2019 Kia Cerato vs Mazda 3

What's the difference?

The drive-away pricing and big features list makes the Cerato great value, and then there’s the practicality and warranty. Also, you have choice between something a little hardcore or more comfortable.
 
To me, the Sport Plus is the sweet spot in the range. The leather seats, dual-zone climate control with rear air vents, proximity key and heated seats clinch it.
 
The Kia Cerato could be the smartest choice you’ll make this year. Or there’s the Mazda MX-5. 

The new 3 sedan is just as good as the hatch, but different. Mazda has gone out of its way to make the two body styles look different enough to cover more than a few bases. This works on a global scale - the Chinese market absolutely loves a sedan but in Australia, the 3 sedan only accounts for around 10 percent of sales.

The new 3 really is something else - it looks feels a heck of a lot more expensive than it is (especially in Soul Red), drives beautifully without being startling and in the case of the sedan, rides very comfortably indeed.

What a time to be alive: small cars have never looked better. Have you seen the new Ford Focus or the Hyundai i30? Even the current Toyota Corolla looks sexy.

But does the same go for the new Cerato? The sedan is certainly attractive, but the hatch looks hot from some angles and not from others. The hatch has whiffs of BMW X4 around the tail-lights, although its side profile is not as pleasing as the sedan’s. 

Both have the same angry Kia face with signature ‘tiger nose’ grille, while all grades in both body styles have the glossy black diffuser and lower bumper with integrated exhaust.

And that’s a bit of a tip for you right there. See, despite there being four grades and a $12K price difference between the entry level and top-of-the-range Cerato, the difference in styling is almost zilch. 

Really, the only way you can tell the difference visually between an S grade and a GT is the wheels and exhaust (the S has hub caps and one tail pipe, not two). 

All Cerato hatches have that same body kit, including the roof top rear spoiler. The Cerato sedans don’t miss out – they have a little boot lid spoiler.

If it came down to it, I’d say the sedan is a better-looking car than the hatch.

The cabins are also almost identical although the cloth seats in the S and Sport aren’t as premium looking or feeling as the leather ones in the Sport + and GT, and there are other similarly luxurious elements on these grades such as the push-button ignition and soft-touch plastics. Have a look at the interior photos, I took them myself.

What colours can you get your Cerato in? There are 10, but one ('Sunset Orange') is exclusive to the GT. 

Only one is a non-cost option, too – it’s 'Clear White'. The rest are premium paint colours and will cost you extra. You can have 'Aurora Black', 'Gravity Blue', 'Horizon Blue' (which was the colour of my S hatch and looks great), there’s also 'Runway Red' (that was the colour of my Sport hatch and it was hard to keep looking clean), 'Steel Grey', 'Snow White' and 'Silky Silver'. No green and no yellow.

The Cerato is a small car, but not the smallest Kia – that’s the Picanto and it’s tiny. Nope, the dimensions show the Cerato hatch to be 4510mm end-to-end, while the sedan is longer at 4640mm. Both are the same height at 1800mm tall, but their widths are different with the hatch being 1445mm across while the sedan is 5.0mm narrower.

The sedan is oddly anonymous in this new Mazda3. It misses out on some of the cool detailing of the hatch, particularly the gloriously designed tail-lights - the circular sections are flatter and flush with the rest of the housing.

It's not ugly, not by a long shot and certainly isn't as polarising as the hatch. You can also see out over your shoulder. 

The front ends of the hatch and sedan are fundamentally identical, with the funky grille shape and effects along for the ride.

From the side, both have good presence but the hatch's - I hesitate to use this word - stance is much more convincing. The good news is, the choice between them is more than a boot.

Inside is visually identical to the hatch. The new dash is refreshingly button free (although still a bit colourless) and the new screen looks terrific.

There's something about the consistency of detailing in the current Mazda range - all the fonts match on the switches, the instruments and the head-up.

It sounds ridiculous but that makes a huge difference in making the cabin feel resolved. The seats are terrifically comfortable, too.

You can get the Cerato as a four-door sedan or a five-door hatchback. They’re the same size, but which do you reckon has the biggest boot? The hatch? Nope.

See, the Cerato hatch’s boot has a luggage capacity of 428 litres and the sedan’s boot space is 502 litres.

Thing is, the hatch is the more practical of the two because of its tailgate which opens high and gives you a big aperture and you can fold those rear seats down to open up the cabin as a cargo area.

Another practicality win for the hatch is the segmented storage area under the boot floor. The sedan doesn’t get this which is a shame because it’s like a big bento box for wet clothes or muddy shoes. 

Storage throughout the cabins of both the sedan and hatch is excellent with two cupholders in the fold-down rear armrest and another two up-front, while the centre console bin is deep (there’s a USB charging port in there, too) and the shelves under the dash were a great place to plonk my wallet and phone. Also hiding in there is a USB charging port, a USB media port and a 12-volt outlet. That top shelf under the dash in the GT also doubles as a wireless charging pad.

