2021 Jeep Compass vs Kia Seltos

What's the difference?

The Jeep Compass Night Eagle is good looking and offers great practicality for a small SUV, and comes standard with good city-focussed safety tech. 

What stops the compass Night Eagle from being a great urban car is its thirsty petrol engine and a driving experience which isn’t all that enjoyable.

Small SUVs tend to come with their fair share of drawbacks. They’re more expensive than their hatchback cousins and tend to be half as practical as they might look. This is not the case with the Seltos, which offers great value, top-shelf practicality, and a reasonably entertaining drive experience, too.

There aren’t many boring looking Jeeps. If anything they look like full-scale sand pit toys. The Jeep Compass is no different but has a more refined and domesticated appearance than a Wrangler. If anything, it looks like a mini version of the big Jeep Grand Cherokee with its low narrow grille, squared headlights and tall, flat bonnet.

Even the side profile of the Compass and the rear of the car with its tailgate and taillight design is shrunken Grand Cherokee looking. Which is odd because the Cherokee, which is bigger than the Compass, looks nothing like the Grand Cherokee.

Talking of size, how big is the Compass? Here are the dimensions. The compass is 4394mm long, 1819mm wide and 1629mm tall.

That makes it a small SUV, but not as small as the Jeep Renegade, which looks tiny enough to pick up and carry.

Night Eagle sounds like a special ops code name and there are some stealthy elements to the styling, such as the black alloy wheels and the blacked-out grille. These touches are a good combination with the Grey Magnesio paint my car wore. That’s a premium colour costing $645, but the black roof is standard. In the photos I took, the Night Eagle looks as dark and as brooding as the day I took these pictures.

I’ll talk about how much room is inside in the practicality section below, but for now I can tell you that the Compass’s interior has a layout which is more functional and rugged than refined and fancy. I wasn’t overwhelmed by the feel of the plastics, which to me didn’t have the same quality as interior elements of a Mazda CX-30 or Kia Seltos.

I think the Seltos looks pretty neat. There’s a youthful flair about it and even the plasticky bits which make up its bold face remind me of an age of small SUVs past, with echoes of things like the first-generation RAV4.

There’s nice angular detailing, unexpected amounts of small patternwork to add a sense of depth to its textures, and a fun sporty side profile, accentuated by its two-tone alloy design.

One thing the Seltos doesn’t look is small. Even parked next to a Kona, you’d be forgiven for thinking the Seltos is in the class above, as it’s significantly taller, perhaps even enough to step on the Sportage’s toes.

Inside things are typically Kia, but there’s a bit of give and take when it comes to the materials. The massive multimedia screen is incredible in a car like this, but its glossy panelwork which enshrines the dash and includes the climate module is somehow at odds with the otherwise nasty plastics surrounding it.

Every other surface around it is in a hollow, hard finish. It’s not just the dash either, with the hard plastics continuing into the doors.

Other important touchpoints are pretty good, with Kia’s latest steering apparatus looking and feeling great while hosting ergonomic buttons and toggles for the most important functions.

The seats, which are in an odd grey seat trim with a pattern which again, somehow reminds me of the ‘90s, are reasonably comfortable and adjustable, even if they are only six-way manual on this grade.

Good practicality in a small urban car means a cleverly designed interior, which makes the most of the limited space and the Compass hits the nail on the head here. There’s a storage space under the cushion of the front passenger seat (see the images), a deep centre console bin, decent-sized door pockets and four cup holders.

You’ll find two USB ports (one in the front and one in the back), along with a 12V outlet and a 230V power point.

Boot space is large for the class at 438 litres. 

As for people space there’s plenty of elbow-, head and shoulder room up front, while legroom in the back is excellent and, at 191cm tall, I can sit behind my driving position with about 4cm between my knees and the seatback.

It's great to see that there are directional air vents in the second row. 

As you’d expect from a current Kia or Hyundai product, every thought has been given to maximizing stowage space in the cabin. Front occupants get big chunky bottle holders in the centre console and doors, a large two-tiered shelf under the climate controls, and large binnacles with bottle holders in the doors.

The console arm rest box isn’t massive and void of amenities, but is useful nonetheless. The Sport grade adds a second USB port for a total of two (USB 2.0) for front passengers and a 12V power outlet.

