BYD's performance division keeps feeding the spec sheet. The Yangwang U9 Xtreme has posted 503.17 km/h (312.65 mph) on a closed road in Abu Dhabi, becoming, according to Yangwang, the first production car of any kind to crack the 500-km/h mark in a single-direction run.
The attempt took place earlier this week on Sheikh Khalifa Bin Zayed International Road, a public road closed for the occasion. About 6.3 miles of road were shut down, with 4.3 miles given over to the top-speed passes. German racing driver Marc Basseng was again at the controls, the same driver who was behind the wheel for the car's record run last year at the ATP Papenburg proving ground in Germany.
The new mark beats the U9 Xtreme's own 496.22 km/h (308.4 mph) run from Germany. Yangwang says the Abu Dhabi result has been recognized by Guinness World Records and the FIA, both as the fastest single-direction run by a production car and the fastest by an electric production car.
Getting there took some fiddling. Initial passes topped out at 304.4 mph, after which engineers changed the rear wing's angle, revised the suspension software for more rebound damping, and dialed in the tire pressures. Two more passes followed, and the second one delivered the record.
The U9 Xtreme runs four electric motors making almost 3,000 hp, each capable of spinning to 30,000 rpm. The 1,200-volt architecture handles up to 1,000 amps, and the BYD Blade Battery is built for extremely high discharge rates. The development curve has been steep: a standard U9 managed 243.5 mph in 2024, and the Xtreme hit 293.5 mph in August 2025 before its 308.3-mph record a month later.
Every "fastest production car" claim depends on how you define the attempt. The Petersen Automotive Museum demands independent verification plus runs in both directions to cancel out wind, and under those rules, a one-way pass like this one doesn't qualify for its official ranking. Even so, an electric hypercar clearing 500 km/h is a number worth sitting with.
[Images: Yangwang]
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