Fiat Sedici

Our verdict

Something of a chink in Fiat’s 21st Century suit of armour, the Sedici is a joint project with Suzuki, who sell the same car as the SX4. It’s a rubbish road car and a bad small SUV all in one. What’s the point?

Comfort

The ride in the Sedici is too harsh for a car that purports to be an urban SUV, and any effort to isolate driver from road has been woefully off target. There's plenty of space inside, however.

Performance

What with the Sedici's lack of mid-corner competence, speed is seldom something you'll want to factor into your daily drive. Which is handy, as it'll only get to 60mph in around 11 seconds.

Cool

There are few cars on the road less cool than the Fiat Sedici. It's a mini-SUV, which is a pointless idea in the first place. It doesn't do anything particularly well either, and it looks utterly hateful.

Quality

The boon of a joint venture with Suzuki is that the Hungarian factory where the Sedici is built has the hand of Japanese quality control on it. So the cars come out squeak-free and nicely finished.

Handling

Behaves as you'd expect a jacked up supermini to behave. It's all over the place. Too tall for its short wheelbase and narrow width, you take one corner at speed in the Sedici then spend the rest of your life backing off.

Practicality

Despite its modest dimensions the Sedici, courtesy of a high roofline, is big enough inside to be a useable family car. But not if your family has any possessions, as the boot is tiny.

Running costs

Depreciation is an unknown quantity at the moment, but expect a car that makes precious little sense to anyone to take a hammering in its first couple of years. Especially one that seems unreasonably expensive in the first place.