Renault Kwid: 500km Long Term Review

We’ve been following Renault’s pursuit to take on the Maruti Suzuki Alto, the top selling small car in India, right though the making of the Renault Kwid in India and France. And then to Goa, where we got to test drive this new small car, which left us pretty impressed.

We also got this well packaged hatchback to the ZigWheels garage and found out that the Renault Kwid is compact, smart, attractive and frugal – features most Indian car buyers adore. Having a French lineage is an added advantage, giving this compact hatchback a unique identity on our Indian roads. The Kwid’s bold styling and SUV-like stance make it quite a head turner.

Just like the handsome exterior design, the cabin quality and materials used don’t look cheap by any measure. Especially if you consider the Renault Kwid pricing which starts from as low as Rs 2.56 lakh onwards. The cabin is spacious, with abundant storage space including two glove compartments and a couple of coffee mug holders near the gear lever, and bottle holders on the door panels. Impressive for a car of this size.

The seats are reasonably large and well padded and can easily fit four adults. But what left me mighty impressed is the boot space which I discovered during a recent trip to the airport. The 300-litres might not sound that impressive, but it did manage to swallow two full size suitcases and still had space for more.

Powering this feather light (read: 660kg) Renault is a newly developed and very compact 3-cylinder 799cc aluminium motor, which develops 54PS of power and max torque of 72Nm and just about gets the job done.

There are vices too - mostly related to electricals and sensors. For example the left speaker of our brand new Kwid hasn’t been working since day one. The central-lock button sometimes throws a tantrum and refuses to unlock. Minor niggles which needs to be ironed out by Renault if it wants the Kwid to challenge the auto giants like Maruti Suzuki.

Overall, in the last few weeks and over 500km, the Renault Kwid has proved its potential to be the kind of car that a fast-paced, modern India needs and is willing to embrace.

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