Ford Tourneo Custom vs Nissan Navara

What's the difference?

There’s absolutely no doubt that the van-based people-mover has some distinct advantages over a three-row SUV. The rear seat is bigger, access to it is far better and there’s more luggage space even when all eight seats are occupied. But the Tourneo goes a step or two further with the sliding, swivelling seats that make it one of the most practical and flexible interiors on the market.

True, the driving experience is a bit alien at first, but it’s a case of different, rather than worse. Meantime, the ride is excellent and the performance and economy from the turbo-diesel driveline are both absolutely spot on for this vehicle’s intended purpose.

And perhaps that’s the metaphor for the whole thing: By not trying to be something it’s not, and concentrating on what it needs to do, the Tourneo emerges as a bit of a quiet achiever.

As we said earlier, this type of vehicle concept is never a sure-fire proposition. Parcel vans converted to passenger duties haven’t always worked out. This time, though, it’s different.

While it won’t appeal on the value front as much as its Mitsubishi Triton engineering twin, the Navara’s tweaks from Premcar make it a more comfortable and livable thing. 

The extra cost is worth it for how much better it is on the road, plus you get more features, regardless.

Whether the changes to the Navara are sexy enough to get people in the dealership door is another question, but anyone who takes this over a Triton won’t be disappointed.

If it's for work, the SL or ST will do. If it's doubling as a family car, the Pro-4X is worth the outlay.

Note: CarsGuide attended this event as a guest of the manufacturer, with travel, accommodation and meals provided.

Perhaps the biggest revision of the successful Transit Custom formula needed to make the leap from FedEx to Brady Bunch has been to the rear suspension. Where the Transit uses a leaf-sprung arrangement, the Tourneo has switched to coil rear springs. These technically offer much greater ride comfort at the expense of some load-carrying ability. Which is fine, even if your kids are the bigger variety.

The move to powered sliding side doors is a welcome one, but I found out the hard way that the doors will still open a fraction if you push the button while still travelling at low speed. Not sure why that would be, but at least the buttons in question are up front in Adult-Land, not within reach of you-know-who.

The reality is, too, that the Tourneo is destined to run with the air-con on any time you have bodes in the back. That’s because – like a lot of van conversions – there’s no opening side windows beyond the tiny, hinged windows that open an equally tiny amount. This has more to do with the Transit’s basic structure than any desire to oxygen-deprive the young `uns, but as any parent knows, a supply of fresh air on the move is sometimes the only thing between a happy day out and a clean up in Aisle five.

Nissan has done well to inject its own design flavour into the ute, because even though there’s inevitable similarity in the silhouette, it doesn’t just look like a Triton.

Impressive given a lot of the car is the same, and Nissan couldn’t change any of the hard points the Triton comes with. In fact, the Navara’s dimensions are largely the same as the Triton, coming in at 5320mm long, 1930mm wide and 1815mm tall.

The biggest Nissan-specific design element is a nod to the Navara’s heritage, the three little vent lines above the grille hark back to the original D21 generation ute which had these holes in the bonnet.

It’s subjective to some extent, but I reckon the Navara has the Triton beat on the design front.

Depending on the variant, you get some other indicators that this is no Triton, including a sports bar on the rear of the cabin with ‘Navara’ cut into it, or Pro-4X decals if that’s the variant you go for.

Given the lifestyle and off-road focus of the Pro-4X, it also has a bit more trim inside and out to feel more rugged and premium.

The Navara’s new interior is a big step up over the previous generation, even if it is genuinely all-Triton in there. The biggest change is the Nissan badge on the steering wheel.

It’s a ute, so there’s still a lot of plastic, cheap materials and even the nicer looking surfaces are in a few spots made of gloss black plastic (sometimes called piano black) which gets smudged easily and after a short while.

