New Porsche Cayman Electric: EV sports car seen testing for first time

• All new fully-electric Porsche Cayman
• Convertible Boxster variant in the works too
• Likely to arrive in 2026

Like it or not, the Porsche Cayman is going fully-electric. The two-seater sports car will ditch the petrol engine that it’s used since it first hit the scene in 2005, trading it for a battery and electric motor setup that we still know little about. However, we now have a good idea of what the new Cayman will look like, thanks to these fresh spy shots.

Despite the new electric platform, Porsche has kept a traditional mid-engined sports car silhouette for the electric Cayman. It doesn’t look all that different from the current 718 Cayman at first glance, with a similar sloping roofline, a low nose and wide rear haunches, but Porsche has updated many of the details to tie it into its latest models.

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You’ll recognise the headlight design from the Porsche Taycan, Porsche’s first electric car, as well as the Porsche Macan Electric. They’re sunken into the front fenders and sit above a pair of gaping air intakes with vertical vanes. We’ve seen a similar intake setup on the latest Porsche 911 GTS models – they can open and close to adjust cooling on that car, so the new Cayman could use this tech, too.

The same front end design was spied on the new electric Porsche Boxster back in 2022, which isn’t a huge surprise as the two cars will be mechanically identical underneath. The two cars also share their rear light bar, which has become something of a Porsche trademark in recent years.

The roofline is, of course, where the two models differ. While the Boxster gets a folding soft-top, the Cayman sticks to a sloping hardtop with a large glass hatchback. The roof looks to be even more streamlined than before, meeting a small spoiler at the rear. We can just make out a slim, vertical air intake behind the doors which could be used to feed air to cool the electric motor.

Do we know anything else about the electric Cayman?

We haven’t had a peek inside the new Cayman yet, but it won’t share anything in common with the current model, which hasn’t changed much since the third-generation Cayman arrived in 2012. Instead, it’s likely to use bits from the Taycan, Macan and 911, with digital dials and fewer buttons.

At its core, though, the Porsche Cayman is a sports car, so buyers will be most interested in what’s under the bonnet. This is still a bit of a hazy area – we know the electric Cayman and Boxster will use an all-new platform, but details about battery size and motor power are still a mystery. The Porsche Mission R concept car, which served as the inspiration for the new Cayman, had a whopping 1,017bhp, but we’d be surprised if the new Cayman had half of that.

With the electric Taycan now well-established, and with the Macan, Cayman and Boxster going electric, Porsche seems to be fully committed to its EV future. Its iconic 911 sports car remains petrol-powered for now, but if the new electric Cayman proves popular, it could encourage the German marque to take the plunge on a ‘911 E’.

Another iconic sports car is ditching petrol for electrons – read about the upcoming electric BMW M3…