If Polestar is not on your radar, you’re like a lot of Canadians. But that could soon change. 

The small EV brand with Swedish roots is making two brash moves. For starters, it is rolling out a controversial feature soon in Canada: A vehicle with no back window—just a rear-facing camera and side mirrors. In the meantime, the company’s new global CEO is trying to exploit political backlash against rival CEO Elon Musk in hopes of poaching Tesla customers. 

It’s a striking bit of swagger for a brand that has faced its fair share of puzzled glances and people asking, “What is that car?” Polestar’s struggle to break into the mainstream has weighed on its sales and its stock.  

The name certainly wasn’t top of mind of Stewart Harris, who went looking for a Hyundai Ioniq before selecting a Polestar 2 for his frequent commutes from the Niagara region to Toronto. “This vehicle has been probably the best that I have driven in my two decades of commuting into the city,” he wrote in an email.

That sentiment makes Harris part of a cult following in this country that Hugues Bissonnette, the head of Polestar Canada, hopes to broaden, helping the global company to profitability this year. Features like a heat pump that makes it one of CAA’s best-ranked EVs for range during Canadian winters won’t hurt.

“Montreal became the largest dealer in North America and one of the most important in the world in terms of volume,” he said of the company’s expansion into Canada. The firm has just begun Polestar 3 deliveries in the country and hopes to begin Polestar 4 deliveries in November.

What’s going on with Polestar: Initially a racing and motorsports brand, it was acquired in 2015 by Volvo, which spun it out again in 2017. Polestar went public in 2022, backed by both Volvo and its owner, Chinese automaker Geely. Michael Lohscheller became global CEO of Polestar in October as the company tried to turn around its declining stock price. Global retail sales fell 15 per cent to about 45,000 in 2024, down from nearly 53,000 in 2023.

While Geely has tried to emphasize Polestar’s independence, some of its vehicles are made in China, which places the company in the thick of the tariff fray in both the U.S. and Canada. Bissonnette recently told me the company has tried to mitigate the impact by pre-ordering almost a year’s worth of Polestar 2 vehicles, and making the Polestar 3 at a U.S. Volvo factory.

Asked about fear of Chinese technology within the North American auto sector, Bissonnette said that “competition is needed to elevate everyone’s game.”  

The vibe: The vehicles themselves are a little unconventional. The Polestar 2 is often described as “between a car and a crossover,” while the Polestar 4 has been dubbed a “sedan-coupe-wagon chimera.”

Test drivers have mostly praised Polestar’s winged chassis and metallic flourishes inside the cab, which buck the industry trend of matte earth tones. Like many EVs, it has a large screen inside. But it also has physical buttons and pull-out door handles.

Reviews of Polestar 2’s infotainment system have been more mixed; so have ratings of the car’s handling, which has been described as both “stable” and stiff. During the first 90 days of ownership, Polestar buyers and lessees encounter more problems than owners of any other brand studied by J.D. Power. 

No looking back: The company’s next big test comes with the Polestar 4, which is currently on display at the Toronto Auto Show, complete with that absent rear window. In its place: a wide-view camera and a sunroof that extends to the back of the cab. The idea is to eliminate blind spots, and prevent weather or distracting backseat passengers from obstructing the driver’s rear view. While that may be nerve-wracking if the camera goes out, Bissonnette emphasized that Volvo’s renowned safety standards have influenced Polestar’s engineering. 

“That’s quite unique,” he said. “It makes a big difference in the design of the car.” 

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