New Skoda Kamiq Review

The new Skoda Kamiq now starts at £0 Motability Advance Payment for the SE trim and some SE L models. If you'd like the better SE L trim with an automatic gearbox, that'll set you back a minimum of £595. For that you get upgraded alloy wheels, an improved touchscreen with satellite navigation, micro-suede seats and dual-zone climate control (section updated October 2020).

Skoda Kamiq Motability Advance Payment Offers 

Skoda could have been at the forefront of the current craze for supermini-based SUVs. Back in 2009 it launched a model you might conceivably remember, the Yeti, which used Fabia bits but dressed them up with Crossover attitude.

It was a good start, but the foundation wasn't built upon. The facelifted Yeti of 2013 was disappointingly conservative in a market seeking high fashion and after four years on sale, it was allowed to drift out of production without being properly replaced. Leaving the Czech brand to wait until it could launch its own version of a small SUV on the VW Group's MQB-A0 platform, a chassis that by Autumn 2019 had been pressed into service for the SEAT Arona and the Volkswagen T-Cross in this class. That was when Skoda was also able to use it to launch this car, the Kamiq.

Because this Kamiq uses the same underpinnings as a Skoda Scala family hatch, it can only have front wheel drive and straightforward torsion bean rear suspension. Still, that's probably all that the vast majority of Motability customer will want. As an option, the brand offers 'Sport Chassis Control', which lowers the car by 10mm and gives it two-way adjustable dampers. We can't see many customers taking this up.

Most Motability customers will go for a version of 1.0-litre TSI petrol engine. Entry-level versions get it in 95PS form with a 5-speed gearbox but further up the range, the variants available feature this unit in a 115PS state of tune. Go for that and you'll also be offered the option of a 7-speed DSG auto gearbox. Both engines have impressive torque available from low revs - the 95PS version delivering 175Nm from just 2,000rpm and the 115PS version serving up its 200Nm across the same 2,000rpm to 3,500rpm band. In other words, you won't have to row this little SUV along with the gear lever through town. Skoda is also offering two other units, a 150PS 1.5 TSI petrol powerplant and a 115PS 1.6 TDI diesel. Don't expect a Kamiq to ride quite as well as a Scala - that taller, heavier body has to tell somewhere - but for the school run and commuting duties, few drivers are likely to have issues.

With cars like the Roomster and the Yeti, Skoda used to set itself apart with individualistic design. There's nothing like that here. Instead, the Kamiq looks essentially like a version of one of the brand's larger SUVs - the Karoq and the Kodiaq - that's been somehow shrunk in a hot wash. The separated lighting panel for the dipped headlamp beams sits below rather than above the daytime running light strips flanking the grille. Otherwise, the front end here is very similar to the Skoda Crossover norm.

Inside, there's plenty of quality, acres of ergonomic design, little to surprise and nothing to disappoint. Upper-spec models can have digital instrument cluster dials, and all get the Czech brand's shiny smart glass-fronted centre-dash screen that sets the class standard for infotainment. Rear legroom isn't of the order you'd find in the kind of Scala or Octavia family hatch model you could buy from Skoda for similar money. The same comment applies to the boot, which measures in at 400-litres, extendable to 1,395-litres when the rear seats are folded.

Skoda Kamiq Motability customers are currently offered a choice of two out of the four available trim levels - 'SE' and 'SE L'. Customers interested in the 'SE' version can choose to upgrade from the entry-level 95PS version of the 1.0 TSI petrol engine to the 115PS variant. Further up the range, you have to have this perkier unit. The 7-speed DSG auto gearbox is only available with the 115PS version.

The Kamiq 'SE' is decently equipped, coming with LED headlights and tail lights, air conditioning, 17 inch alloy wheels, a 'Bolero' infotainment system with an 8 inch touchscreen display, rear parking sensors, cruise control plus light and rain sensors. 'SE L' models get an even larger 'Amundsen' infotainment system and microsuede upholstery.

Skoda quotes CO2 figures for the 1.0 TSI petrol engine ranging between 113 and 116g/km - so not too far off what you'd get in a diesel. Expect just under 50 mpg on the WLTP combined cycle, while for the DSG auto, it's around 46 mpg.

There's nothing very original about the Kamiq, but it's more in tune with the current zeitgeist than the old Yeti was. And certainly more fashionable than the next model up in the Czech maker's SUV model line-up, the rather worthy Karoq. Skoda drivers are now well used to re-worked Volkswagen Group engineering with a bit of practical embellishment with lower Motability Advance Payments - which is precisely what's served up here. If you're looking for something a little more outlandish and head turning, order something like a Nissan Juke instead.

But a Juke might not be as easy or as pleasing to live with as a Kamiq. You get most of the sensible virtues we like in the brand's Scala family hatch, without the rather vanilla blandness we don't. A Kamiq, in fact, is without doubt the trendiest car the marque has yet produced. A fashion statement that's also a Skoda. Whoever would have thought it?

People with a disability and carers who choose a new Skoda Kamiq through Motability will receive a brand new car, delivered by a Motability Specialist at a local Skoda dealership, complete with insurance, servicing and maintenance, full breakdown assistance, replacement tyre cover, windscreen repair or replacement cover plus a mileage allowance of 60,000 miles over three years.