The ET5 Touring vehicles currently being delivered by are produced in advance, and consumers who customize the model will have to wait about 3-4 weeks.

(Image credit: Nio)

Nio (NYSE: NIO) today began delivery of the ET5 Touring, which was officially launched in China and Europe yesterday.

The first owners from several cities across China took delivery of the ET5 Touring on June 16, Nio said in an article posted on its mobile app.

Nio did not announce the number of ET5 Touring deliveries today, though it shared images showing deliveries in cities including Xiamen, Suzhou, Chengdu and Guangzhou.

Nio officially launched the ET5 Touring yesterday, and its pricing is identical to that of the regular ET5.

Including the battery, the version with the 75-kWh battery pack starts at RMB 298,000 ($41,860) and the 100-kWh version at RMB 356,000.

Chinese consumers who choose to purchase the model using the BaaS (battery as a service) service will see the prices start at RMB 228,000 for both versions, with monthly battery rental costs of RMB 980 and RMB 1,680 respectively.

It is worth noting that the ET5 Touring vehicles delivered today are not customized, but were produced by Nio in advance based on designer-recommended configurations to enable quick first delivery.

Consumers who currently customize the ET5 Touring are expected to receive delivery in about 3-4 weeks after locking in their orders, as shown by the information on the configurator for the model in the Nio App.

This is the same approach Nio took when it launched the new ES6 on May 24, when it began deliveries of the SUV the night of the launch.

The pricing of the ET5 Touring was a surprise, as it was previously widely seen to be priced RMB 10,000 to 20,000 higher than the regular ET5.

"Pricing of ET5 Touring is more competitive than we thought -- on par with the incumbent ET5 sedan at Rmb 298k+," Morgan Stanley analyst Tim Hsiao's team said in a research note sent to investors yesterday.

With Nio's broad price cut and the rapid rollout of the new NT 2.0 model, its sales can rebound considerably in the second half of the year, paving the way for 20,000 units per month, Deutsche Bank's Edison Yu's team said in a research note sent to investors today.

Here are more images of the first ET5 Touring deliveries shared by Nio on its mobile app.

(1 $= RMB 7.1193)

NIO ET5 Touring pricing 'a pleasant surprise,' says Morgan Stanley