Honda City - VFM Skoda Slavia - Fun-to-drive, Looks Hyundai Verna - Performance and Features
Honda City - Old design, Performance Skoda Slavia - Suspension, Back-seat comfort, Expensive Hyundai Verna - Interior
Honda City
The Honda City has one of the oldest-looking interiors in this test, and it most certainly feels due for an update. The cabin is riddled with scratchy plastics and one of the only cars that still adds wood to its interior. The City has a certain old-world charm, and Honda has done its best to keep this cabin up to date. Focus solely on the functionality, though, and you’d be hard-pressed to find any fault.
Honda has added a new TFT that works well in tandem with the analogue speedometer. However, Honda could have made the speedometer a TFT instead of the tachometer since the car always tends to digitally display the speed. That being said, the TFT works quite well and is clean and smooth in terms of functionality. The animations are swift, and you wouldn’t even notice that the tachometer is a TFT until you try to notice.
The seats on the Honda City are by far the best in comfort and do a fantastic job providing support. The buttons feel decent, and although the beige interior looks far too corporate for my taste, Honda has done a decent job adding some spit and polish everywhere they could. Another thing worth mentioning is the sound system in the City. That sounds surprisingly good and even the best in this test. All in all, the interiors of the City aren’t something that’ll genuinely wow you, but it’ll not let you down either.
Skoda Slavia
The Slavia has been around for a year, and despite that, its minimal interior still looks bright and classy. The Slavia removed most of its buttons and switchgear and tried to integrate as much of it into the TFT as possible. The centre console is well done and emphasises the sense of space inside the Slavia. The two-spoke steering wheel looks clean and is relatively easy to use.
The Slavia also gets ventilated seats but needs to catch up on powered seats which seems like a sore miss given its price tag. The music system on the Slavia does a decent job at playing your tunes, and I doubt you’d want an aftermarket unit. The TFT speedo on the Slavia could have been a bit more customisable, but that’s just me knit-picking. Overall, a good interior that blends functionality and tech quite well.
Hyundai Verna
The Verna has the freshest feeling interior of the trio and is riddled with tech. Featuring a large TFT for the centre console and a large TFT for the speedo that’s taken inspiration from the layout in the IONIQ 5. The Verna has an all-black interior with little bits of red thrown in to add to its sporty aesthetic. I am not a massive fan of the new steering design; to me, it looks a bit toyish.
Even though the Slavia also has a twin-spoke steering, the execution of the Slavia has been done better. The speedo, too, seems to lack any customisation, and you’re stuck with a digital speedo and tachometer. I don’t like cars that tend to describe the tachometer to me instead of giving me one, and I didn’t enjoy the speedometer on the Verna.
Hyundai has also thrown in far too much piano black, and within hours of our shoot, it was covered in dust and ruined the entire look of the inside simply due to how prominent it tends to make dust or smudges. The seats are relatively comfortable, and I like the ambient lighting that Hyundai has included in the Verna. It’s got the sportiest-looking interior of the three and is also the most feature loaded. It’s also the only car in this comparison to feature a powered seat for the driver.
