Category: Compact MPV 
Price Range: £10,750 to £14,850
Loads of room, extraordinary design, very versatile seating, well made, quiet, comfortable and surprisingly, fun to drive. Good crash test results - and good value too.
You can't fully hide boot contents, gloveboxes are small, no FSI engines and that's about it.
Here's a car of the future, very useful, highly individual-looking and great to live with. It's rational with a wacky twist, and sets Skoda up as its own creative force.
It's tall and it's airy, so you have a good view out. There's a pump-action height adjustment for the driver's seat, and with the seat set at its lowest there's an almost comic excess of headroom. The steering wheel adjusts for reach and rake and the seat is very comfortable.
Neat, simple dials and switchgear suit the Roomster's gimmick-free aura, and the controls all work with smooth, typically VW-group precision. The gearshift is especially slick, easy and precise.
That sensation sets the tone for the whole driving experience. There's little body roll, and despite the simple torsion-beam rear suspension the electro-hydraulic power steering is crisp and feelsome and the handling balance excellent. The wide rear track (wider than the front track) helps, making the Roomster extra-eager to turn into corners. The spring and damper rates are very well chosen, so the responses are crisp yet the Roomster is quiet and supple over bumps. In these times of too many cars with too-firm, fidgety suspension, the fluidly-moving Roomster is a joy. Czech roads are similar to British ones in their topography and surface deterioration, and it shows. Skodas always work well on UK roads, often rather better than their German-badged cousins. The brakes can feel snatchy at first, but you soon adapt.
None of the Roomsters is exactly a ball of fire, but paradoxically the slowest is in some ways the most appealing. The 1.2-litre, three-cylinder petrol unit is smooth, and revs easily with a crisp note so deep you can't believe you've just eased past 6000rpm. You have to work it hard to get it to go briskly, which would kill its potential economy advantage over the 1.4 petrol engine (indeed, the official mpg figures show minimal advantage for the 1.2), but its character suits the Roomster's individuality well. A 0-62mph time in the high fifteens is pretty slow, though.
The 1.4 and 1.6-litre petrol engines are smooth and crisp enough to deliver a decent drive, and the former is likely to be the best seller in the UK. They reach 62mph in 13.0 and 10.9 seconds respectively; it's a shame the more powerful, more economical direct-injection FSI versions, used elsewhere in the VW group, aren't offered in the Roomster. They would push the price up by too much.
We tried the 80bhp version of the three-cylinder, 1.4-litre turbodiesel with its impressive 144lb ft of torque, and once past the considerable turbo lag this gruff but engaging engine moves the car well. It's hard to be fluid when trying to get a move on along demanding roads, though, because the power is seldom there exactly when you want it. Better to chill out and let the engine respond in its own languid way. You need 14.7 seconds to reach 62 mph with this one.
Quickest in the real world is the 1.9 TDI, even though it's in relatively low-power, 105bhp tune. Its 177lb ft of torque is why, although outright acceleration - 0-62mph in 11.5 seconds - lags behind that of the lighter 1.6. It's a touch gruff-sounding at low speeds but quietens down as pace rises. Its size and torque makes for the best cruising ability, but all Roomsters score here with a lack of resonances and very low levels of wind and road noise.
Latest Readers' Drives About the Skoda Roomster
wrote on 28 08 2007
wrote on 24 05 2007