2019 Suzuki Jimny Reviews

Three of the best factory-prepped 4WDs in Australia go head to head in the bush, on sand, through water and up some very steep hills

Automotive journalists are normal people, just like you. (But maybe not like that weird bloke sitting across from you on the train, right now. Don't look at him!) We car journos laugh, we cry and we're also prone to becoming caught up in nostalgia-fuelled fever dreams when the likes of something like the Suzuki Jimny pops up on our reportage radar.Yep, most of us were fair dinkum guilty of jumping on the bandwagon when the Jimny first lobbed, largely due to the fact that it brought back happy memories of rough-and-tumble camping trips of the past (whether they actually happened or not) and the little Zook also happily flew in the face of current SUV trends that err on the side of sleek, modern and safe rather than boxy, bouncy and, er, safe-ish.We were willing to initially overlook the Jimny's flaws, mostly because we hadn't spent a lot of time in it at that stage and we were also viewing everything through a glaze of that aforementioned nostalgia.But now that I've spent more time in it, I'm ready to face the cold hard facts: while it's a charming little off-roader, and more than capable in an off-road setting, it's far from perfect as a daily driver or, indeed, even as a 4WD.Have I got your hackles up? Great. Read on.

So many SUVs today are just hatchbacks that sit a bit higher off the ground. But there was a time, long, long ago, when SUVs were four-wheel drives designed to be able to tackle serious off-road terrain. The new-generation Suzuki Jimny can do exactly that. But most people won't, so we figured we'd see what it was like as an urban runaround. We even got the automatic version!

The new-generation Suzuki Jimny has been 20 years in the making and it's finally here. (Cue much rejoicing from Zook fanatics.) It has big expectations to meet in that it needs to retain the off-road capability and undeniable fun factor of previous versions, but somehow at the same time embrace the 21st century.

Australia has been waiting two whole decades for a new Jimny, but does the all-new model live up to the legend?