The El-Iseo marks a first for Riva – and for Ferretti Group as a whole. After more than 180 years of building glamorous runabouts and motoryachts, this is their first fully electric model.
Launched at Boot Düsseldorf 2024, it sits on the compact Iseo hull but trades petrol or diesel power for a Parker Hannifin electric motor and a 150 kWh battery pack developed with motorsport specialists. That means 40 knots flat out, a 25-knot cruise, and a usable range of around 25 nautical miles at speed or twice that if you throttle back. Fast charging from 20 to 80% takes just over an hour. Ferretti could have debuted electric power under a different name, but it was Riva - the brand most tied to tradition and style - that has been chosen to carry it. Let's find out why.
Riva El-Iseo Key Facts
- LOA 27' 5"
- Model Year 2024
- Max Speed 40 knots
- Status In Production
- Yacht Type Classic Style
- Use Type Dayboating
Review Video
The El-Iseo sits on the same 27ft hull as the petrol and diesel Iseo but this boat is all about a different kind of power. Ferretti gave the job to Mauro Micheli and Sergio Beretta of Officina Italiana Design, the duo behind every modern Riva, and their brief was to prove that going electric doesn’t mean losing the Riva soul. That’s why, at first glance, it looks utterly familiar: the long run of polished mahogany across the deck, stainless steel grilles and fittings polished to a mirror finish, and the aquamarine beauty line tracing the waterline. Even the cushions are in Riva’s signature sky fabric. It’s the same heritage Riva - until you know what lies beneath.
Because under that aft sunpad is not a V8 but a full electric drivetrain developed with technology partners outside the marine world. The motor comes from Parker Hannifin, better known for industrial and automotive engineering, while the 150 kWh battery pack was designed by Podium Advanced Technologies - a company that builds high-density batteries for racing series like Formula E. The whole system is built with layers of redundancy and safety, measures that helped the El-Iseo become the first open electric runabout of this size to earn RINA Category B certification.
Even so, the designers made sure the new technology doesn’t spoil the look. The charging port is hidden behind a stainless grille. The swim platform still folds out a ladder and handhold, with the shower and towing eye blended neatly into the structure. And the first hull wears a California Sky Blue finish (Ferrari reference) that marks it out from the rest of the Riva fleet without breaking the family line. What you end up with is a boat that plays both sides very well.
Looking at the bathing platform, the shapes are pure Riva with polished stainless trim around the edge, neat fairing, and everything finished to the nines. But it’s also practical. A telescopic swim ladder hides beneath a flap, with a solid stainless handhold to pull yourself up from the water. There’s a deck shower tucked away too, so you can hose off after a swim, and an unobtrusive towing eye if you fancy some watersports.
What’s clever is how the new electric requirements have been absorbed into this area without spoiling the lines. The charging port, for example, isn’t an ugly cap bolted on the deck – it’s set behind a stainless steel grill in the topside, mirrored on the other side by the freshwater filler. All the useful points are there, just hidden in the detail. From the first step, you get that blend of classic runabout style with the subtle adjustments needed for an electric drivetrain.
The cockpit is a very familar Riva layout. A big sunpad stretches across the stern and ahead of that the cockpit is arranged around a glossy table. The table itself rises and falls at electronically, and with an infill cushion it turns this whole side into a chaise longue, somewhere to sprawl out properly.
The seating wraps around three sides, with space for a group to gather, and there’s storage underneath for fenders and kit. A fridge is integrated too, just enough to keep drinks cool on a warm day. What you won’t find is a wet bar as this is a clean, simple dayboat arrangement. Overhead, there’s a canopy folded under panels in the coamings, that pops up to shade the whole cockpit.
Forward, the lines stay beautifully clean. The bow has a sharp profile, all sweep and polish, with stainless handrails running along. The anchor gear is kept unobtrusive, allall low-set so it doesn’t interrupt the look of the deck.
The finish here is a reminder of just how much care goes into these boats. The mahogany planking on the deck is laid in multiple layers, lacquered again and again until it shines like glass. It’s the same obsessive process that’s defined Riva for decades, carried straight onto this new electric model.
The helm has two seats, both with flip-up bolsters, so you can perch and lean or sit right down behind the screen. And that screen is a beauty and fully wraparound, doing a brilliant job of sheltering the cockpit while still looking every bit Riva. It’s the sort of detailing Micheli and Beretta never let slip: functional but also styled to match the heritage lines of the boat.
In front of you, the wheel is classic Riva having stainless steel spokes, a thick rim, and properly weighty in the hands. Around it, though, the El-Iseo is very much twenty-first century. Instead of an analogue dash, you’ve got two touchscreens. The first is a Simrad chartplotter (9 or 12 inches depending on spec) for navigation and depth. Alongside it sits a dedicated Böning display, purpose-built for this model, which keeps you up to date with the electric side of life: state of charge, estimated range, drive mode.
The drive modes are called Adagio, Andante and Allegro - the tempos of classical music. Adagio is the eco setting, capped at 5 knots but stretching range for up to 10 hours of cruising. Andante is the everyday planing mode, giving you 25 knots and performance to match a petrol Iseo. Allegro is the sport setting, releasing any measures so the motor’s full 300 kW come to play and giving you the 40-knot top speed. The system steps down automatically if the battery drops: so at 20% it eases you into a slower mode, and at 5% it forces Adagio, leaving you a couple of miles in reserve to get home.
Everything is tied together by Xenta’s electronic control system. The throttles look like twins, but it’s actually a single shaft drive with a rudder – forward, neutral, reverse, as simple as it gets. Trim is handled automatically too, with Zipwake interceptors and autotrim on the sterndrive keeping the running angle level.
Lift the aft sunpad and where you’d normally expect to see a V8, you’ll find the Parker Hannifin GVM310 electric motor. It’s coupled to the same sterndrive you’d see on the petrol Iseo, but the power source is very different.
Feeding it is a 150kWh battery bank, split into two blocks so you’ve always got redundancy if one fails. They’re sealed and liquid-cooled for efficiency, and wrapped in aerospace-grade insulation to keep heat in check.
Riva also built in layers of safety you don’t normally talk about on a boat this size – gas sensors in the compartment, thermal shielding around the packs, and a full fire suppression system.
Our Verdict
So does the El-Iseo still feel like a proper Riva? It really does - and that’s the clever part. The styling hasn’t changed, the craftsmanship is all there, and the helm gives you the same tactile satisfaction you get on any other boat in the range. But beneath the gloss it’s a very different animal: quicker off the line than its petrol version, able to top up over a long lunch break, and built with enough engineering depth to earn a RINA Category B certificate when most electric runabouts stop at C.
There are some limits: The range isn’t huge and you’re not going to be blasting offshore. But these boats are really used pottering on Italian or Swiss lakes, shuttling out as a tender to a bigger yacht. And that’s why Riva was picked for this first electric push. The Iseo hull is the right size for today’s batteries, the clientele are the ones who can live with the range, and no other badge in the Group carries the same mix of glamour and heritage.
Reasons to Buy
- No compromises on Riva styling
- Acceleration sharper than petrol Iseo
- Category B rating
- Silent eco-cruising
Things to Consider
- Limited range at higher speeds
- Price significantly higher than petrol Iseo
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Specifications
- Builder Riva
- Range Open
- Model El-Iseo
- Length Overall 27' 5"
- Beam 8' 2"
- Draft 3' 3"
- Hull Fibreglass
- Yacht Type (Primary) Classic Style
- Use Type (Primary) Dayboating
- Cruising Speed
- Max Speed
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