Despite its imposing size, the multimedia system isn’t placed so high it will distract the driver, and the ergonomics are backed by easy access dials for things like volume and climate temperature.

On the topic of climate controls, I have to spare a moment to note the automatic defog feature which was downright magic.

The major annoyance in the cabin is the abundance of hard plastics where elbows normally rest. This is common to some of the more affordable Hyundai products, too, so Kia is far from alone here.

In terms of overall cabin space, the Seltos falls short of the trickery employed by Honda in its brilliant HR-V, but makes up for it with sheer size.

Front and rear passengers have leagues of leg and headroom, making the Seltos easily one of the most spacious places to be in the segment.

Rear passengers benefit from large binnacles in the doors, but no pockets on the back of the front seats (instead, a hard-wearing plastic cover. Good for kids). There are also no directional air vents or power outlets either, a mark against the otherwise practical package.

Boot space is at the top end if not the largest in the small SUV segment, too, with 498-litres (VDA). Not only is this much larger than its Kona cousin, it’s even a much larger boot than Kia’s own Sportage in the size above. My usual equipment set of a duffle bag, tripod case and largest 124L CarsGuide travel case had so much room they slid about freely in corners. Impressive.

The Seltos Sport we have here is the second-rung up in the Seltos line-up and it wears an MSRP of $30,490. This places it squarely against the Nissan Qashqai ST ($30,290), Honda HR-V VTi-S ($30,390), and the Hyundai Kona Elite ($30,600).

To be precise, because I know this particular market segment is crowded and confusing, the Seltos is a smidge larger than the Kona and HR-V, but a tiny (we’re talking a handful of mm) bit smaller than the Qashqai.

This first-rung-up variant is in the most competitive price segment – you’ll note its major rivals are all similarly specified (front-wheel drive, non-turbos) and are all within a few hundred dollars of one another, but this has also created the annoying side-effect of making the must-have 'Active Safety Pack' a $1000 option.

So really, with the specification it should have, the Seltos is $1000 more than equivalents in the segment.

But given its standard equipment, and, as you’ll read about shortly, it’s generous cabin and safety inclusions with that box ticked, it’s easily worth the small extra spend.

The Sport grade is the first rung in the line-up to include 17-inch alloy wheels, an impressive 10.25-inch multimedia touchscreen with digital radio and built-in nav, climate control, auto folding mirrors, leather-trimmed steering wheel and shift knob, and fog lights.

Less impressive are the halogen headlights (which cheapen an otherwise good-looking car), lack of keyless entry or push-start ignition, and the unusual down-grade to a continuously variable automatic transmission from Kia’s usual six-speed torque converter auto. More on that in the engine and transmission section.

The screen in particular, dominates the dash in this car and is a real star feature which the Seltos gets over rivals at this price. There’s also the plus of a large interior space to offset some items that are (annoyingly) missing.

The Night Eagle is the only front-wheel drive variant in the Compass range, although it has the same 2.4-litre petrol engine as the all-wheel drive Limited and S-Limited grades. In Jeep World even the engines have cool names and this one is called the Tigershark.

If only the engine was a good as its name because with 129kW and 229Nm I felt that, in the Compass, this four-cylinder engine was underpowered even when unladen.

A six-speed automatic does a good job of smooth shifting, however.

There are two engines in the Seltos range, but the Sport here is powered by the lesser 2.0-litre non-turbo four-cylinder petrol engine which produces 110kW/180Nm.

The same engine appears in lesser variants of the Hyundai Kona with identical power outputs. The 2.0-litre versions of the Seltos are front-wheel drive, but interestingly forgo the Kona’s six-speed torque converter automatic in favour of a continuously variable transmission (CVT) solution instead.

When it comes to urban driving nothing makes more sense than electric vehicles, hybrids and cars with small capacity turbo engines. So, the Compass Night Eagle with its 2.4-litre naturally aspirated petrol engine isn’t ideal for fuel economy.

Yes, this engine has a stop-start system, which will save fuel but even then, Jeep says you can expect to use 11.2L/100km after urban driving.

I live in Sydney’s Inner West, about 8km from the CBD. The traffic moves at a frantic pace, unless it’s peak hour in which case the city gridlock extends all the way to the street I live on. That kind of environment never does any favours for your fuel economy, but even then, the 13.7L/100km the trip computer was reporting at the end of my week with the Compass was high. 

