Nio unveiled on Tuesday the first official images of its ES9, a full-size three-row SUV that will become the Shanghai-headquartered company’s new flagship model and China’s largest electric SUV.
The company’s founder and CEO William Li is scheduled to present the vehicle’s full technical specifications and announce the pre-sale price at a launch event on April 9 at 7 p.m. local time (7 a.m. Eastern).
Deliveries are planned to begin on June 1.
“Heaven and earth in full view. Nio ES9 — an expansive realm, a world of its own,” the company wrote in a social media post on Tuesday.
Below is the teaser video shared by the EV maker.
What Is Known
The ES9 is built on Nio‘s 900-volt architecture and shares the SkyRide intelligent chassis with the flagship ET9 sedan, which starts at 788,000 yuan ($114,500) in China.
The platform integrates ClearMotion’s fully active suspension, steer-by-wire, and all-wheel steering into a unified system.
The powertrain is a dual-motor all-wheel-drive setup producing 520 kW, with a top speed of 220 km/h.
The model is equipped with a 102 kWh CATL NMC swappable battery.
The ES9 measures 5,365 mm long, 2,029 mm wide, and 1,870 mm tall, on a 3,250 mm wheelbase — 430 mm longer than the third-generation ES8 it replaces.
Inside, the cabin features a 15.6-inch AMOLED main display, Nio‘s Nomi Mate 3.0 AI assistant, a built-in refrigerator, and two 14.5-inch entertainment screens mounted on the back of the front headrests.
An interior image that surfaced on Chinese social media in late March showed the ES9’s second row configured as a two-seat executive layout with a centre island partition and fold-out tray tables — closely mirroring the ET9’s rear cabin architecture.
The same image confirmed the rectangular steering wheel associated with the steer-by-wire system.
Timeline
A detailed launch timeline that surfaced on the Chinese automotive platform XChuXing in late March — reportedly shared by a Nio sales representative — outlined the schedule.
As detailed back then, the official interior reveal was planned for this Tuesday (April 7), a media static experience on April 8, the technology launch event on April 9, the configurator opening on May 11, and a launch event with order lock-in on May 28.
Li confirmed earlier this month that the April 9 event would proceed, describing the ES9 as “the most important product of the year” and “the world’s most technologically advanced SUV.”
He said the vehicle had completed the tooling trial manufacturing phase and entered pre-production.
The final retail price is typically slightly lower than the pre-sale figure announced at the launch event, based on Nio’s recent model introduction pattern.
Flagship Succession
The ES9 replaces the ES8 as Nio‘s flagship SUV — a position the ES8 has held since becoming the brand’s first mass-produced vehicle in May 2018.
The third-generation ES8, launched last year, became the best-selling pure electric large SUV in China in the fourth quarter of 2025 and represented the majority of Nio‘s sales over recent months.
The ES9 sits above it as a full-size model aimed at the executive segment.
