Jeep Avenger Review

Avenger. American carmakers are good at cool names, aren’t they? Even if the Jeep Avenger is as American as a bowl of spaghetti. The Avenger is ‘right-sized for Europe’ and has only been built because Jeep has access to the same parts bin as Fiat, Peugeot, Citroen and Vauxhall.

Somehow, despite the wide use of shared parts, the Avenger does feel quite 'Jeepy'. That chunky halfpint styling has a lot to do with it, and Jeep’s insistence to riff off its history is evident anywhere you care to look. You’ll find the classic 'seven-bar grille and round headlights' design stamped in the brake lights, on the wheels, in the boot, and within the grille itself. Grilleception. Look at the base of the windscreen on the passenger side and you’ll see a young boy – the son of the car's designer – stargazing at a constellation in the opposite corner of the screen.

It’s a youthful car that doesn’t take itself too seriously – just try to resist the urge to dance along to the indicator beat every time you signal at a roundabout! Along with the option of a coloured dashboard pad, the Avenger manages to feel fun and funky, and certainly more playful than some other small SUVs like the Volkswagen T-Cross and Renault Captur.

Four-wheel drive is coming, but the Avenger has some very European – and very un-American – engines. The most powerful Avenger is the 156hp electric one, while the entry-level petrol produces 100hp. Barely enough to get you through the drive-thru, you might think. Keep reading to find out…

The Avenger’s interior feels up-to-date, with a big infotainment screen perched on top of the dashboard, but also quite intuitive as well. There’s a good mix of physical and digital controls, with a row of toggles for the climate control, a few buttons on the steering wheel and, on automatic cars, a row of four gear selector buttons.

Our gripes with the controls are pretty minor. The electronic handbrake needs to be disengaged manually when you set off – plus the button on our brand-new test car seemed to be sticky and hesitant to sit in its proper position – and there’s no button to skip tracks or change radio station on the steering wheel.

The screen might look like an aftermarket afterthought, but it works really well. It’s responsive to your touch, the graphics are sharp and the reversing camera produces a high-quality image. Once you’ve remembered that the home and settings buttons are on a separate panel beneath the screen, the home screen is really easy to get around thanks to an ‘application drawer’, as seen on recent Peugeot cars. It works like your phone’s app screen so it’s easy to understand for anyone with a smartphone.

There’s Apple CarPlay and Android Auto included as standard – press the ‘Mirror Screen’ icon to connect – as well as energy readouts and a "Hey Jeep" voice assistant.

Jeep would say the materials used are durable and hard-wearing. While that’s undoubtedly true, there’s an awful lot of scratchy black plastic and some of it feels cheap. A Skoda Kamiq has nicer materials without costing a fortune. Our test car had crinkled plastic trim across the dash, which isn’t the nicest – there’s a body-colour trim option that really lifts the interior but, weirdly, it’s only available on the top-spec electric Avenger if you pay for the yellow and black paint.

In automatic versions, the centre console gets a flimsy, folding iPad-style cover that sits over the storage cubby. It’s frustrating to live with – it comes off too easily and, when folded up, gets in the way of the gear selector buttons. We also think it’ll look tatty after a few years of use. Manual cars don’t get this cover – in its place there’s a lovely metal-effect round gearlever that feels great in the hand. There’s still a good-sized storage cubby ahead of the gearlever, too.

In fact, up-front storage is generally impressive. The two big storage cubbies might be expected in an electric car, but it’s rare to have such big areas in a petrol car with a transmission tunnel. There’s also a handy shelf below the touchscreen, which makes up for the half-sized glovebox.

At a whisker over four metres long, the Avenger is the same size as a Ford Fiesta – so, while it might be an SUV, don’t expect acres and acres of room. An average-sized adult will fit in the back seat behind another average-sized adult up front, but if either is tall then there’s going to be some compromise.

That also means the Avenger makes it trickier to install child seats than a bigger alternative like the Peugeot 2008 or Skoda Kamiq. And, because the windowline is quite high, kids might struggle to get a good view out.

Headroom is good enough but that’s about it – both legroom and elbow room are quite tight. Trying to fit three adults across the back seats is going to be uncomfortable, perhaps even impossible depending on their size and shape.

The 380-litre boot matches family hatchbacks like the Volkswagen Golf, and is reasonably competitive in the small SUV class. We’d like a few more features in the boot, but it’s good to see that there’s barely any load lip. There’s a small area under the boot floor, which is ideal for cable storage in the electric one. Speaking of which, the Avenger EV’s boot is 25 litres down on the petrol one, not that that’s likely to be a dealbreaker.

Initially, the Avenger was only going to come to the UK as an electric car. However, we expect the new petrol and petrol-hybrid engines to be the bigger sellers. The electric one is the most powerful, even if its 156hp and 0-62mph time of 9.6 seconds are still modest figures. Up to 248 miles is achievable from a charge, so expect about 210 miles in the real world, depending on the type of driving you do. A 20-80% top-up at a 100kW public charger takes 24 minutes, while a home wallbox will fully charge the battery from empty in under eight hours.

The petrol model uses a 1.2-litre turbo engine with 100hp. Don’t be fooled by its small-sounding power output, as this engine is an eager little beastie that always feels willing and responsive around town. It’s less potent at higher speeds, so you may need to drop down a gear to accelerate hard on the motorway, but the same is true of many of the Avenger’s similarly powerful rivals.

Bridging the gap between petrol and electric is a mild-hybrid engine, which is also a 1.2-litre engine with a total output of 100hp. It’s mated to a six-speed automatic gearbox, and is said to return up to 57mpg – a 7mpg increase over the standard petrol. The hybrid is about £1,600 more than the petrol if you buy new, while the electric Avenger is a whole £10,000 more than the equivalent petrol.

This is a rare occasion when the petrol car is more enjoyable to drive than its electric counterpart – and not just because you can bask in the savings. The petrol engine feels like it produces all its power from low down, just like the electric car does, and you don’t have to change gear often at low speeds.

You might want to, however, because the manual gearshift is precise and slick. The clutch is a bit heavier than the related Peugeot 2008 and Vauxhall Mokka, which is actually a good thing – we found it easier to be smoother driving the Avenger than in the Peugeot and Vauxhall.

The petrol Avenger is a little lighter on its feet than the electric one – it’s 340kg lighter – but body control isn’t perfect. There’s a bit of roll through corners, which puts a slight dampener on the Avenger’s otherwise fairly fun driving experience.

The ride is generally pretty good, save for some vibration at lower speeds, and the Avenger is as quiet as it needs to be on the motorway. Get the electric one if you want the quietest driving experience an Avenger offers, but the petrol engine’s noise is actually quite charming.