NIO ES9 Completes 10,000-Km "Driver Swap, No Vehicle Change" Challenge in Record-Breaking 94 Hours 19 Minutes

On May 6 at 12:00 noon, the NIO ES9 kicked off the "Ten Thousand Li Beyond the Great Passes" challenge—a record attempt for the shortest time to complete a 10,000-kilometer journey—starting from the NIO battery swap station at Luocheng Service Area on the G4216 Rongli Expressway in Leshan, Sichuan. The vehicle crossed the finish line at the NIO battery swap station in Dunhuang on May 10, completing the entire route in 94 hours, 19 minutes, and 11 seconds, breaking the previous all-electric vehicle 10,000-km record held by the ONVO L60. The challenge traversed over ten provinces and municipalities—including Sichuan, Yunnan, Guangxi, Guangdong, Jiangsu, and Gansu—and passed through famous historical passes such as Shanhai Pass and Jiayu Pass. Throughout the journey, the team adopted a "driver-swapping, vehicle-unchanged" approach: the same ES9 was used without replacement, relying solely on NIO’s high-speed battery swap network for energy replenishment. Previously, in July 2025, the ONVO L60 set the all-electric 10,000-km record at 98 hours and 6 minutes. This time, the ES9—a full-size all-electric SUV with a larger body and higher energy consumption—shaved nearly four hours off that benchmark. Officially unveiled on April 9, 2025, the NIO ES9 is positioned as a tech-focused flagship executive SUV, with a starting pre-sale price of RMB 420,000. Customer test drives are scheduled to begin on May 11, followed by its official market launch and deliveries on May 27. As of the completion of this challenge, NIO has built 3,841 battery swap stations nationwide, including over 1,000 along expressways, enabling battery swaps in approximately three minutes.