Category: Superminis 
Price Range: £10,485 to £17,385
Diesel engine is refined and punchy, sensible kit levels, comfortable cabin.
Petrol GT is underpowered and noisy, handling a little woolly and soft, too many variants.
A timely update for the Clio, but it's nothing special in a category full of classy performers.
In the past Renaults have been rather fragile but the French manufacturer insists that its latest models will hold together because they have been put through extensive tests in the most extreme conditions.
Renault's customers will need more than just a few assurances to know that things have changed: in the 2008 JD Power customer satisfaction survey the Clio finished equal 59th out of 100 models, with Renault itself finishing 22nd equal out of 28 in the manufacturers league table. It isn't a wonderful result.
Still, we have no reason to suspect that this updated will present too many headaches: the cabins in both the 128bhp GT and the dCi 106 models we tested seemed pretty solid and functional, but not much different from the previous model.
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