Mahindra's BE 07 just confirmed it: LFP has quietly become the default EV battery for India, and Hyundai is the one holdout still importing NMC

Mahindra used its Q2 FY27 results briefing this week to confirm the BE 07, the second model under its dedicated BE electric sub-brand, built on the same INGLO architecture that already underpins the BE 6 and XEV 9e. Buried in that confirmation is a less obvious fact: INGLO's battery chemistry — lithium iron phosphate, or LFP — is now the chemistry almost every electric car sold in India has converged on, whether it is built by an Indian company, a Vietnamese one, or a Chinese one selling through a joint venture. The exception is Hyundai, which is still importing the older nickel-manganese-cobalt (NMC) cells it has used since the Creta Electric's launch, while it waits for a locally made LFP supply to mature.

That split is not a branding choice. It is an engineering bet about what happens to a battery inside a car that sits in 45°C Vidarbha sun or crawls through a Chennai traffic jam with the air conditioning on full, and it is worth understanding before you buy.

What LFP and NMC actually trade off

Both are lithium-ion chemistries; they differ in what sits at the cathode. NMC packs nickel, manganese and cobalt into the cathode to maximise how much energy a given volume of cell can store — which is why NMC has dominated the premium end of the global EV market, Tesla's older packs included. LFP swaps that cathode for iron phosphate, which stores noticeably less energy by volume and weight, but is chemically far more resistant to the runaway reaction that turns a damaged or overheated cell into a fire.

Independent lab comparisons cited by Electric & Hybrid Vehicle Technology International put the numbers at roughly 150–170°C before an LFP cell even begins self-heating, against 90–110°C for NMC, and a correspondingly higher ceiling — around 230–260°C versus 170–190°C — before a full thermal runaway sets in. NMC cells also release close to twice the heat per amp-hour when they do go into runaway. None of that means an NMC pack is unsafe; every pack sold in India has to pass ARAI's AIS-156 thermal-propagation test, which requires that a single cell going into runaway must not set off the pack or produce fire or explosion. It means LFP starts with a bigger safety margin before the battery management system and pack engineering even have to do their job — a margin that matters more in a country where ambient temperatures regularly sit within 20–25°C of a cell's danger zone for months at a time, and where DC fast chargers are not always maintained to the standard a carmaker assumes in its lab testing.

The scorecard, model by model

Run down the EVs actually on sale in India today and the pattern is stark. Mahindra's BE 6, XEV 9e and XEV 9S use BYD's "Blade" LFP cells in a cell-to-pack design that drops the module layer entirely, cooled through a Mahle battery chiller — the same supply chain the newly confirmed BE 07 is expected to inherit. Tata's Nexon EV, Curvv.ev and Harrier.ev packs are built around LFP cells (cylindrical cells from Eve Energy in the smaller packs, prismatic cells assembled by Tata AutoComp in the larger ones). Maruti Suzuki's first EV, the e-Vitara, imports complete LFP Blade packs from BYD rather than NMC cells from its Toyota-platform partner. MG's Comet and Windsor EV use imported LFP cells assembled at MG's own battery shop in India. VinFast's VF6 and VF7, and BYD's own Atto 3 and Seal, are LFP across the board — unsurprising for BYD, whose Blade battery is an LFP design by definition.

The outlier is Hyundai. The Creta Electric's packs — a 42kWh and a 51.4kWh option — use NMC cells reported to be imported via HLI Green Power, Hyundai-LG's joint venture in Indonesia, or from LG directly, then assembled into finished packs at Hyundai's Chennai facility. Hyundai and Kia signed an initial agreement with Exide Energy Solutions in April 2024 to localise LFP cell production in India, followed by a binding term sheet specifically for Hyundai Motor India in December 2024 — but two years on, no Hyundai model sold here carries an Exide-made cell. Until that supply chain actually ships, Hyundai remains the one mainstream brand asking Indian buyers to accept NMC's higher energy density along with its narrower thermal margin.

What this means if you're choosing an EV

Range figures on a spec sheet don't tell you which chemistry sits under the floor, and dealers rarely volunteer it unprompted. It is worth asking, for three practical reasons. First, degradation: LFP packs tolerate more full charge-discharge cycles and hold up better to being left at a high state of charge in heat — the two things Indian EV owners are most likely to do, given erratic charger access and a habit of topping up to 100% rather than planning around 80%. Second, warranty confidence: every LFP-based carmaker above now offers 8-year packs with minimal degradation guarantees, and Tata has gone further, offering a lifetime warranty on specific LFP packs for first owners. Third, and least talked about: LFP's lower energy density means these packs are usually slightly larger and heavier for the same range than an equivalent NMC pack would be — a trade Indian-market carmakers have evidently decided is worth making.

None of this makes an NMC-based EV unsafe to buy. It does mean that if you're cross-shopping a Creta Electric against a BE 6 or an e-Vitara, chemistry is now a real, researchable difference between them — not a technicality.

The Auto Grid angle

Chemistry sits inside a sealed pack and PPF has nothing to do with keeping it cool. But the way these packs are packaged changes what we see when these cars come into the bay. Nearly every India-spec EV, LFP or NMC, now carries its battery as a flat structural floor sitting lower than an equivalent ICE car's fuel tank and exhaust line, which means the underbody, sills and lower bumper lip take speed-breaker and loose-gravel strikes that a petrol Nexon or Creta would mostly shrug off higher up. Add the extra kerb weight of any battery pack — a BE 6 or e-Vitara runs 250–400kg heavier than its ICE sibling — and stone-chip damage on the lower third of the car arrives faster and harder. It's why our install plan for any EV, regardless of what's inside the battery, puts more emphasis on the lower bumper, sills and underbody than it would for the same brand's petrol model.

What's next

Watch for Mahindra to confirm the BE 07's actual battery specification — expected to be the BE 6's existing 59kWh and 79kWh LFP packs rather than a new size — as its "first half of 2027" launch window firms up. On the other side of the ledger, the real story to track is whether Hyundai's Exide Energy supply chain finally ships a locally made LFP cell into a production Creta Electric; until it does, India's best-selling non-LFP EV will keep running on imported NMC cells, the last significant holdout in a market that has otherwise made up its mind.