Road test review: Honda Civic Sport

Wednesday, 6 April 2022

• HONDA CIVIC SPORT

• Base price: $47,000

• Powertrain and economy: 1.5-litre turbo-petrol four-cylinder, 131kW/240Nm, continuously variable transmission, FWD, combined economy 7.0L/100km, CO2 165g/km (source:Honda/WLTP).

• Vital statistics: 4560mm long, 1802mm wide, 1415mm high, 2733mm wheelbase, luggage capacity 404 litres, 18-inch alloy wheels.

• Safety: Not tested.

• We like: Handsome, understated looks, fantastic interior quality, wonderfully agile and precise handling.

• We don't like: CVT takes the edge off the fun, a bit pricey.

While SUVs of all sizes are all the rage these days, there are still some very good cars to be found in the small hatch segment – if you don’t want the high-riding alternative – and the newly refreshed Honda Civic is very much one of them.

OUTSIDE

Honda’s eleventh-generation Civic is a subtle and almost unassuming looking car that reveals more to you the longer you look at it.

**READ MORE:

* First drive review: Honda Civic Sport

* Not just for learners: Street Smart teaches parents road safety too

* Toyota reveals second-generation GR 86

* Road test review: Honda CR-V Touring and Sport Premium

**

It’s not the sort of car that you will stare at as it drives past, but linger on it for a while longer and you will start noticing all sorts of nice touches, like the subtle clamshell effect of the windscreen-edge of the bonnet and the nicely-judged creases along the flanks.

The result is a quietly handsome car that harks back to the early 90s heyday of the liftback body style and, quite frankly, it works very well. You might not turn heads as you drive it, but it will raise a quiet, knowing smile when you look at it in the driveway each morning.

The only real styling sin (to my eye, at least) is the slightly awkward arrangement of lines around the taillights and rear quarter window, which just seems unnecessarily fussy, but is far from a deal-breaker.

INSIDE

Here’s where things start getting more instantly striking, yet not necessarily any less subtle, as the Civic’s interior is impressively restrained, yet packs some deeply delightful touches.

The full-width vent grille (the vents aren’t actually full-width, however) looks fantastic, while the little stubby levers you use to adjust the vents are a tactile delight that also happen to make adjusting the airflow brilliantly intuitive – just point the lever where you want the air to go. Easy.

Quality materials feature throughout, with Honda back on its game when it comes to making sure that all the bits you touch feel nice and are of a high quality, particularly the sculpted steering wheel. As an added bonus, the infotainment system is not the traditional Honda ergonomic nightmare of unintuitive screens and laggy input, and is instead rather pleasant and simple to use.

UNDER THE BONNET

The new Civic packs the same 1.5-litre turbo engine as the previous car, but with a bit of tweaking that now sees it producing131kW of power and 240Nm of torque (up 4kW/20Nm on the last Civic), it is also hooked up to what is probably the Civic’s weakest link – a CVT transmission.

The engine is impressively strong and smooth, with solid responses across the meat of its rev range, and it never sounds strained of coarse, which is good, because… CVT… That said, as far as CVTs go, this is actually a very good one that never aggressively flares the engine and does an excellent job of keeping it in its power band.

The result is a quiet and smooth car to drive at urban speeds, while also making it supremely competent at wafting along at open road speeds. It’s just if you want to get a bit more eager on a back road, the CVT will do its usual thing and suck a lot of the fun out of it.

ON THE ROAD

Which is a shame, because the Civic has a thoroughly excellent chassis that deserves a more athletic transmission.

When Nile Bijoux first drove the new Civic, he raved about how good the chassis was on a winding road, and to be perfectly honest, I pretty much put that down to him being a sweaty Honda fanboy and didn’t think much more of it.

But having now spent time in the Civic for myself, I am forced to reluctantly agree with him. Not because I have anything against the Civic, I just don’t like having to agree with Nile.

According to Honda, the new Civic packs a reworked version of the previous model’s chassis, with a 19 per cent improvement in torsional rigidity, as well as multiple tweaks to the front Macpherson struts and rear multi-link suspension.

And the result is a fantastically composed car with delightfully sharp responses and a wonderfully nimble attitude. And it doesn’t compromise in the ride quality stakes either, with the Civic effortlessly smoothing out the coarse imperfections of New Zealand’s chip-seal roads.

And that is why the CVT, no matter how good it actually is, is a disappointment. While the manual mode goes some way to making up for things (it is actually quite quick and does a pretty good impersonation of real gears), it is still a far cry from offering the same sort of tactile experience that a manual, or even a DCT or well-sorted conventional torque converter auto, would offer.

VERDICT

Of course those gripes about the transmission will only really apply to a very small percentage of the population (mainly motoring journalists and people who would never buy the car anyway), and for the vast majority of people who would consider the Civic, the CVT is a wonderfully smooth and unobtrusive transmission that is well-matched to the engine.

The quality of the interior and great ride will make it a compelling option for some, but the fact it is a hatch in an SUV world will limit its appeal, as well as the fact that it is $8k more than the equivalent top-spec Toyota Corolla…