Kiwi off-road favourite gets bigger and goes hybrid

Thursday, 12 January 2023

Suzuki’s 5-door Jimny has broken cover in India, and it could be coming to New Zealand.

Suzuki has been testing a 5-door version of its eternally popular Jimny for years now, making it one of the worst-kept secrets in motoring.

It’s almost a bit of a relief to see the Japanese manufacturer finally whipping the covers off its new larger, more practical Jimny – unveiling it overnight at Auto Expo 2023 in India (a core Suzuki market).

That dinky little second door opens up the Jimny to a whole new group of possible customers.

The new four-wheel drive Jimny 5-door is of course longer than the current 3-door, growing in outright length from 3,645mm to 3,985mm. This all stems from its longer wheelbase, which is 340mm longer than in SWB models.

From dead side on, the elongated Jimny looks a little odd thanks to its new back doors looking much, much smaller than its front doors. But, from a quarter view it looks just as funky as the 3-door that’s become so popular around the world.

The first new Suzuki Jimny in 20 years is here. Suzuki literally can't get enough of them though. (Originally published March 2019)

* From EVs to utes: NZ's 10 best-selling cars of 2022

A Jimny with a boot? Now we’ve seen it all ...

* Local electric car sales exceeding industry expectations

Not much change up front. Yes, that 5-speed manual is back, too.

The additional doors will come as a relief to those who’ve wanted a Jimny, but hesitated around the nameplate’s practicality chops. And evidently, the change in body layout also means a much larger boot space.

Up until now one of the Jimny’s real Achilles heels is how, with the back seats up, you get a miniscule 85 litres of space. Now, with the seats up, you get 208 litres – expanding to 332 litres when they’re folded flat.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, much of the rest of the Jimny remains more or less the same as it was before. The dashboard carries over, the transmission options too, its width and height are unchanged, and it’s even photographed in the same Kinetic Yellow hero colour.

There is one slightly surprising change, however. And that is its engine.

The 5-door Jimny has been unveiled with an electrified engine – a first for the Jimny nameplate. The model launches with a 1.5-litre mild-hybrid four-cylinder petrol engine making a fire-breathing 78kW of power and 134Nm of torque.

Those might not sound like earth-shaking figures, and they’re almost identical to the standard 1.5-litre’s 75kW/130Nm. But being achingly slow off the line has become part of the Jimny’s character.

It’s also obviously more than enough output for the model to be incredible off-road, given that the Jimny is commonly considered to be one of the most capable gravel-bashers this side of a Mercedes-Benz G-Wagen.

Suzuki New Zealand has yet to confirm the model for local sale. It seems a local start is likely, with the brand having already detailed that the 5-door will be offered in neighbouring Australia.

If it does come here, it’s likely to be a strong seller. At its peak, customers ordering 3-door Jimnys were having to wait almost 12 months before taking delivery. This was pre-pandemic, too.