Category: Superminis 
Price Range: £12,460 to £12,960
2005 restyle has brought looks up to date, quality feel inside and out, space, safety equipment, ride and handling, interesting engines, aura of rational Volkswagen-ness.
Mediocre performance from some engines, expensive.
The Polo falls short on few measures, but some supermini rivals do the job better, and for less.
The steering wheel adjusts in and out as well as up and down, and the front seats have pump-ratchet height adjusters in all versions except the base model. A good driving position is easy to find, and the seats are firmly supportive. The rear seats are even firmer, and may take a few months' use to be beaten into comfortable submission. Noise levels are low, except when the four-cylinder engines are worked hard; the three-cylinders are almost inaudible at low speeds.
Four trim levels are available. The simple E does without air conditioning or electric windows, and is only offered with the 1.2-litre petrols or lower-powered 1.4 TDI. Moving one step up to S specification buys you automatic air-con (previously optional), bigger alloys and tyres, electric doors, windows and mirrors, plus a split-fold rear seat, which helps tremendously if you're asked to carry the occasional flat-pack from IKEA. SE cars gain items such as remote central locking, a better stereo, sliding rear seats and more storage cubbies. Finally, Sport models add, on top of everything featured in lower-spec cars, foglights, leather trim on the steering wheel, 'sports' suspension and front seats, and some cabin detailing to set it apart from more humdrum Polos. Parking sensors were added to the options list for the first time in 2005.
The Polo rides calmly over bumps, staying impressively smooth and even with none of the old car's float and bounce. The bigger, heavier body brings more people space: combined front and rear legroom is up by 2.5in, there's 1.2in more elbow room in the front, and the boot has 25 litres more volume thanks to its increased floor length.
There are many storage spaces, all rubber-lined, including under-facia shelves, a credible glovebox, a centre-console cubby hole, door pockets and under-seat drawers. The pop-out facia cupholder adjusts to clamp its cargo by a ratchet mechanism.
Standard wear for most models is a single-CD player and RDS radio which sounds clear and accurate enough to suit most tastes. A six-CD changer is optional, integrated into the dashboard. Also optional is a sat-nav system with a monochrome screen, whose information is repeated in the info panel between speedometer and rev-counter. This comes complete with an eight-speaker sound system, but you can't play a music CD when a navigation disc is inserted.
Latest Readers' Drives About the Volkswagen Polo
wrote on 03 03 2008
wrote on 29 05 2006