Here’s where a vehicle like this stands or falls. Because if something like a Tourneo can’t cope with lots of people and their luggage in a single bound, then there’s really not much point to it, is there? I mean you’re not going to buy it for its sporty looks or supercar dynamics, so unless it works brilliantly as family transport, it’s kind of dead in the water. Fortunately Ford seems to have got it right. Mostly, anyway.

That starts up front where the two front seats feel like they’re metres apart. In reality, this huge gap forms a walk-through function for getting access to anything or anyone misbehaving in the second or third row of chairs. But you can’t help wondering what if… What if Ford had ditched the stubby centre console and added a third front-row seat? Wouldn’t a nine-seater be better than eight?

But the seats themselves are comfy and the high-and-mighty driving position gives plenty of vision in every direction. With one exception. And that is when you’re pulling out of a side street on to a main road and need to see what’s coming from the left. Depending on the angle you’re on, the fat frame of the pop-out side window (in the sliding door) becomes a blind spot, especially for taller drivers.

There’s nothing irretrievably wrong with the way the controls are laid out, but they will take some acclimatisation. That goes for the menu system on the touchscreen as well as the column-mounted shifter wand which is about the same size and shape (and in the same place) as a conventional indicator stalk. Tip the lever accidentally and you’ll wind up in neutral, wondering what just happened. The manual-shift mode is also fiddly to use and paddle sifters would be vastly better. Most won’t bother anyway.

The front cabin is home to a shallow lidded bin in the centre console, a deeper bin below that and a couple of charge points. There are also cup-holders in great spots up high in the corner of the dashboard, a shelf across the top of the dashboard and no less than two gloveboxes (the top one is pretty shallow) thanks to moving the passenger’s airbag into the roof lining. Both front doors also feature bins and storage nooks but there’s a fair bit of hard plastic on show, surely a legacy of the Tourneo’s parcel-van DNA.

The Tourneo’s party trick is the way both the second and third rows of seats can be slid to almost any point on a pair of tracks in the floor. The move is simply accomplished via a lever at the front or a rip-cord in the back of the seats, and all three centre-row seats can be moved individually (the third row is split 60:40). The upshot is that you can have all three rows bunched together for a large luggage space, or the rear row pushed right back to form a rear row with huge legroom. Don’t need all eight seats? How about a second row with the two outside chairs in place and the centre one folded forward to expose a work-surface with built-in cupholders.

But it gets even better, because individual seats can be removed to suit the weirdest of loads and the second-row seats even swivel 180-degrees to form a loungeroom on wheels. The kids will be begging you to take them for a drive in this thing.

The seats fold forward, but they don’t tumble. They don’t need to really, and they don’t fold into a bed either. But if you fancy camping in the Tourneo, you can remove both rows of rear seats for a huge flat floor.

The second row is home to storage bins in each sliding door (yes, a door on each side) a pop-put window that opens only about 40mm, temperature controls, air vents and reading lights. The third row, meantime, is not only easily accessed provided the second row isn’t slid all the way back (at which point you wouldn’t be using the third row anyway) but the good news is that the rearmost seat itself is basically three bucket seats with the same comfort levels (high) as the second row. There are also reading lights and a pair of phone pockets and cup-holders in the last row, too. Only the way the track system works and the shape of the seat base means that foot-room is limited to an extent.

With all three rows in place, but pushed as far forward as they can go, there’s a long load area of up to 725mm. But you can also push the second and third rows all the way back and have a cargo area 2622mm long behind the front seats. Maybe the van DNA is a good thing after all.

With all eight seats in place, there’s a minimum of 673 litres of luggage space which can be expanded all the way to a monster 4683 litres with the second and third rows removed.

There’s also a 12-volt power socket and a lighting system in the back, too, although while the side doors are automatic, the tailgate is manual. And you’ll need plenty of real estate to open it, too. Even tall folk will hit the button to open the tailgate, start the strut-assisted opening and then take a step or two back to allow the huge tailgate to rise without clobbering them. An automatic tailgate where you hit the button and run away to a safe distance would be much nicer.

