Volkswagen Golf vs Mercedes-Benz A45

What's the difference?

Eight generations over more than half a century qualifies the Volkswagen Golf as an automotive icon, standing on the shoulders of its original beetle-shaped ancestor.

It remains one of the world’s favourite cars and this 110TSI Life version is the entry-point to the local model line-up, the latest ‘8.5’ version of which arrived here just over 12 months ago.

It sits in a hotly contested small-car category, appealing to those with a preference for a conventional hatch and pure internal-combustion power.

In an automotive world now dominated by increasingly electrified SUVs, we spent a week behind the wheel to see how it shapes up as an urban specialist with occasional open road ability.   

Driving the first-generation Mercedes-AMG A 45 in 2013 was an intense, noisy, brutal experience and I loved every bone-shaking, ear-bleeding moment of it.

But I’m older now, married and have children, and while this is also an intense, noisy, brutal experience I now prefer cars to be less like a 24-hour, seven-day-a-week continuous cage fight. So, I was surprised to find the new-generation A45 S has grown up a bit, too.

So, like me, is the new Mercedes-AMG A 45 S 4Matic+ not as quick as it used to be, and does it have a dad bod, now, too? Far from it. If anything, it’s matured into the serious weapon of a hot hatch it was always supposed to be.