Interior and Features

The Suzuki Ignis is a strict four-seater. There is no centre safety belt on the rear bench so it’s not even legal to try and squeeze five people into the car. However as a four-seat, compact car it’s surprisingly roomy. Like the original Ignis from 2000, the boxy body shape is paired with a clever interior layout to make this happen. 

The rear seats fold downs and split 50:50 to increase boot space, but that’s not all they do. The rear seat cushions slide separately on their own rails as well, so passengers have the option of rolling the individual seats all the way back for extra legroom, or if there is  a lot of stuff to carry in the boot, scoot the seats forwards for more boot space. Rated at just 267 litres, the boot isn’t very big in default mode, but sliding the rear seats and tipping the backrests out of the way really gives the car plenty of configurability.

The rear seats also have adjustable backrest angles. There’s not much to see and do in the black interior, but the seats are comfortable for passengers. 

Up front, there’s a small little basic infotainment system that’s Apple CarPlay and Android Auto enabled. We’ve driven small cars that have terrible storage space configurations but the Ignis does its best here with a tray for your phone and three cupholders total. The door pockets also have cutouts to hold a water bottle each. 

Front seats are comfortable but side bolstering is minimal, which means that if you try some spirited cornering you and your passengers have to hang on to something in the car to stop from tipping out of the chairs. The leather seat surfaces are also very soft, and sharp objects or claws from a cat or dog will definitely scratch up the material. 

However the car is very well equipped with active safety features. The cruise control is very well-judged, and while it’s not adaptive it is very smooth, maintains good engine efficiency on the highway, and does not accelerate abruptly. Then there’s a pair of cameras fitted to the top of the front windscreen for lane keeping assist and frontal collision warning, and it features six airbags all round. 

We had a stint in the car in a tropical rain storm, and discovered that under crazy rain conditions with limited visibility, the lane tracking cameras stop functioning until visibility is restored with clearing skies. To be fair though this was an extreme case.

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They’re automatic start/stop for the engine too, but like in the Volkswagen Golf, the aircon compressor shuts off when the engine is off. The smallish cabin stays cool enough, but on a hot afternoon it can be a little uncomfortable as the car’s minimal thermal insulation doesn’t keep out the sun’s heat very well.

1. Introduction
2. Design and Appearance
3. Interior and Features
4. Driving Experience
5. Competitors and Conclusion

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