Nio's Firefly adds a 60-kWh battery option, pushing CLTC range to 560 km

Firefly, the compact EV brand owned by Nio, has rolled out a bigger 60-kWh battery pack — and crucially, it isn’t reserved for new buyers. Existing owners can move up too, either through a battery swap or by paying the difference.

On the numbers that matter, CLTC range climbs from 420 km to 560 km, a gain of 140 km or roughly a third. All of that comes without a single millimeter added to the pack’s footprint or the car’s curb weight.

Key Specs: 60 kWh ternary lithium pack · 560 km CLTC range (up from 420 km) · 0–100 km/h in 7.9 s · Permanent upgrade at ¥17,000 (~$2,530)

The engineering trick is modularity. Firefly designed the two packs around the same standardized module, so housing dimensions, mounting points and the locking mechanism are identical. The 42-kWh unit uses LFP cells; the new one switches to ternary lithium. Swapping one for the other doesn’t require touching the rest of the car.

What it costs

• Outright owners: ¥17,000 to upgrade permanently, and the request can only be filed at least a year after the purchase invoice date.
• BaaS subscribers: a ¥3,000 permanent upgrade service fee, with the monthly rental moving from ¥399 to ¥599.
• Launch promotion: eligible BaaS users can claim a ¥1,000 coupon, bringing the fee down to ¥2,000; outright owners get 20,000 credit points of equal value.
• Window: open to first owners who locked 42-kWh orders on or before October 22, 2026, with the upgrade completed by December 31, 2027.

New customers now pick a capacity at order time. The 60-kWh Free Edition starts at ¥136,800 bought outright, or ¥79,800 under BaaS with the ¥599 monthly rental. The Glow and Halo trims sit at ¥142,800 and ¥150,300 respectively in full-purchase form.

A pattern across Nio’s brands

Offering two capacities is standard practice elsewhere in the group. The main Nio line runs 75 kWh and 100 kWh packs, while Onvo sells 60 kWh and 85 kWh options. Firefly was the outlier with a single battery — that gap is now closed.

The timing tracks with Firefly’s momentum. The brand crossed 90,000 cumulative deliveries on October 16, roughly six weeks after passing 80,000 at the end of August. September was its best month yet at 7,327 units, up 26.87% year on year and 25.21% month on month, taking the nine-month total to 48,122.

There’s a service angle here as well. Firefly only gained access to Nio’s fifth-generation swap stations on August 7 — earlier fourth-generation sites were off-limits because of the car’s short body and wheelbase. Bigger batteries plus a wider swap footprint gives the little hatch a more convincing pitch against the Mini and Smart crowd.

The model, which carries the brand’s own name, landed in China in April 2025.