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First Drive: Skoda Octavia Estate

By / 11 years ago / Road Tests / No Comments

Sector: Lower-medium Price: £16,790-£24,040 Fuel: 53.3–74.3mpg CO2: 99-124g/km

For Skoda, Simply Clever is more than just a slogan – it's the backbone of everything the company does. It means that while the Octavia Estate offers few real surprises, it’s brimming with neatly executed ideas that make this an incredibly versatile load carrier.

This is a big part of Skoda’s European sales footprint. It’s the biggest seller in its segment across Europe, and UK sales are split almost identically between the Octavia’s hatchback and estate body styles.

Simplicity is even extended to the model range. British buyers will get a choice of three versions, following the familiar S, SE and Elegance range structure Skoda employs across all its cars. Engines comprise two petrols and two diesels, and the Estate gets four-wheel drive as an option on the latter. A GreenLine package, which cuts fuel consumption to 83mpg and CO2 to 87g/km on the 1.6 TDI, will be available on all trim levels by the end of the year.

Stylistically, it's an elegant and simply penned model, if a little conservative inside and out. The plastics are soft touch, the doors close with a solid Germanic thunk, and everything is logically laid out.

But beneath that simplicity, the Octavia is a brilliant piece of design. The boot floor covers a compartment big enough to store roof bars, and drops with a tug on a handle at the back to offer extra loading height. Not only does the rear bench fold forward, but the front passenger seat will too, offering up to a three metre flat load length from tailgate to dashboard.

Although we tested the car with a near empty boot, the smaller engines, a 1.2 TSI and 1.6 TDI both with 103bhp, are ample for a car of this size. It’s these that will make up the bulk of sales, in retail and fleet respectively, but the larger 1.4 TSI and 2.0 TDI are better suited to those needing to haul heavier loads.

All-wheel drive is only offered on the two diesel engines and in SE spec in the UK. It’s a clever Haldex system that only sends power to the rear wheels when required, and while it’s best suited to the 2.0 TDI it doesn’t blunt even the 1.6 TDI’s performance too heavily even on steep inclines. The big sacrifice is in fuel economy and CO2 emissions, which rise from 74.3mpg and 99g/km to 60.1mpg and 122g/km on the smaller engine.

Ride height is identical to the two-wheel drive models, which limits this to smooth but loose surfaces, but an outdoor pack and rugged Scout version are both coming soon.

Both four-wheel drive Octavias also benefit from a multi-link rear suspension setup, compared to the simplistic torsion bar fitted to their two-wheel drive equivalents. Aside from the vRS, which launches this summer with diesel and petrol engines and in both body styles, these are the only Octavias to get the more advanced setup. Ride quality even with the torsion beam is perfectly respectable though.

This isn’t a car that makes your hair stand on end or your pulse race, at least not without a vRS grille badge, but it's a model that delights on design and packaging, offering a more appealing workhorse than a C-segment SUV.

Verdict:

With efficient engines, high quality and versatile storage, the Octavia is all the car you'll ever need, for a lot less money than you’d think. Simple, but very clever.

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Alex Grant

Trained on Cardiff University’s renowned Postgraduate Diploma in Motor Magazine Journalism, Alex is an award-winning motoring journalist with ten years’ experience across B2B and consumer titles. A life-long car enthusiast with a fascination for new technology and future drivetrains, he joined Fleet World in April 2011, contributing across the magazine and website portfolio and editing the EV Fleet World Website.