Suzuki Vitara 2019 Review – International

Clearly confident that it executed the Suzuki Vitara pretty well first time around, the Japanese car-maker has resisted the temptation to use a new design broom to sweep clean.

The result is a ‘Series II’ version of the Suzuki Vitara that has familiar lines, the same spacious and well-equipped interior and a host of detail changes that add up to an impressive whole.

It may not be readily apparent, but the 2019 Suzuki Vitara does look different on the outside. The easiest way to spot one of these latest Suzukis is to check out the rear light clusters, which now feature LED signatures made up of three horizontal bars.

It might not seem like much, but this is the kind of attention to illuminating detail that the German brands have done so well in recent years.

You wouldn’t believe how funny some buyers get about distinctive ‘light signatures’ on the exterior of their cars, so it’s good to see that even a lower-priced Japanese SUV is responding to consumer desires.

Other than that, it’s a subtle redesign of the lower front air-dam, necessitating a change to the surrounds of the fog lights and a different arrangement for the licence plate mounting.

It’s not immediately obvious what’s changed when you look at the front of the MY19 Vitara, but you know it somehow looks newer and neater.

Inside, the big news pertains to the upper layer of the main dashboard, which is now finished in soft-touch materials. Clearly irked by previous critical appraisals of the Vitara, which focused on the hard, scratchy plastics that swathed large expanse of the interior, Suzuki’s bosses are immensely proud of the fact there is now some squidge to the area immediately beneath the windscreen.

The slight problem with this, though, is that where the dashboard meets the door cards at the extremities of the car, there’s an unfortunate juxtaposition of the upgraded, soft fascia and the still-unyielding trims inside the doors, which haven’t been treated to the same sort of tactile tweaking.

If anything, the move has slightly backfired in that the soft-touch dash has only served to further highlight the areas where the Vitara is built down to a budget, which is presumably not what Suzuki intended at all.

Besides that, the main update inside is a more attractive, 4.2-inch colour LCD panel in the instrument cluster. This is part of a boost to the equipment levels overall, with safety kit bolstered by some useful toys.

Chief among these is Suzuki’s Dual Sensor Brake Support (DSBS) camera-based system, which handles things like autonomous emergency braking, lane departure warning (with lane departure prevention too) and traffic sign recognition.

There are also further items like blind-spot monitoring and rear cross-traffic alert, which build on the Vitara’s adaptive cruise control and seven airbags to ensure that its glowing five-star ANCAP safety rating will be preserved.

Whether some of the equipment above will be standard fit or not is dependent on our spec lines, which we think we follow the usual RT-S, S Turbo and then RT-X hierarchy as before.

Motive power is largely the same as the pre-facelift Suzuki Vitara – for our market, at least. There’s a choice of front- or all-wheel drive, the latter under the ALLGRIP branding, with either five- or six-speed manual transmissions augmented by the option of a six-speed automatic.

One thing we do know, though, is that the top-shelf Vitara RT-X diesel model will be canned, as Suzuki – like so many manufacturers – is looking to hybrid, plug-in hybrid and electric vehicles for its fuel-efficient future.

That leaves petrol power, but where Europe is getting an 82kW 1.0-litre three-cylinder turbocharged BoosterJet engine to replace the old 88kW normally aspirated 1.6-litre unit, Australians will continue to be offered the larger non-turbo engine.

The 1.4-litre BoosterJet turbo engine is retained, but again (in Europe), there’s been a slight change to the way it has been presented. Over there, the 1.4 turbo was previously the sole preserve of the sportier-looking Vitara S, which was an analogue for our S Turbo model – they both had glitzier grilles, bigger alloys and racier detailing.

However, the Vitara S has been dropped in Europe, meaning the 103kW 1.4 is now just an engine choice for the regular Vitara range; Suzuki Australia will follow Europe’s lead and fit the 1.4 BoosterJet into the new Vitara Turbo and Vitara Turbo ALLGRIP all-wheel drive, replacing the S Turbo variants.

And the 1.4-litre turbo engine is unquestionably the best motor in the Vitara. The little Suzuki SUV’s hidden strength is that it’s almost ridiculously light for a 4x4 of this size, with even the heftiest model tipping the scales at a mere 1265kg.

Thus, while there’s only 15kW in it between the NA 1.6 and the turbocharged 1.4, the BoosterJet has a whopping 41 per cent more torque – 220Nm plays 156Nm, specifically.

And that has a positive impact on the way the Vitara drives.

With all that rich torque on tap from a mere 1500rpm and not relenting until 4000rpm, the 1.4-litre Vitara is properly quick.

It feels so urgent through all of the lower gears and flexible enough to allow it to haul hard from low revs in a higher ratio, that it comes as something of a surprise to see that the AllGrip manual model can’t quite crack the 10-second barrier for the 0-100km/h sprint.

It feels a good deal livelier than that and it certainly has much more muscularity to it than any of the normally aspirated petrol motors in its key Honda, Mazda and Mitsubishi rivals.

What the MY19 updates obviously preserve are the Vitara’s pleasant driving manners, as it still feels like a fun vehicle to drive quickly on your favourite roads – overly light steering aside – while it maintains the same civil ride and refined manners that make it such an easy-going family urbanite.

This is another area where the 1.4 BoosterJet aids the cultured character of the Vitara, because it’s quieter around more of the rev counter than the other engines Suzuki offers in its SUV; albeit, when revved hard, the 1.4-litre engine can still sound coarse and strained.

Perhaps the only slight irritant about the Vitara’s character when it’s holding steady freeway speeds is a touch too much tyre noise, but it’s never intrusive enough to have you grinding your teeth in frustration.

The only potential barrier to the Vitara’s ongoing success, then, will be pricing, but we still expect it to be one of the less expensive cars in class, probably following the $22,990 to $34,990 (plus ORCs) pattern of the old, pre-facelift petrol models.

If it does, then this likeable SUV has every chance of tempting the motoring public out of its preferred choices in this class, like the Mitsubishi ASX, Honda HR-V and Mazda CX-3.

That said, as good as this small Suzuki SUV is, it’s highly unlikely that anyone will be frothing at the mouth with excitement at the thought of owning a Vitara – unlike the Mk4 Jimny, eh?

How much is the 2019 Suzuki Vitara?
Price: TBC
On sale: January 2019
Engine: 1.4-litre four-cylinder turbo-petrol
Output: 103kW/220Nm
Transmission: Six-speed manual and auto
Fuel: 6.3L/100km (ADR Combined)
CO2: 174g/km (ADR Combined)
Safety rating: Five-star (ANCAP 2015)