2018 Volvo XC40 vs 2019

What's the difference?

The small SUV segment harbours innovation, eye-catching style and bigger-than-you'd-think cabin space.

The Volvo XC40 delivers on all of those fronts, plus more - this has been widely regarded as a game-changer for the Scandinavian brand: but does it live up to the hype?

The Volvo XC40 is the smallest and most recent addition to the Swedish brand’s SUV line-up and from the moment it arrived in 2018 it seems just about everybody hailed it as the best thing since smashed avocado.

Seriously, the praise was so high for the hugely anticipated car you could have been forgiven for thinking it could have been the new Dalai Lama or the Messiah.

But what’s it like live with? The XC40, not the Messiah.

We found out when an XC40 Inscription T4 came to stay for a week. During that time, I found out just how much fuel it needed, how much room was inside, what is was like to drive and what was missing from that impressive armoury of safety technology.