Used cars ranked by practicality: Mid-sized SUV-crossovers
Used cars ranked by practicality: Mid-sized SUV-crossovers
By Martin Pretorius
Practicality is a very important consideration when shopping for a car. It determines the car’s usefulness when going about its job, and should be evaluated alongside the car’s purchase price and running costs. We’ve taken a look at 10 used medium-sized crossovers listed here on AutoTrader, and ranked them from the least to the most practical. For the purpose of this exercise, we’ve used luggage space (with 5 seats in use, as applicable) as the yardstick, because most offerings in this class are about the same size, and offer roughly similar cabin space. Luggage volumes are as claimed by the manufacturers.
Just as its smaller sibling (the CX-3) didn’t score very highly in its category, the CX-5 also comes in at the bottom of this pack. However, the CX-5’s showing is nowhere near as woeful as the little one’s was, because its 442 litre cargo volume isn’t that much worse than those of the rest of our bottom 5. It’s not great, but it’s not terribly practical either. At least it’s very good to drive...
The Ford Kuga is (ahem) hot property on the used-car market, but that’s not because it’s massively practical. With a seats-up load volume of 456 litres, it’s only marginally ahead of the Mazda CX-5, and lags a little behind the average for this group. It compensates for that with a really spacious cabin, however.
It’s surprising that the Kia Sportage has a cargo bay of 466 litres, because its (mechanically similar) Hyundai Tucson cousin has 22 litres more at its disposal. Still, it should be able to fit a family of four and all their chattel, and it’s very nice to look at.
The Kadjar was recently discontinued in our market, and that’s a real pity: it was a capable product with a very good value proposition, so they should make for excellent pre-owned buys. It’s not the most practical car around here, however, because it only has 472 litres of space behind the rear seats.
Running on the same platform as the Kia Sportage, the Tucson has 488 litres of boot space at its disposal. That luggage compartment is also shaped without too many bumps and ridges, which aids the packaging. It misses out on a top-5 finish, however, as the really practical cars have a lot more luggage space.
As the first of the heavy hitters, the Honda CR-V has a luggage area measuring a substantial 522 litres. It also achieved that number without compromising on rear-seat space, and the loading aperture is wide and easy to access.
Audi Q5/BMW X3/Mercedes-Benz GLC
These three are really the premium contenders in this category, and they’re rather larger than the others here. It’s amazing how they also have identical cargo volumes in spite of their disparate mechanical configurations. Still, 550 litres is a lot of luggage space, which means that their practicality at least match their pricetags.
Basically a stretched Qashqai in its current generation, the X-Trail also boasts a cavernous load bay with a volume of 550 litres. It’s also very spacious in the rear seat, so, unlike the smaller Qashqai, it offers up a capacious luggage area with compromising on passenger comfort. Excellent, and these days, underrated and under-appreciated.