Volkswagen ID.Buzz interior, tech and practicality

Thanks to the sheer abundance of space, the ID.Buzz is a very comfortable place to spend time. The seats are supportive and easy to climb into thanks to the wide-opening doors, and all models include both heated front seats and a heated steering wheel. You’ll find electric adjustment, power lumbar support and even massaging features on the options list. Armrests are equipped to both front seats and, if you choose the six-seater layout with individual second-row ‘captain’s’ chairs, you’ll find them there too.

You sit high up in the ID.Buzz. This gives you a commanding view of the road ahead, which makes it easier to place this fairly sizeable car on the road. You get a reversing camera as standard as well as all-round parking sensors and, on updated models, a 360º parking camera is also fitted.

All-round visibility is decent considering the ID.Buzz is a fairly big car. That said, crash safety regulations mean you don’t sit right over the front axle as you would on an old Type 2 and, instead, look out over a fairly deep dashboard to the upright windscreen. As a result, the roof also extends fairly far outwards ahead of you to meet the windscreen. This means, at certain junctions that lacked traffic light repeaters on the other side of the road, we sometimes had to crane our neck forwards to see the single closer traffic light.

The range starts with Life trim and is well equipped – you’d hope so, given the steep purchase prices. You get 19-inch alloy wheels, tinted rear windows and illuminated door handles. Inside, there are heated front seats and a heated steering wheel, ambient lighting, a 'Buzz box' removable centre console with storage draw, two-zone climate control, adaptive cruise control, lane-keep assist, automatic emergency braking, and auto lights and wipers. ID.Buzz models before the 2024 update got a 10-inch touchscreen infotainment system with built-in sat nav plus wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto. Models after the update get a sharper 12.9-inch screen and enhanced software.

Style trim is the upgrade option. This brings larger 20-inch alloy wheels, a power-opening boot lid and the option of power-opening side doors – these became standard on Style-trimmed cars after the 2024 update. You also get LED matrix headlights that can remain on full beams without dazzling other motorists, an adjustable shelf that brings the cargo floor level with the folded rear seats, stainless steel pedals, and brighter interior upholstery in colours that match the outside paint scheme.

High-performance GTX models, which were added in the 2024 update, are equipped in line with Style cars. To mark it out, there are 21-inch alloys, a slightly sportier body kit, an electrically dimmable panoramic glass roof – optional on other trims – and special dark-coloured GTX upholstery.

This has been a slightly sour note in some recent Volkswagen products. A few years ago, the company committed to removing nearly all the main physical buttons and knobs on the dashboard, and putting those functions in its central touchscreen.

In practice, this solution is more fiddly than just having proper buttons for key controls. You’re obliged to take your eyes off the road briefly to see where on the screen to aim your fingertip and, with several different shortcut icons dotted all over the screen, it sometimes takes a moment to figure out how to swap between functions.

The most egregious problem, however, are the touch-sensitive sliders beneath the screen that control the two climate zones and the stereo volume. They’re already a little fiddly and inconsistent to use but the issue is they’re not backlit. This means they’re impossible to see and use at night.

Volkswagen has tried to address these complaints with the 2024 update. You now get a larger 12.9-inch screen as standard. The larger screen means buttons and icons are bigger and easier to hit, and Volkswagen’s cleaned up the software a little to reduce the visual fuss. Crucially, it’s also added backlighting behind the sliders so, while they’re still not as good as proper dials, you can at least use them at nighttime now.

The driver also gets a small screen behind the steering wheel to show key info such as speed and cruise control information. Annoyingly, this screen is also stuffed full of extra graphics and driver assist popups that distract from its main purpose.

The ID.Buzz is a fairly large car – measuring more than 4.7 metres long in NWB configuration and nearly five metres in LWB form. Even with that in mind, the amount of passenger space in the back is simply astonishing.

Second-row passengers have all the legroom and headroom they could ask for and, on five and seven-seat versions, the centre-rear passenger even has enough room to get comfy with no transmission tunnel to straddle.

Best of all, however, is the third row on LWB models. Many SUVs and MPVs claim to be seven seaters, but few of them are actually large enough to regularly carry passengers in the third given the seriously cramped legroom that’s usually offered. Not so in the ID.Buzz – there’s more space in the third row than many family SUVs muster in their second row, so six-footers will fit back there with room to spare.

Pick a seven-seat ID.Buzz and you’ll also get a grand total of four Isofix points split between the two outer second-row seats and the two third-row seats. They’re not just there for show, either, with enough space to actually carry a bulky child seat in each position, so this is a sensational option for families with more than two young children.

Access is excellent. You get sliding side doors, giving you loads of room to manoeuvre passengers into position. And, on LWB models, folding the second row out the way to access the third row takes just one hand, meaning it really isn’t just a space for occasional use.

NWB models with five seats have a massive 1,121-litre boot with all seats up. That’ll take your whole family’s holiday gear, as well as all the duty-free you can carry, or a couple of very large dogs without any hassle. Drop the second row and that space grows to a van-like 2,205 litres.

Seven-seat LWB ID.Buzzes have 306 litres of space with all seats up. That’s still on par with many family hatchbacks and the space itself is wide and tall, though not very deep. Drop the third row and that jumps to 1,340 litres or a ludicrous 2,469 litres with just the front seats in use.

If you’re going to make regular use of the cargo area, consider upgrading to a Style model. This includes a powered bootlid – handy with such a tall, wide panel to open – as well as a foldable shelf that flattens the cargo floor in line with the backs of the seats when they’re folded, as well as providing useful divided storage underneath.

Perhaps the only flaw in the ID.Buzz’s practical armour is that the tailgate itself is so big – you have to park a good distance from car park walls if you want to open it up all the way. Once it is open, however, you do have a great rain shelter for picnics…