Is the little Mini Cooper Convertible still as fun as it should be?

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SINGAPORE

The whole Mini lineup was given a midlife makeover in mid 2021 and while we took a look at the Mini Cooper S Convertible in an earlier review at time of launch, the standard Mini Cooper Convertible has been a little late in hitting our review pages but here it is nonetheless. This is still essentially the third-generation Mini, with engineering bits that date back to 2015 but with two major facelifts, one in 2018 and then in 2021 in between it’s quite up to date by 2023 standards still. 

For readers that are not familiar with the Mini naming scheme, here’s how it works. The Mini One is the base model, with a 102 horsepower engine. Next up is the sportier Mini Cooper, with its 136 horsepower engine. The Mini Cooper S is the very sporty version, as you can tell by the capital ‘S’ in its name, with a 178 horsepower engine. Right at the very top is the Mini JCW, the rawest, craziest of the Minis with its 231 horsepower engine and plenty of other go-fast bits. 

Also, it’s now the age of electric vehicles so you get a Mini Cooper SE in the mix too.

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Now however we’re looking at the Mini Cooper Convertible, which is basically the Mini Cooper with a ragtop. Despite fashionable styling, it’s really a sports car in the same vein as the legedary Mazda MX-5, but with more luxurious trappings in the cabin.

When we say sports car, we are not solely talking about how powerful or fast the car is in a straight line, but also how it handles itself around corners. The Cooper isn’t really quick at all by 2023 standards, it still has that dynamic, agile feel that makes it fun to throw into corners and accelerate out the other end.

Its three-cylinder turbo engine, which it also shares with the BMW 216i Active Tourer and a bunch of other BMWs worldwide, may have been tuned to deliver just 136 horses worth of power, but the engine’s wide powerband makes it quite a flexible unit whether in urban traffic or carving through winding roads. Perhaps the biggest complaint, one that is typical of convertibles anyway, is that the chassis isn’t as rigid as the hatchback and when combined with the stiffly sprung suspension the ride is as jiggly as you would expect.

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It’s front-wheel driven through a seven-speed, dual-clutch transmission. At speed it’s a smooth operator, but the slightest bit of clunking around the gears can be detected at carpark pace.

The car is also very much a 2+2, with very upright backseats and usable, but not comfortable legroom for backseat passengers. A wind deflector can be set up across the back seats to keep buffeting at highway speeds to a minimum if you’re just driving with a passenger or by yourself. Even without the deflector however, the car is quite calm with the roof down. The wind sweeps over the top and doesn’t make a mess of your hair.

The roof folding mechanism is clever in that it does not intrude too much into the usable boot space, which at 215 litres is one of the tiniest around. Even small compact hatchbacks like the Honda Jazz e:HEV pack more in.

You can however fold down the rear seatbacks, and that way you can still carry long items in the car.

As with the other Minis of this generation the entertainment controller is tucked too low on the centre console for safe use while driving, as you can’t even see it in your peripheral vision and have to look away from the road to see where you are stabbing your finders at. It’s a side effect of the compact size of the cabin, but thankfully the touchscreen works fine as an alternate form, or maybe even as the primary form of control.

The car’s fuel efficiency around town came in at 7.6L/100km over three days of mixed driving, but on calm highway speeds it’s not hard to record a figure of under 6.9L/100km.

The Mini Convertible has no other car still on sale in Singapore in its class category, as there are many of them in town so it still has a sizable audience. It’s a compact, 2+2 luxury ragtop sportscar with little in the way of boot space but plenty in the fun-to-drive factors. It’s just zippy enough, but if you want even faster there’s the Cooper S version still. Yet the biggest shock could be how the price for this car has jumped because of taxes and COE prices. If you ordered one at the time of its launch in June 2021, its sticker price was S$188,888 with COE. Now in June 2023, you will have to pay S$250,888 for the same.

Mini Cooper Convertible 

Drivetrain type	Petrol engine
Engine	1499cc, inline 3, turbocharged
Power	136hp at 4500-6500rpm
Torque	220Nm at 1480-4100rpm
Gearbox	7-speed dual-clutch
0-100km/h	8.7 seconds
Top Speed	205km/h
VES Banding	B / neutral
Fuel Efficiency	6.4L/100km
Agent	Eurokars Mini Habitat
Price	S$250,888 with COE and VES
Availability	Now
Verdict:	The littlest fun luxury sports car you can get, if you can put up with the limited space inside

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