- Renault wants to set a new efficiency record for electric vehicles.
- To do so, it built a stunning single-seater demo car called the Filante Record 2025.
- It has an 87-kilowatt-hour battery pack and weighs just 2,204 pounds.
French automaker Renault is killing it when it comes to designing electric cars. After the deliciously retro Renault 5, Renault 4 and over-the-top Renault 5 Turbo 3E concept, the brand that once sold something called Le Car in the United States is upping the ante once again.
The sleek single-seater you see in the photo gallery below is called the Renault Filante Record 2025. It looks like a Batmobile that visited the gym religiously and then dressed up in a designer suit. It’s quite futuristic without forgetting its ancestors—a skill that Renault seems to have mastered in the past few years.
As its name suggests, the Filante Record 2025 was built to set records. However, as opposed to its predecessors from the 1920s, 1930s and 1950s which were all about speed, this year’s Ultraviolet Blue spaceship on wheels is all about efficiency.
Everything from the shape of the wheel covers to the skinny round headlights was created with efficiency in mind. As a result, the entire car weighs a measly 2,204 pounds, with the lion’s share going to the 87-kilowatt-hour battery pack nestled in the floor. The battery, which uses cell-to-pack technology to minimize volume and weight, tips the scales at 1,322 lbs, leaving just 882 lbs for the body, suspension, wheels, electronics and everything else.
Carbon fiber was used throughout the construction, while 3D-printed aluminum was employed for complex parts that needed extreme precision. This approach also minimized material waste by using as little raw material as possible.
Photo by: Renault
The skinny bespoke tires come from Michelin. While it’s unlikely we’ll see them on a production car anytime soon, the efficiency claims are impressive. Michelin says the custom-made 19-inch tires have a rolling resistance that’s nearly 40% lower than conventional car tires.
Inside, the Renault Filante Record 2025 fits a single person on a lightweight stretched-fabric seat positioned over the battery pack. The steering wheel is far from conventional–just like the rest of the car. Instead of a round piece, the driver grabs onto a pair of handles and can check essential info like the speed and remaining range on a flexible panoramic screen wrapped around a cylinder.
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Renault
Speaking of steering, Renault’s futuristic EV doesn’t have a physical connection between the steering wheel and wheels. That’s because it uses steer-by-wire tech, just like the Tesla Cybertruck, to minimize weight. The same goes for the brakes, which are brake-by-wire instead of a conventional hydraulic system. There isn’t even a brake pedal inside.
Renault didn’t say anything about the Filante’s powertrain, but at just 2,200 pounds and a slippery body, even a low-powered motor would be enough to achieve high speeds. The French automaker said the demo car will be on display at this year’s Retromobile Motor Show in Paris in February. Afterward, it will undergo wind tunnel testing and ultimately set out to establish a new record for efficiency in the first half of the year.
For context, the efficiency record for electric vehicles is currently held by a team of students from the Technical University of Munich (TUM) in Germany. Their experimental “muc022” single-seater EV drove 1,599.27 miles (2,575.79 kilometers) on a 15.5 kilowatt-hours battery pack in 2023. Weighing just 374 pounds, the prototype returned an energy consumption of 103 miles/kWh.