Room for people is also outstanding. I’m 191cm tall, and mainly all limbs, yet I had no elbow or legroom issues up front and I can even sit behind my driving position in both the sedan and the hatch with about 20mm of space between my knees and the seatback.

The Sport Plus and GT have directional air vents in the second row, but the lower grades don’t get these. That’s something I find pretty frustrating – my four-year-old sat for two weeks in the back of the Cerato S and Sport through the killer summer of 2019 and it was hot back there.

The sedan rides on the same wheelbase as the hatch but the overall length is up 200mm. That might not seem like much, but that translates to a boot of 444 litres, which is a lot more than the hatch's 295 litres.

The rear seats seem slightly more roomy than the hatch. There are even air vents for rear seat dwellers, which is rather nice.

The G25 Evolve starts at $29,490 (before on-road costs) for the manual almost nobody buys, and an extra thousand takes you to $30,490 for the six-speed auto.

The Evolve spec isn't skimpy, with 18-inch alloys, dual-zone climate control, an excellent safety package, reversing camera, rear parking sensors, keyless entry and start, auto LED headlights, auto wipers, electric drivers seat, sat nav, leather wheel and shifter, leather seats and a space-saver spare.

Mazda's 'MZD Connect' has a had a big facelift to go with the very nice interior. Displayed on an 8.8-inch screen that looks like it belongs, it has DAB+, Apple CarPlay, Android Auto and in-built sat nav. The eight-speaker stereo is quite nice if nothing amazing.

So, you can get a Cerato S, a Cerato Sport and a Cerato Sport Plus, but only the top-of-the-range Cerato GT is the true sporty one in the family.

The GT has a 1.6-litre four-cylinder turbo-petrol making 150kW/265Nm. It’s a great engine and Kia has given it a seven-speed dual-clutch automatic transmission for quick shifts.

The rest of the Cerato line-up shares a 112kW/192Nm four-cylinder petrol engine. If you want a manual gearbox, then you can only have it with the base grade S, otherwise the six-speed automatic, that is standard in the others, does the shifting for you.

Both are good powerplants, the 1.6-litre is smaller but more powerful and responsive and uses less fuel. How much less? Which we’re just about to get to. 

Mazda's 'SkyActiv' 2.5-litre engine lives on with a few more kilowatts into the bargain, in this case delivering 139kW/252Nm to the front wheels via a six-speed automatic.

The G20 makes do with 114kW/200Nm and feels a lot slower.

As ever, the SkyActiv engine drives the front wheels through a six-speed SkyActiv transmission. 

As mentioned above, the GT with its 1.6-litre turbo-petrol four-cylinder is the most fuel-efficient member of the Cerato family and after a combination of open and urban roads Kia says you should see it using 6.8L/100km in both the sedan and hatch. 

When I tested the GT at its launch in January 2019 the trip computer said I was using 7.6L/100km after driving the hatch on mainly country roads and 8.4L/100km in the sedan on similar open roads.

As for the other grades Kia says the combined fuel consumption for the S, Sport and Sport Plus grades with their 2.0-litre four-cylinder petrol engines and six-speed auto is 7.4L/100km. My own testing in the Sport hatch saw me measure bang-on 7.4L/100km (measured at the petrol pump), while the S hatch did 8.6L/100km (also measured at the bowser).

A manual gearbox is available on the S and Kia says you should see it using 7.4L/100km in the hatch and 7.6L/100km in the sedan. Along with that good mileage it's nice to know both engines are also happy to run on regular unleaded petrol.

Despite all the extra hardware south of the rear axle, Mazda reckons you'll sip standard unleaded (there's a bonus) at a rate of 6.5L/100km on the combined cycle, 0.1L/100km less than the hatch.

Our week with the car saw us average 9.8L/100km with mostly suburban driving.

As before, Mazda's has fitted 'i-Stop' stop-start which is quite clever. Most people hate stop-start, but this one covers both bases.

You can control whether it switches off the engine. Light brake pressure keeps the engine ticking over while a slight increase will cut the fuel.

This is simple. There are only two types of Cerato when it comes to driving. There’s the fast and hard one, or the comfy and easy one.

If you’re looking for a Cerato which is pretty quick and has great handling, then it’s the GT for you. The catch is, the GT’s ride is firm and jarring over potholes and speed bumps.

If you’re looking for something which has a comfortable ride and is fuss-free to drive then the S, the Sport and Sport Plus are for you.