It’s a bit of a shame the Navara doesn’t benefit from the changes Nissan has been making to its interior design and layout recently, because it leaves older Nissans in the dust, in terms of design and ergonomics.

But, the Mitsubishi Triton’s interior isn’t a bad one for the Navara to have inherited, because it just works. It’s uncomplicated and sensible, if a little boring.

There are physical buttons for shortcuts, and the tech is relatively straightforward, even if it does also carry the downside of Android Auto being wired-only. It adds to the somewhat dated feeling the Navara’s interior carries, but the physical space itself is rather sensible.

The Navara’s seats are comfortable, and as the driver it’s easy to find your own preferred position, with the electric adjustment in higher variants being an extra help there.

The driving ergonomics and visibility are also good, which lines up well with the Navara’s driving dynamics and makes it feel less like you’re pedalling a big dual-cab around.

Behind the driver, there’s not heaps in the way of amenity, but the addition of USB ports once you’re past the base SL is welcome for second-row passengers, and the space isn’t cramped by any means.

The Navara has a tub capable of easily fitting a Euro pallet, according to Nissan’s specs, but with its distance of 1135mm between wheel arches, it won’t fit an Aussie pallet. The tub is almost square, at 1555mm long and 1545mm wide, and 525mm tall. 

Plus there’s the 3500kg towing capacity and its payload ranging between 964kg for the Pro-4X or up to 1064kg in the base SL.

The new D27 generation Navara starts from $53,348, before on-road costs, so it’s already more expensive than the Triton it’s based on, but we’ll get into the main, somewhat oily reasons for that in a bit. 

The Navara’s available in four variants at launch, SL, ST, ST-X and Pro-4X. They’re all 4X4 dual-cabs, so it’s mainly the features for each trim level that make the difference when it comes to pricing.

The SL starts off with a lot of the basics covered. There are LED headlights and tail-lights, climate control, the same 8.0-inch multimedia touchscreen as the rest of the range and digital radio as well as Android Auto and Apple CarPlay.

Its aforementioned touchscreen is also a little larger than the one in the Triton it’s based on. Then there’s the 7.0-inch driver display screen which lives between the two physical dials.

At this point in the range the steering wheel is polyurethane and the floors aren’t carpeted, just covered with vinyl. It’s a work ute and it feels like one.

Things pick up slightly with the ST, which starts from $56,765, and gains alloy wheels, auto-folding mirrors, a leather-accented steering wheel and floor carpet, plus now side-steps and a sports bar. It also adds USB ports in the second row for charging, so it’s probably the minimum grade you’d want if you’re ever going to have kids in the back. Essentially, it gains a few things that make it feel a little more livable without getting too fancy.

The ST-X is a fair step up in price, it’s $63,177, but gets better suspension, 18-inch alloys, leather-accented and heated front seats and a power adjustable driver's seat, dual-zone climate and a wireless phone charger.

It also gains a centre limited-slip differential, drive modes more compatible with off-roading, different styling elements and push-button start, so you don’t need to use the physical key.

The top-of-the-range (until the Warrior arrives) is the $68,418 Pro-4X with more design changes, all-terrain tyres, a black sports bar and roof rails, contrast stitching and specific seats with Pro-4X styling. It’s the variant Nissan Australia expects to be the most popular, too. It also has the same diff and better suspension the ST-X gains.

Because the platform is (mostly) borrowed from the Transit Custom, you get the same driveline. That starts with a 2.0-litre turbo diesel, good for 125kW of power and a useful 390Nm of torque. It drives through a conventional eight-speed automatic transmission and then to the front wheels as a means of keeping the load floor as flat and low as possible.

Ford claims a 2500kg towing capacity with a braked trailer, but on a wet road or damp boat ramp, that’s really going to test the limits of the front wheel’s grip which can be overcome even in the dry if you’re too hasty with the throttle.

The biggest engineering change in the move from Transit Custom to Tourneo has been the switch from leaf springs on the former to coil springs and an independent suspension on the latter. This is all in the name of ride quality and recognises the fact that the Transit will often be called on to cart heavier loads than eight humans.

