- Sealion 5 tested alongside newer M9 people mover.
- 3-star rating reflects shortcomings in 'established' areas of testing.
- Overall, safety performance is 'mixed' says ANCAP.
BYD's 5-star safety confidence has crumpled a bit this week, following ANCAP's assessement of the Sealion 5 SUV. It has rated the model 3 stars under the tougher new 2026 test protocols, with Crash Avoidance and Safe Driving results particularly impacting its performance.
Some of the result can be attributed to the Sealion 5's age. Despite being a relative newcomer to New Zealand, it's is a model that dates back to 2023 in its current incarnation, and even further to a pre-facelift version in China.
The Sealion 5 lacks several "important" new safety features says ANCAP, including seatbelt misuse alert, stature classification (recognising occupant size to tailor restraint performance), low-speed pedal misapplication and eCall.
However, ANCAP also notes that "shortcomings were also identified in established areas of assessment".
The emergency lane keeping system did not intervene when tested in road-edge scenarios: this has been factored into ANCAP’s ratings since 2018. Child presence detection, assessed since 2023, is also not provided.
Overall, ANCAP says the Sealion 5 provides "a mixed level of safety performance". It provides adult and child occupants with "respectable" Crash Protection, but the new Virtual and Sled test assessments showed that protection was reduced for larger occupants and at higher test severity.
The Sealion 5 was tested at the same time as the new BYD M9 people mover (a model not yet sold in NZ), which achieved a 5-star rating. ANCAP noted the Sealion 5 offered many of the same Post Crash features as the newer car, including battery thermal management, multi-collision braking, and occupant egress options.
“BYD has been, and continues to be, proactive in bringing forward models for ANCAP testing," says ANCAP CEO Carla Hoorweg. "However, the Sealion 5 was a model the brand hadn’t actively pursued for testing, and was subsequently selected by ANCAP to ensure consumers have a clear picture of its safety performance.”