Ten of the best city cars you can buy in the UK right now

Inspired by the BMW Isetta from the 1950s, we first saw the Microlino back in 2016 when it was hoping to provide fuss-free urban transport to the masses for around £10k. That didn’t exactly happen, but even though luxuries like a quilted seat and a digital dash were added – and the price crept up accordingly – the little electric bubble car did at least kept its ultra-cute looks and front-hinged door for its proper production run. Prices now start from just under £17,000, but there are £170,000 supercars that would get less attention in town.

Read our full Microlino review here
 

What do city cars really need? Easy: narrow width for city streets, small engines to save on fuel and tax and good visibility to not run into anything (or anyone). Scant weight to save even more fuel? Very welcome. Rationalising the controls and systems to only what you absolutely need? Great idea – less to break, less to get confused about.

Delivering uproarious fun at every juncture, acting as a rolling reminder of everything that’s entertaining and rewarding about being in control of an automobile? That’s probably more a ‘nice to have’, but it’s what the entry-level Caterham has in spades.

Okay, it might not be the most practical daily driver given it takes 10 minutes to put the roof up and barely has enough boot space to bring home a takeaway, but who said that all city cars had to be hatchbacks?

Read our full Caterham Seven review here
 

City cars aren’t exactly money spinners, so for Toyota to try to find and hit its own niche by transplanting the seemingly endless popularity of crossover SUV-type things to its little city car is understandable, if not particularly up our street. It’s a perfectly decent city car, as the Aygo/C1/108 always were, just now with another half inch of ride height to deal with… well, have you seen the state of city streets these days?

Read our full Toyota Aygo X review here
 

Four in and we’ve already bent the rules three times. Oops. Still, that shows how short on city cars we are in the UK right now.

Both the Ami and its slightly more stylish Fiat Topolino sibling are officially classed as quadricycles, but in our minds they’re almost cars with doors that lock, a windscreen, accelerator and brake pedals, a steering wheel inside and four wheels outside. It’s just that, with a 28mph top speed and 45 miles of range, you wouldn’t actually want to leave the city in one.

Read our full Citroen Ami review here, and the Fiat Topolino review here

With the i10 pulled from sale in the UK, the electric Inster is now the smallest Hyundai on our shores. With a starting price of £22,995 it actually costs a little more than some larger superminis (cough, Renault 5, cough), but you do get a funky cartoon-like look and quite a bit of kit. There’s also a slightly raised Inster Cross that looks like it could be the spiritual successor to the Suzuki Ignis.  

Read our full Hyundai Inster review here

At this end of the market, everyone knows what you’re after – wheels, with a warranty, without spending a wad of cash.

So, to find a car like the Picanto that doesn’t penalise you for your parsimonious approach, but instead rewards you with visual, tactile and on-road interest? That feels like having your cake, eating it and somehow also inheriting the bakery.

Read our full Kia Picanto review here
 

Prices for the Abarth version of the all-electric 500 start at £7,000 more than the standard Fiat, but the little yob can be had in crazy colours and with a waterproof speaker hanging off its underside. Said speaker plays proper petrol hot hatch noises at the legal volume limit for road cars, so it’ll annoy pedestrians just as much as the old Abarth 500s did.

Read our full Abarth 500e review here

Another car with fake sounds, Honda has actually taken its Super-N one step further towards hot hatch territory with a simulated paddleshift gearbox and a fake ‘redline’ that you can smash into. And smash into it you will, because when you’ve got navigation running through the central screen it’ll pop prompts onto the digital dash that cover up the fake ‘rev counter’. Woops. Still, we love this embiggened kei car and its brilliant boxiness.

Read our full Honda Super-N review here

How does Dacia continue to make stinginess look a little bit cool? The Spring is the cheapest proper car on sale in the UK at just £11,990, but you’ll probably want to pay an extra £1,000 for the 99bhp version (up from 69bhp) that drops the 0-62mph time from ‘forever’ to just ‘a really long time’. The battery pack is smaller than you get in some PHEVs at just 24.3kWh, but the little Dacia still manages a WLTP range of 139 miles. There’s more than a wiff of modern-day 2CV about the Spring.

Read our full Dacia Spring review here

The reborn Twingo won’t arrive on UK shores until 2027, but you can already get yourself on the list (and secure priority delivery) by splashing £100 on the so-called ‘Twingo R Pass’. This little four-seat bundle of joy is comfortable and refined thanks to its use of the R4/R5 platform, but we’re also promised a starting price under £20,000. Cute!

Read our full Renault Twingo review here