A 150kW/470Nm four-cylinder turbo-diesel engine lies under the bonnet, which falls a little short of some rivals, but isn’t glaringly weak.

Its power lines up with, for example, the Toyota HiLux, but torque falls short of its rival’s 500Nm. It’s the same story for the Ranger, though that ute slips a nose ahead with 4.0kW more than HiLux and Navara in its four-cylinder guise.

The Navara’s six-speed automatic transmission also sends that power and torque to all four wheels, though how exactly it gets there depends on the spec and whether you have a centre differential or not.

Ford quotes an official combined fuel consumption figure of 7.4 litres for the Tourneo. Over a few days of running in a pretty broad mix of urban and country work, we saw an average of 8.6 litres per 100km which is still pretty good for a vehicle of this size.

With the standard 70-litre fuel tank, that gives the Tourneo a theoretical combined range of around 900km between fills, but the real-world number says closer to 800km is more realistic.

Don’t forget, either, that running costs will be a little higher than some diesels, as the Tourneo requires AdBlue at regular intervals, in line with its Euro 6 emissions levels.

From the Navara’s 75L tank, a claimed 7.7L/100km is used on the combined (urban/extra-urban) cycle, though on the launch drive we saw the trip computer hovering around 9.0L/100km.

With a few hundred kilos in the tray, that jumped up to the low 11s.

Hypothetically, if you manage to get close to Nissan’s claimed consumption, you should be able to get more than 900km out of a single tank of diesel. Nissan’s claim isn’t too outrageous, either, considering the type of driving a car launch generally consists of isn’t normally conducive to favourable fuel consumption figures.

If you haven’t driven a one-box van for a decade or more, you’re in for a treat. Just like the Transit Custom on which this car is based, the Tourneo represents a different experience to that of a conventional car or SUV, but one that is not without merit.

For a start, you sit very high which means a great view out across the traffic. And while the driving position is a little less laid-back than a modern car, once you get used to the almost square steering wheel, neither is it the dreaded sit-up-and-beg of older van designs.

The four-cylinder engine doesn’t make the Tourneo a fast vehicle, but it does give it lots of flexibility thanks to all that turbo-torque being available from just off idle. The eight-speed transmission helps, too, but the real surprise is just how quiet the Tourneo is when on a cruising setting. In fact, it’s almost uncanny how such a big, empty metal box could be so silent, but beyond a little tyre noise on coarse surfaces, the Ford pulls it off. As a result, it’s very relaxed and effortless feeling at freeway speeds.

The other surprise is how good the ride quality is. By swapping the cargo van’s leaf rear springs for coils, the Tourneo suddenly displays a very good match between the front and rear axles in terms of how they work to absorb bumps. You do still get some of the front-seat sensation that you’re sitting over the front axle, but it’s not terrible and the reality is that you simply sitting closer to the axle, not right over it.

For many drivers perhaps the over-riding impression will be of the vehicle’s external size. And, yes, it’s a long and wide piece of equipment, but at least the boxy shape means the corners are easy to place and the huge glass area and driver aids like parking sensors and blind-spot warnings help a lot in the daily cut and thrust.

Things are also improved by the fabulously small turning circle of 10.9m kerb-to-kerb (courtesy of the Transit’s role as an inner-city delivery van) that gives an agility the looks don’t suggest. But there’s a sense that the Tourneo is a little wider in the rear track than the front, as you’ll sometimes find the inside rear tyre finding the lips of roundabouts and suburban gutters.

Now we get to the biggest reason you’d consider a Navara over the Triton it’s based on.

While the Navara benefits from having a relatively new platform underneath it - thanks Mitsubishi - it’s still a ladder-frame dual-cab ute so expectations weren’t exactly on the floor, but they also weren’t sky-high.

