Chevrolet Bolt (2025): The next generation with Ultium technology

Chevrolet Bolt EV and EUV (see video and photo demo) are real winners for General Motors. According to the company, about 70 percent of all buyers of the electric compact sibling directly drove a car that did not come from the GM Group. In addition, Bolt sales in the first half of 2023 were stronger than ever. However, this is probably due to the fact that the two models belong to a very small group of vehicles that meet the strict criteria for new American electric vehicle financing.

But the Bolt also caused GM a lot of grief – just as the sister model Ampera-e produced in Europe caused problems for the former Opel subsidiary. Especially in the phase of one and a half years starting from October 2020, where Chevrolet had to carry out a major recall that cost a total of two billion dollars (now equivalent to about 1.8 billion euros) due to batteries that burn too much. . At the same time, the production stopped completely, and later the car batteries had to be replaced in the cars already produced. The production of the new Bolt EV and EUV models has been well underway again since October 2022. However, until the end of this year – then this generation of Bolt will end.

New Bolt with Ultium and Ultifi technology

But despite all the initial problems, GM is planning a new generation of Bolt. Mary Barra announced this in a conference call on the current quarterly figures at the end of July 2023. “He is an important source of sales victory for the company and for Chevrolet,” the CEO said. “We will continue the momentum with the release of the new Bolt.” For this to be successful, the previously planned timetable for the new Bolt should be accelerated. As Barra confirmed to the trade magazine “Automotive News” at the beginning of December 2023, the next generation of the electric compact is expected to arrive in 2025.

In order to bring the newcomer to market maturity with less development effort and therefore capital investment than before and to avoid past mistakes, the model will change to the Ultium power platform, which has now manifested itself in the group. Instead of previously problematic battery cells from supplier LG Chem, energy storage devices designed to Ultium’s specifications will be used in the future. There’s also Ultifi’s cloud and Linux software platform, which General Motors plans to introduce this year.

New Equinox EV as a guide

Moreover, Chevrolet has not yet revealed anything about the technical specifications of the new Bolt. Since it is placed below this in the model hierarchy, the electric compact SUV Equinox EV, which will soon begin to be released to dealers for the first time, will be marked by the new Bolt and its data will be placed under it. Depending on the driver’s specifications, the Equinox offers 213 or 294 hp and can travel up to 483 km. The Equinox also offers a memory segment when it comes to price. The basic version should cost around 30,000 dollars (a cool 27,600 euros). So the new Bolt should be below this mark.