Renault Megane 2016 review

Compact hatch whets the buyer’s appetite but the menu and prices will be critical.

Promise and potential are words commonly bandied about when discussing up and coming athletes. The same applies to the fourth-generation Renault Megane due here in October.

The chassis is undoubtedly going to rival the class leaders in this field, from the VW Golf to the Mazda3. The price and specification, though, could bring this compact hatch undone.

The existing Megane starts at $22,000, similar money to the VW Golf at $22,490, but the Renault will have to be well equipped to persuade buyers to trade out of a Japanese or Korean brand.

Normally when we drive a car on local roads — this launch was at the Anglesea proving ground in Victoria — local pricing is already set and we could make that call. Renault has taken the unusual step of shipping four left-hand drive vehicles here to give the local motoring media a sneak peek months out from launch. That makes a definitive verdict hard.

The new Renault certainly looks the part. The design works well from any angle, though the profile is a highlight with taut lines, subtly flared wheel arches and a better balanced look than anything this side of the Clio.

I prefer the honeycomb grille in the top-spec GT to the five-louvred look found on the GT Line but that will come down to taste. Beyond fancier wheels, the GT can be spotted by the twin rectangular exhaust tips, the alcantara seats and GT badges on most surfaces.

Overall ergonomics aren’t bad and the seats are among the more supportive.

Expect the warm hatch — a track-tuned RS version will arrive in the next year — to cost less than $40,000.

The interior has been dressed up for this iteration of the Megane with soft-touch plastics upfront (the rear doors still have hard plastic shells) and greater attention to detail. Renault persists with the steering column-mounted audio controls that are a pain to use but overall ergonomics aren’t bad and the seats are among the more supportive in this class.

Expect (or hope for) seven-inch touchscreens on the lesser versions and a classy 8.7-inch portrait-oriented display for the top variants. The likes of autonomous emergency braking and adaptive cruise control are likely to be options but even so, they’re features not typically found on mainstream small cars.

On the road

A couple of hours with the Megane convince us this will be on the short list for drivers wanting a vehicle that’s fun to push along.

Road-holding on the GT-Line is as good as any vehicle in the segment and it only gets better in the GT with the four-wheel steering notably lifting the car’s ability to manoeuvre at pace.

This angles the rear wheels up to 2.7 degrees in the opposite direction to the front wheels to tighten the cornering line. It works up to 60km/h in all driving modes other than sport, when the threshold rises to 80km/h.

The auto is good without being great.

The GT-Line’s 1.2-litre engine fulfils its brief of providing reasonable momentum with little fuss. Encountering a hill will mean reaching for the shifter in the six-speed manual models and, with the turbo boost, the small hatch is happy to power up steep inclines.

The seven-speed auto is inclined to hang on to too tall a cog unless you squeeze the accelerator, at least in the neutral and comfort driving modes. Upping the ante to sport adjusts the throttle, transmission and engine response and reveals a decent note from the exhaust.

The 1.6-litre engine (151kW/ 280Nm) is the range topper for now and propels the GT to 100km/h in a more than respectable 7.1 seconds. It’s teamed exclusively with the dual-clutch auto.

The auto is good without being great — average accelerator pressure is met with slick shifts but there’s a conventional auto’s delay between ratios when you’re standing on the pedal.

It will, however, accept multi-gear downshifts via the paddle shifters when entering a tight corner.

Wind noise is minimal even at freeway speeds and coarse-chip bitumen doesn’t elicit much of a moan from the grippy Continental rubber. The electric-assisted power steering has decent feel and weight and the brakes are more than up to the job.

Big scallops on the back of the front seats contribute to decent rear kneeroom, while headroom is fine.

Boot space is 434L.