Motorway miles would bring that down substantially, and Jeeps says that after a combination of open and urban roads you can expect 7.9L/100km.

This is an urban test, however, and urban fuel economy is what counts.

The Seltos Sport has a claimed/combined cycle fuel consumption rating of 6.8L/100km which is down from the same engine’s 7.2L/100km in the smaller Kona.

Kia would, perhaps, put this down to the CVT auto, but in a week of combined testing including daily urban drives with some freeways thrown in for good measure, our car returned a computer-reported 8.0L/100km.

This is about the same as I scored in the Kona on my recent range test.

The Seltos has a 50L fuel tank which can be filled with base-grade 91RON unleaded fuel.

There’s good and not-so good news, here. Making the Compass Night Eagle good for city driving is great visibility, wide and comfortable seats and the smallish size of the car makes it easy to fit into spaces.

But working against the Compass was steering which seemed to lack both feel and accuracy, suspension which struggled to iron-out the many creases in Sydney’s shocking roads and not much in the way of acceleration.

A large turning circle of more than 11m also didn’t help me much in the streets where I live, either.

The Seltos is generally a winner behind the wheel, with a few shortcomings which could come down to driver preference.

For a start, visibility out of its wagon-like body is excellent, with large windows and generous wing mirrors giving you a great awareness of your surroundings. The driving position, while not sporty, is quite upright granting a commanding SUV view, and not all cars in this category do.

Despite a dated sounding engine, power is more than adequate, with even this 2.0-litre version proving quick off the mark, the transmission clearly calibrated to give the Seltos an immediacy in traffic.

As you might expect with an engine like this though, the power delivery becomes less impressive as you work your way up to higher revs. The CVT surprised me by not imparting too much of the lackluster rubber banding feeling common to many rival CVTs.

While I was surprised to find this engine much quieter at low revs than it was in the Kona, once you’re up above 3500rpm it is still making a racket. Road noise is also a minor issue with the large wheels, and thin tyres, especially above 70km/h.

The Seltos does feel light and surprisingly responsive in the corners, with more sporty and direct steering than most cars in this class. The suspension tune adds to this sporty feel, but I would argue it's overly firm (a criticism which is becoming easy to make of many Kia products).

This small SUV crashes over even small bumps, leaving you to cringe at the larger ones. Even freeway rumble strips send vibrations shuddering through the body and steering wheel.

While it’s one of the more engaging handling combinations in the class, its certainly a bit less comfortable than something like a Subaru XV or Toyota C-HR. Kia’s local suspension tuning program would suggest this is to Australian tastes though, so perhaps it’s just not for me.

While the more comprehensive share of active safety items are a $1000 option, every Seltos gets the now must-have auto emergency braking (works at city speeds and detects pedestrians), basic driver attention alert, and lane keep assist with lane departure warning.

Ticking the Active Safety Pack box upgrades the AEB to include cyclist detection, adds 'lead vehicle alert' to the driver attention alert system, and introduces adaptive cruise control. There is no way to get blind spot monitoring or rear cross-traffic alert on the S or Sport Seltos grades.

Not a bad safety suite by any means. The option pack is worth it for the upgraded auto braking and adaptive cruise.

On the 'expected' front the Seltos packs six airbags, as well as the usual brake, traction, and stability controls. There are two ISOFIX and three top-tether child seat mounting points across the second row.

The Seltos carries a maximum five-star ANCAP rating from a 2019 assessment.

The Compass is covered by Jeep's five-year/100,000km warranty. There's also five years of capped price servicing. It's recommended the petrol variants are serviced every 12 months/12,000km and the diesels every 12 months/20,000km.

As always, ownership continues to be a strong proposition when picking Kia over rivals, with its stellar seven year/unlimited kilometre warranty promise.

The tried and tested 2.0-litre engine, which the brand has relied on for a long time, shouldn’t give you any problems, but the CVT is new so you might want to keep an eye on it.

Service costs are fixed for the life of the warranty (up to seven years or 105,000km). The small SUV require servicing in 12 month or 15,000km intervals which cost between $261 and $593 for a yearly average of $402.57. Not as astoundingly cheap as Toyota servicing, but hardly expensive.