Volkswagen Tiguan SUV

The last Volkswagen Tiguan was with us for an impressive nine years, but in that time the market has moved on significantly. SUVs have become one of the dominant driving forces in new car sales around the world and buyers want then to be more comfortable, more stylish, more spacious and more upmarket than ever before. 

Fortunately for VW, the new Volkswagen Tiguan ticks all those boxes. It's as practical as aNissan Qashqai, but has the same sort of upmarket appeal as a BMW X1. Its place as VW's third biggest-selling car in the UK – behind the Volkswagen Golf and Volkswagen Polo – won’t be under threat for a while yet. 

The new Tiguan will be available with a choice of 1.4 and 2.0-litre petrol engines, but most buyers will plump for one of the diesels. A 1.4-litre TDI will be the entry point, accompanied by a pair of 2.0-litre TDIs. In time, a twin-turbo 2.0-litre diesel will be available, while a plug-in hybrid version called the Tiguan GTE is likely, too.

Two and four-wheel-drive versions will be available when the car goes on sale in April, as will automatic and manual gearboxes. It's worth pointing out that all automatics are four-wheel drive and all manuals two-wheel drive.

Running costs should be around the average for this type of car

Volkswagen hasn’t yet confirmed the Tiguan’s fuel economy and carbon-dioxide emissions figures, but numbers we’ve seen suggest they won’t be the lowest in the compact SUV class.

When equipped with four-wheel drive and the 148bhp version of the 2.0-litre diesel (a 178bhp version will also be offered), emissions are likely to be around the 149g/km mark. That’s about the same as a Mazda CX-5 automatic.

Manual front-wheel-drive models see emissions drop to 125g/km and if you’re one of the 10% of buyers who’ll choose a petrol, emissions there are rated at around 170g/km, which will make it rather pricey to tax.

The old model had flexible service intervals, meaning the cars of average-mileage drivers could cover between 10,000 and 18,000 miles before a service was required, depending on how the car was driven. This is likely to continue in the new Tiguan, which will almost certainly be covered by VW’s standard three-year/60,000-mile warranty.

We’ve only driven the 2.0-litre TSI 150 petrol and 2.0-litre TDI 150 diesel engines, which both produce 148bhp. Both were also fitted with a seven-speed automatic gearbox and had VW’s 4MOTION four-wheel-drive system. 

Our drive was on Volkswagen’s Arctic Circle test track, so it’s hard to deliver a definitive verdict on how the car will feel on UK roads just yet. What we could tell was that the new Tiguan felt sure-footed, with controlled movement over bumps at speed.