See, Kia set out to make the GT a bit more hardcore – it has a more powerful engine, firmer suspension (the torsion bar set-up in the other grades was swapped for a multi-link system in the rear of the GT), it also sits lower and rides on 18-inch wheels with low-profile Michelin Pilot Sport 4 tyres. The result is a hatch which is knocking on the door of Golf GTI territory.

I drove the GT in hatch form at its launch on twisty country roads and it felt planted, with excellent body control and impressive grip. The only thing lacking was more grunt.

This chassis is now so good it feels like it’s in search of a more powerful engine to match it. The steering also felt a bit ‘lumpy’ in places. Still it’s accurate and not a deal breaker.

That lumpy steering feel is also present in the S, Sport and Sport Plus, too but it becomes irrelevant because these grades don’t have the performance bent of the GT. Instead they have a ride which is composed and comfortable, with an engine that provides plenty of oomph for highway cruising, overtaking and city sprints – especially when you select 'Sport' mode which sharpens throttle response.

And while they don’t have the handling and agility of the GT, I was impressed by how controlled and planted the Sport felt when I tested it over the route I normally take sport cars on.
 
More importantly, the S, Sport, and Sport Plus are easy and enjoyable to drive. I clocked up hundreds of kilometres in the S and Sport and found the seats to be wide at the base and supportive around my back, and they could be adjusted to find a great driving position.

Kia tunes most of its cars for Australia roads and the job its local engineering team has performed on these lower grade Ceratos is outstanding – the ride is compliant and comfortable and the car has good body control over bumps and corners.

If I could change anything it would be to improve visibility in the rear corners – those tiny porthole-like windows aren’t big enough.

Mazda tells that the set-up of the sedan is identical to the hatch. Sure there are differences like, say the tyres, but the idea is that the two drive identically. I, uh, I don't think so.

Plenty is the same. The engine and transmission do a good, less frantic job of moving the 3 along than the lower-powered 2.0-litre.

I can't stress enough how much better the 2.5 is. The 2.0 does a good enough job, it's just that you'll find it wanting with a load on about halfway up that steep hill. The 2.5 is much happier in traffic and the difference in fuel consumption is negligible, so the only real extra cost is the up-front spend for the G25.

The steering is just as keen and quick as the hatch's, too. The wheel responds very quickly to inputs and you don't have to do much twirling to get the car into a park.

It's not too quick a sneeze will send you into orbit, though, which is handy. The clever 'G-Vectoring' system is along, too, rapidly building driver confidence in the car's abilities.

What felt a lot different to me was the ride, something I noticed moments after picking up the sedan. I had a hatch overlapping with the sedan so was able to jump in and out over a couple of days to ensure I wasn't making it all up.

It seemed a little less busy than the hatch which felt a bit more loaded for bear. The sedan felt like it had a little more roll and carried a little more weight. There's absolutely nothing wrong with that, a scaled-down 6 isn't a bad idea at all.

In town and at speed, the 3's past problems with road noise are a distant memory. No doubt strategic use of foam, carpets and other clever bits and pieces are a big part of the improvement, as well as stiffer bits and pieces.

The sedan is a bit easier to get around in as the vision over your shoulder is a bit better, unencumbered as it is by that slab of metal that is the hatch's C-pillar. 

Mazda's (very welcome) preoccupation with safety continues. The new 3 has seven airbags, ABS, stability and traction controls, forward and reverse AEB, lane keep assist, reverse cross traffic alert, forward collision warning and a blind spot monitor.

Out back are three top-tether anchors and two ISOFIX points.

The new 3 scored a maximum five-star ANCAP safety rating in May 2019.

The Cerato is covered by Kia’s seven-year/unlimited km warranty. Most carmakers are only just making the move to five-year warranties, but Kia has had this offering in place for years. The Cerato also comes with seven years of roadside assistance.

There’s also seven years of capped price servicing. Kia recommends you service the Cerato S, Sport, Sport Plus annually or every 15,000km. You can expect to pay $275 at the first service, $469 at the second, $339, $623, $309, then $596 and finally $328 for the seventh.

It’s good to know that after seven years of regular servicing you can expect to pay no more than $2939.

As for the GT Kia recommends servicing it every 10,000km or annually. Servicing is capped at $282 for the first service, $476 for the next, then $346, $630, $317, $604, then $640 for the seventh.

The aftercare Kia offers is outstanding and so the Cerato gets full marks for its cost of ownership.

Mazda offers a five year/unlimited kilometre warranty which, like the clutch of advanced safety gear, is very welcome indeed.

Since the start of April 2019, you also get five years of roadside assist. In the past, you had to pay for that.

The company continues with the weird 12 months/10,000km service intervals, so clearly it doesn't seem to bother its customers too much.

The 'Service Select' program lists the price of each service up to the fifth. Total cost over five services is $1581 at an average of $316 per service (you'll pay either $299 or $342, plus extra items listed on the website).