Category: Compact MPV 
Price Range: £16,245 to £20,295
Fine drive, rear sliding doors, improved 2.0-litre petrol engine.
Not a true seven-seater, traditional MPV looks, S-Max has better ride handling compromise.
Mid-life tweaks improve what already is a very impressive MPV.
Here's where the Mazda MPV always impressed.
Blessed with underpinnings shared by the Mazda 3 and Ford Focus, the 5 has always offered a drive for the enthusiast, feeling agile, well balanced and even fun when pressing on.
Not much has changed, although Mazda felt that stability needed to be improved: facelifted 5s now come with a stiffer rear multilink suspension, while the front has new softer-acting dampers. The ride now feels firmer and is more easily upset than previously, but through a challenging twisting section of road, the 5 still shows it has what it takes in the handling department. Grip levels are high and, pleasingly, lifting off the throttle tucks the nose deeper into a tightening bend, the standard ESP stability control allowing a few angles of slip from the rear.
Where the 5 doesn't feel quite so sharp as before is in the steering department, which is lighter and fractionally less precise.
Against the clock it's the 144bhp 2.0-litre petrol that triumphs reaching 62mph in 10.2 seconds. The diesel feels even more muscular, completing the 0-62mph dash in 11 seconds, but packs 229lb-ft of torque from just 2,000rpm, compared to the petrol's weaker 137lb-ft at 4,000rpm, so it's no surprise that in-gear the diesel feels more urgent than the petrol.
But before you rule out the petrol-power, the 2.0-litre has been revitalised by its variable valve timing. It now feels more eager, spins sweeter and is far more enthusiastic than its oil-burning equivalent.
The 113bhp 1.8-litre engine, meanwhile, is carried over without receiving the variable valve trickery: 0-62mph takes a more modest 11.3 seconds and it needs working to deliver its best. Slowest of all is the 109bhp 2.0-litre diesel, which crawls to 62mph in 13.9 seconds.
Both diesels gain six-speed gearboxes, as does the 2.0-litre petrol that used to be chronically short-geared in top. The 1.8 makes do with the old five-speed 'box, which means a busy 4,000rpm at the average 80mph motorways cruise. All gearboxes, noticeably the six-speeds, have gained improved shift quality.
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