What is Jaecoo? Complete brand, model and tech guide for UK car buyers

Jaecoo has made a big impression this year, with its first model, the 7, hitting an incredible fourth place in the new-car sales chart in September, an unprecedented feat for a brand that hadn’t even sold one car in the UK a year ago. That’s unlikely to all be retail buyers running for their nearest Jaecoo dealer, but no matter whether it's rental, Motability or enticing fleet deals, you’ll be starting to spot that distinctive toothy grille on our roads increasingly often. 

Jaecoo is one of a trio of closely related brands, alongside Omoda under Chery’s ownership. As with Omoda, it was created in April 2023 by Chery, and designed to expand outside its own borders into Europe and other big markets worldwide. The story behind the company's name is that it blends the German word for 'hunter' – Jager – with the English word ‘cool’. Honest.

The 7 kicked off Jaecoo's UK presence at the beginning of 2025, coming in 145bhp 1.6 petrol or 201bhp 1.5-litre plug-in hybrid forms, the latter with a generous 56-mile EV range. That’s a better bet than the petrol, which doesn’t exactly blow you away with its official 37.7mpg fuel economy figure.

The 7 wasn’t alone for long, with the smaller and even more Range Rover Evoque-like 5 landing here this autumn. That takes Jaecoo into electric territory for the first time, and while the E5's range of 248 miles and charging speed of just 80kW don’t grab the attention, the pricing will. Kicking off at £27,505 for the EV, or £3k less for the 1.6-litre petrol, it’s well loaded with kit for its price. Think well specced Nissan Qashqai for the price of a smaller Juke. 

The next new thing looks likely to be the larger Jaecoo 8 SUV, a seven-seater aimed at the likes of Volkswagen’s Tayron. Although not yet officially confirmed for the UK, it’s already on sale in Australia and South Africa, so looks likely to be with us next year. That car will probably come with a 245bhp petrol engine and sit at the top of Jaecoo’s UK line-up.

There’s also talk of the boxier electric Jaecoo 6 off-roader, boasting looks that merge a DS No7’s detailing with the Land Rover Defender’s boxy shape, which is at least a change from the budget- Range Rover looks of the first pair of cars to land here. As well as the styling, a suite of off-road driving modes would mark out the 6 as something different from the rest of the Chinese crowd, but as yet, it’s not confirmed for the UK. 

European production for UK Jaecoos is rumoured, courtesy of Chery’s joint venture with Ebro at the former Nissan plant near Barcelona in Spain. But plans for everything that will be built there are still a mystery, with deadlines pushing backwards from the original 2024 announcement. The plant is already producing rebadged Omoda and Chery cars for the Spanish market under the Ebro brand famous for light trucks and buses.

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