And sure, a lot of the details about the new Navara aren’t groundbreaking, nor is much of the way it drives - but the changes Premcar has made to the suspension in this ute are well worth the extra outlay.

What Premcar has done with the Navara, on what we would guess is a relatively constrained budget, is find the most cost-effective way to make the ute better to drive.

They went with upgraded dampers which have been tuned to balance control and comfort with the ute’s off-road ability.

The result? A very controlled front-end, more communicative steering and confidence on the road to drive over even rough surfaces without fear of being flung off the road. Ladder-frame utes don't normally feel so controlled over rough surfaces at high speeds.

It’s worth noting that while the SL and ST still benefit from the suspension upgrades, the ST-X and Pro-4X in particular are much better to drive than you’d expect from a dual-cab ute.

Some of the roads around Canberra are particularly rough, even close to town where the speeds are lower, but the Navara handled myriad surfaces and conditions on- and off-road, in the soaking wet and when it was bone-dry.

Aside from one particular section of the launch that may have just been a little unkind to the ‘stiffer’ sidewalls on the ST-X compared to the Pro-4X, the Navara’s behaviour was not only confidence-building, but allowed for a degree of fun not normally present in the class.

The steering feel left no guesswork necessary, and there’s not a huge on-centre dead-spot as is often the case in a dual-cab. Nice and direct without being too heavy.

The Navara’s weak point, which still gets a pass mark, is probably that its drivetrain now feels older than the ute in which it lives. The outputs are passable, and the transmission finds the correct place well enough, but in a world of 10-speed autos in Rangers or petrol plug-in hybrids, a bog-standard turbo-diesel with six gears has to be bang-on perfect to keep up. 

The Navara’s is adequate, but once you’re used to it, the drive experience is a step above most in the ute segment in terms of control, something that’s hard to come by in this segment.

It translates well to off-roading, where the ute’s front-end settles very quickly over ridges and undulating surfaces without the harshness of a too-stiff set of dampers.

Unsealed roads feel easily dispatched even at relatively high speeds, and with the right tyres (a la Pro-4X) the Navara is a seriously capable thing.

If you find yourself the owner of a D27 Navara and never leave the bitumen, you’re missing out.

The new Navara inherits the Triton’s maximum five-star ANCAP rating from testing in 2024. It scored notably well in Child Occupant protection, though its score for Safety Assist isn’t as high as some rivals.

Eight airbags mean the Navara’s got occupants cushioned in case of the worst, while the whole range has the same suite of safety tech, including a surround-view camera, forward collision warning and AEB, front- and rear-cross traffic alert, driver monitoring and traffic sign recognition, front and rear parking sensors and trailer sway control.

The Navara’s driver monitoring, however, suffers the same overzealousness as the Triton. Nissan didn’t reprogram any of the ADAS systems which means the car will regularly accuse you of being distracted if you’re not looking directly at the road ahead. Checking mirrors or a map in the centre screen will trigger this.

Ford offers its standard five-year/unlimited kilometre warranty on the Tourneo. Five years is fair enough, but can’t match the seven years or even more that some of the competition offer. It‘s worth noting, however, that the warranty does match many of the makes and models that will be the Ford’s natural enemies.

Service intervals are 12 months or a very long 30,000km, but it’s unlikely many families will clock up 30,000km in a 12-month period, anyway. There’s no word on capped-price servicing yet, but the mechanically similar Transit Custom has a service plan that limits the cost of each of the first four services to around $500.

The biggest additional running cost for the Tourneo will be the AdBlue additive to control emissions. How frequently you need to top up will be determined by what type of driving you do.

Nissan’s 10-year/300,000km warranty is fantastic but applies only if you service with Nissan. It’s five years with no kilometre limit otherwise. 

There’s five years' of flat-price servicing at $499 per visit, every 12-months or 15,000km, whichever comes first.

Roadside assist is also free for a decade if you service with Nissan, or a year otherwise.

Given there are around 180 Nissan dealers nationwide, finding one shouldn’t be a challenge.