Well then, this is the brand new, ‘self-confident’ Audi Q3

Amazingly, more than two million Audi Q3s roam the world’s roads, which means it’s an important car for the Four Rings Of Power. Welcome to the new one.

Audi’s third generation of its best-selling small SUV now incorporates the whole puffed-out-cheeks, suspicious-side-eye and massive 'singlegrame' grille of its updated siblings and looks a helluva lot more… ‘purposeful’, as a result. Even if that purpose is just going to the supermarket.

It’s a big step change from the Mk2 Q3, packed with LED lights and better aerodynamics and a better drag coefficient and sloping pillars and ‘blistered’ arches and big wheels and… you get the gist.

There’s plenty of gist beneath those newly designed flanks, via Audi’s multi-fuel powertrain offering. The entry-level car is a 1.5-litre four-pot petrol car with 148bhp, able to shut down cylinders two and three when you’re not on the doorhandles.

Want more doorhandle action? There’s a 200bhp quattro Q3 in the works, and if you want Full Doorhandles then you’ll require the 2.0-litre 261bhp quattro car. No word on how fast this one is, but it does get 295lb ft and four-wheel-drive, so it’ll probably shift.

Diesel’s still alive, in the shape of a 148bhp front-drive TDI, and there’s the obligatory plug-in hybrid that marries a petrol engine with an electric motor and 25.7kWh battery (double the capacity of the outgoing Q3 e-hybrid). Power sits at 268bhp – again, more than the old car – and a quoted electric-only range of 74.6 miles, which is impressive.

Audi also reckons the new Q3’s ability is now more impressive, with the standard steel suspension setup offering an “improved driving experience”. There’s adaptive suspension of course, and Audi says these dampers “continuously react to the characteristics of the road surface”. Which means in Britain, they’ll be hilariously overreacting.

The twin-valve dampers apparently “enable a better and smoother connection of the body to the suspension”, while the spread between ‘comfort’ and ‘sporty’ driving is now more noticeable. You can spec in progressive steering, and there are new ‘balanced’ and ‘offroad plus’ (in the quattro) modes available.

Lots of driver assist is also there, like adaptive cruise, attention and fatigue warnings, traffic, distance and lane assist and so on. Essentially, there’s a lot of sensors keeping an eye on the road, and on you.

The ‘emergency assistant’ even takes over if the driver doesn’t react, piloting the Q3 to the hard shoulder to a complete stop. It’ll even park itself, able to remember up to five parking manoeuvres. None of which, one suspects, include ‘across two spaces in the car park’.

Inside? Huge. There’s a massive panoramic display that packs in an 11.9in instrument cluster and 12.8in central touchscreen running on Android Auto and assisted by AI. It’s curved, too, and is complemented by a head-up display and a new multi-function steering wheel. A few buttons adorn the cabin.

As do lots of storage areas, lighting packs, speakers, and recycled, sustainable material choices – wood, recycled polyester, velour made from old fishing nets, that sort of thing. Boot space sits at 575 litres seats up, 1,386 litres seats down.

“With a total of more than two million vehicles sold worldwide since the launch of the first generation, the Audi Q3 is one of our best-selling models and had a high status in our product portfolio,” said Audi boss Gernot Döllner. Certainly looks more high status than ever before.