VW Taigo review: Easy to drive, but lacking in visual appeal, supermini crossover coupé may well win you over

Published on 5 March, 2022

Overview

I wasn’t great at maths in school. Come to think of it I wasn’t great at anything much except playing up to one kindly teacher who used to let me go early to help (hinder?) my father on the farm at busy times of the year.

So you’ll forgive me wondering about sub-division. Remember sub-­division? Dividing the parts of something into more parts.

I was useless at it but the car makers of this world love it. They are never going to stop sub-dividing car types into ever spiralling niche markets.

I suppose it has to be never because that’s what they are in the business to do: sell more motors of all different shapes and sizes. 

Sometimes I think it is getting to the stage where there will nearly be a different car type for everyone in the audience such is the level of expansion of variations on a theme.

While it is the name of the game I think you can, however, take it a bit far sometimes. I was a bit that way about the Volkswagen Taigo.

You’ll find it on the car sub-division scale half-way between the excellent Volkswagen T-Cross (crossover) and the evergreen Polo supermini/small car.

The Taigo is Volkswagen’s sort-of couped small crossover, if you like. It’s a feat, the carmaker says, that has not been successfully achieved in this small-car segment before.

Others might disagree but Volkswagen back up their claim by making the car in the first place, believing people will consider another compact crossover of sorts.

The bottom line strategy is that the more individual tastes they cater for the more likely people are to be drawn to something niche rather than mainstream. Oh, I don’t know. I’ve had one of those weeks where the contentious conservative in me won the day and I am a bit less enthused by the test car than I expected to be. A pity. 

What really is the Taigo about? I asked myself on more than one occasion. It’s lower and less visually appealing than the T-Cross which I happen to think is a cracking little car with a lot of style and practicality – it also has a fine boot.

And it lacks the presence, sense of purpose and genuine appeal of the Polo, with which, incidentally, it shares so many underpinnings and materials and techie bits.

So we have three cars based on one sub-structure, if you like, but all tuned to a different wavelength.

I’m not so sure it works all that well for the Taigo. I mean I would buy the T-Cross before it, definitely. Indeed I’d buy the T-Cross before many a small crossover, as I am really fond of it.

So why risk diverting people from it with an in-house ‘distraction’? Aren’t there already significant challenges from the likes of the Puma, Seat Arona, Renault Captur and Nissan Juke with which to contend. No, VW think not.

So would I buy it ahead of the Polo? That is the question to which I won’t give an answer quite yet.

It really didn’t register big time on the visual scales. Not like the T-Cross or Puma or Juke.

It looked a bit hunched and, indeed, bigger than the Polo but I don’t think there was as much rear-legroom. There is a really good-sized and practical boot.

I drove it a lot one week and not so much the second time round. And to be fair the 1-litre 110bhp petrol engine version I had in R trim served me well. Spliced to a 7spd DSG (automatic) transmission it did all I asked of it on a variety of short and long journeys.

The cabin gets lots of the Polo treatment so there were no surprises. As you’d expect in a small Volkswagen everything looked, and felt, solid.

One big plus: there is a proper way of adjusting the ventilation system unlike the, betimes frustrating, touch and slide system they have in the Golf.

I don’t know about you but I think you need simple buttons and dials. No, I’m not going to go into the whole debate about being distracted but it is significant that it sticks near uppermost in my head with the Taigo’s major plus points.

The other, overall plus is how easy, genuinely easy, it was to drive and park. When I see the effort some people have to put in to squeeze their car into a parking slot, I make no apologies for including that issue in my review nearly every week.

So would I buy it over the Polo? Despite my boring reservations to date I have to truthfully admit, hand on heart, that I just might. Why? Because contentious conservative I might have been for a few days, but I’d have a sneaking regard that it would set me apart a little from the mainstream. It would be a close call and I might change my mind at the last minute but it says a lot for the thinking behind subdivision that I would even consider it.

VW Taigo Factfile

Volkswagen Taigo supermini crossover coupe, 999cc, 110hp, petrol, 135 g/km, 'R-line' entry price €31,825, 'R-line DSG' entry price €35,480. Spec, including some options, includes: space saving spare wheel, sports comfort seats, infotainment system, front fogs, LED front, rear lights, multi-colour digital cockpit, air con, black roof rails, driver alert system, pedestrian/cyclist monitoring, adaptive cruise control, 18ins alloys, rear-view camera, panoramic sunroof, wireless smartphone.