China
Chery Jaguar Land Rover opened pre-sales of the Freelander 8 on 14 August in five versions. The five-seater starts at 339,900 yuan (about $50,100). The six-seat cars run 349,900 yuan for the Pro (about $51,500), 379,900 yuan for the Max (about $56,000) and 429,900 yuan for the Max+ (about $63,300). A launch edition capped at 1,000 units is listed at 459,900 yuan with a locked-order price of 449,900 yuan (about $66,300).
The venture had set its own benchmark for this car. Ahead of pre-sales it said it was aiming at the 300,000 yuan segment, a figure it repeated often enough that it became the number the Freelander 8 would be measured against. The entry car came in 13 percent above it, and the six-seater most buyers will actually look at is 17 percent above. The top Max+ is 43 percent above.
That matters more than it usually would, because the same joint venture has just demonstrated what happens when it prices a car above what the market will pay. Chery Jaguar Land Rover launched the Range Rover Evoque L at 429,800 yuan and by June was watching dealers list it from around 200,000 yuan, roughly half its opening price, as production wound down. The Freelander line is taking over the manufacturing base the Evoque L is vacating. Same venture, same plant, and now a flagship priced within 100 yuan of where the Evoque L started.
What the money buys is a large range-extender SUV on an 800 V system. A 1.5-litre turbocharged four-cylinder runs purely as a generator, quoted at 45.79 percent thermal efficiency, and never drives the wheels. Those are turned by a dual-motor all-wheel-drive system making a combined 610 kW (818 hp) and 813 Nm, with the rear motor alone rated at 250 kW. A 60.3 kWh CATL ternary lithium pack gives 310 km of electric-only range on the CLTC cycle, and the specification is the same across all five versions. The car is 5,118 mm long, or 5,185 mm with an option, on a 3,040 mm wheelbase, with a 2+2+2 six-seat layout on the six-seaters. Huawei’s Qiankun ADS 5 driver assistance is standard across the range, and the cockpit runs a Qualcomm Snapdragon 8397.
The other question the car raises is what the badge on it now means. Freelander was a Land Rover model name from 1997; since March it has been a standalone Chinese marque owned by the Chery-JLR venture, with Jaguar Land Rover licensing the name and no Land Rover badge appearing on the car. The engineering, the supply chain and the plant at Changshu are all Chinese. It is the same arrangement that has produced several other China-only badges inside foreign joint ventures, and it is why a car with a British nameplate arrives with a CATL battery and a Huawei driver-assistance stack.
The Freelander 8 makes its first show appearance at Chengdu on 21 August.
The Range Rover Evoque L is a long-wheelbase Evoque built in China by the Chery Jaguar Land Rover joint venture and sold only there. It uses a 2.0-litre Ingenium turbo four with 48-volt mild-hybrid assistance, 245 hp and all-wheel drive through a nine-speed automatic, with R-Dynamic trim and 20-inch wheels standard. It launched at 429,800 yuan; as the joint venture winds down production before the end of 2026, dealers have discounted it to around half that.
