the button for the radio every time I started the vehicle. In addition to the AM/FM radio the media sources include DAB+, Bluetooth, wireless Android Auto, wireless Apple CarPlay, Amazon music and the option to store music in local storage. The S07 has a premium sound system with 14 speakers including in the head rests of the front seats.
In front of the cup holders on the centre console is a double phone ledge with one side being a wireless charge pad (that’s the Deepal’s key fob sitting on the ledge) and under the floating console there is another ledge below with one USB-C port, one USB-A port, and one 12V socket. I liked that there is no gloss black plastic used in the cabin, the slim line vanity mirrors with two lights and there is good sized drink bottle storage in the front door cubbies.
The climate control had a bit of an all blow no go scenario as it struggled to cool the cabin on hot days. I also didn’t like that you have to adjust the temp, air speed, vent open/close, and even the direction of vents from screen and I found it difficult to get the direction where I wanted it. There is a vent in the deep cubby under the arm rest that blows air from the A/C system, it’s not a fridge compartment, but would stop your chocolate bars from melting on a warm day.
The seats are covered with accented synthetic leather and both front seats are heated and cooled and the cooled seats only just take the edge of the heat, but are reasonably quiet when operating. The driver’s seat has power adjustment for recline, forward/back, single tilt adjustment, and 4-way lumbar support and you can save the seat position on the screen for one setting only and also adjust the seat from the screen. The passenger seat has power adjustment for recline and forward back only.
I like that the Deepal has a flat rear floor, but no mat in this press car, and there’s ample leg room and lots of headroom in the rears seats and they are reclined in a comfortable seating position with adequate under thigh support, but the headrests are hard. The rear seat passenger can also move the front passenger seat forward to create even more room on that side and my children found that this was a good way to annoy the sibling who is sitting in the front passenger seat. The centre seat folds down as an arm rest with two shallow cup holders in the front of it, which have grippy sides and a slot for a phone or a small tablet and there are good sized drink bottle storage cubbies in rear door. There are two ISOfix/three rear tether child seat restraint points in the S07, but ANCAP noted a Type A capsule could not be correctly installed in the rear outboard seating positions using the vehicle seatbelt.
Rear passengers have digital temperature controls that can also be adjusted from the front of the vehicle, but there’s only has one central air vent with a single direction control, so potentially another sibling point of conflict. Or for a conflict with me, the rear air speed also controls the front air speed and I hate this. The rear passengers also have controls for the sunshade over the large panoramic sunroof and I like that this sunshade is opaque.
The Deepal S07 has a power open/close boot with a button on the tailgate, cabin, and key fob. The boot is a good size and one substantial tie down point on either side of the boot, two hooks, and two lights with a tyre repair kit under the boot floor. If more space is required the 60:40 split fold rear seats can be lowered with the release on the seat shoulders, but when folded down the seats do not lie completely flat. The front boot is where you can store the charge cables.
ANCAP awarded the Deepal S07 a 5-star (2025) safety rating with an Adult Occupant Protection score of 95% and Child Occupant Protection score of 86%. Dual frontal, side chest-protecting and side head-protecting airbags are standard. A centre airbag which provides added protection to front seat occupants in side impact crashes is also standard.
The Deepal S07 is fitted with an autonomous emergency braking (AEB) system capable of functioning at highway speeds, a lane support system (LSS) with lane keep assist (LKA) and emergency lane keeping (ELK) functionality, and blind spot monitoring. ANCAP tests of the AEB (Car-to-Car) system showed GOOD performance with collisions avoided or mitigated in all car- to-car rear and AEB Junction test scenarios. A collision was also mitigated or avoided in some AEB Crossing scenarios where the test vehicle can autonomously brake to avoid crashes when crossing into the path of an oncoming vehicle. ANCAP tests of the AEB Head-On system functionality showed GOOD performance. ANCAP tests of lane support system functionality showed GOOD performance in lane keep assist scenarios, and ADEQUATE performance in the more critical ELK scenarios. Overall, the ANCAP Safety Assist score is 78%.
Very annoyingly though some of these safety aids cause the S07 to bong at you a lot to tell you that you are not in the lane, that you have gone slightly over the speed limit or to concentrate on the road. The funny thing is the Deepal bongs at you to concentrate on the road when you are trying to look at the screen to adjust the air temp for example. You can stop the bonging by turning off these features, but you have to do this every time you get in the S07.
The Deepal S07 has standard rear-view camera and 360-degree view with front and rear sensors parking sensors. You also get auto lights and auto wipers, but no auto high beam and there’s a button on the screen to turn on the rear windscreen wiper. The adaptive cruise control is activated using a button on the end of the column gear selector and you adjust the speed using a button on the steering wheel in 5km/h increments.
New Deepal vehicles come with a 7 Years/160,000km warranty (whichever occurs first), an 8 years/240,000kms (whichever occurs first) on the battery, and an 8 years/150,000kms (whichever occurs first) warranty on the Electric Drive System and Vehicle Controller. Twelve months complimentary roadside assistance is also included with the purchase of a new Deepal vehicle.
The service intervals are 12 months or 20,000km and under the Capped Price Servicing Program owners the Deepal S07 are covered for scheduled servicing during their first seven years of ownership or the first 140,000 kilometres (whichever occurs first) with the total cost for the first seven services is currently $2,963.40 according to the Deepal Australia website.
The Deepal S07 is priced from $59,361 drive away in Sydney, NSW with this Cosmic Yellow premium paint being an $800 extra. You can request a quote online for your Deepal S07 or visit a Deepal dealer for more information.
| Pros | Cons |
| Nice looking trim in the cabin | The ride over bumpy roads |
| Good amount of room in the rear seats | Must accept Privacy Policy for most vehicle features |
| The good-sized boot | The bonging of the driver safety aids |
Photographs by Driven Women Magazine.