Overall rating:

Quirky, clever and big on quality, the Volkswagen up! city car offers good value too and will make a big impact on a small segment in 2012.

Key Facts

Pricing: from around £8,000
Engine: 1.0-litre, three-cylinder petrol engine
Transmission: five-speed manual/six-speed automatic, front-wheel drive
Body style: three-door hatchback
Rivals: Toyota iQ, Ford Ka, Kia Picanto
CO₂ emissions: 99g/km
Combined economy: 67.2mpg (59bhp) / 65.7mpg (74bhp)
Top speed: about 100mph
Power: 59bhp / 74bhp

In the Metal:

The VW up! was penned by Walter Da Silva, Volkswagen's design chief who has had more design hits than you have had hot dinners - so it isn't a surprise that the car looks good. But crucially, while it has a friendly face with a large VW badge sitting on a smiling grille, the lights are designed to make the car look more 'intelligent' and weirdly it works. Unlike the car's predecessors, which always looked a little innocent, this new model appears much more purposeful.

Packaging is quite good, with a deceptively high roofline masked by VW's design team. This means that when you step inside the front, a six-footer will have inches above his head and in the rear there is a respectable amount of head- and legroom. At the rear there is a small (251-litre), but not entirely useless, boot with a split-level floor. Volkswagen will sell you various boxes to keep this organised too.

Inside, the dashboard matches the car's exterior colour and the quality of the plastics used on the areas your hands and eyes spend the most time is really good given the car's size and price tag. The centre console is quite simple, with fairly basic controls, but there is room on top of the dash for an optional plug-in satellite navigation system/PDA, which won't be expensive and will not only work as a GPS, but, thanks to downloadable apps, will be able to display album covers, trip information and even train you how to drive more economically. One wonders though, why this couldn't have been an iPhone or iPad instead. That would have been very cool.

Driving it:

The experience of Volkswagen's previous city cars was pretty unremarkable. Both the Lupo and Fox weren't that good to drive, but the up! feels much better. It has light steering and gearchange yet doesn't feel flimsy. The three-cylinder engines are throaty, but sound quite good. Acceleration is vocal and not hugely swift, but on city streets and even at speed on the Autobahn the up! is quiet.

With the wheels pushed far out to each corner there could definitely be room for a GTI version, which a Volkswagen spokesperson could neither confirm nor deny, but you get the feeling a 1.4 TSI engine will find its way into the up! at some stage. Until then, the most you can get is 74bhp, though the electric version, coming in 2013, should be quick.

What you get for your Money:

We haven't been fully briefed as yet on to what the up! will have in terms of standard equipment, but we know that there will be three grades: the Take up!, Move up! and High up! The basic car will most likely do without air conditioning and probably alloy wheels, but it won't be a big price walk to the next level, which will add both of these. The High up! should come with most of the potential bells and whistles thrown in. Options will include a City Emergency Braking system, which will brake the car automatically in the event of it detecting an imminent collision. Pricing in the UK is going to start at about £8,000, which is pretty impressive.

Worth Noting

The plug-in navigation system is removable and owners will be able to upgrade it with downloadable apps.

Summary

VW's new up! is likely to be a big player in a small segment. While this class of car has traditionally been flimsy and insubstantial, the up! is well-built and quite fun to drive. Expect it to be a strong seller.