2015 Mazda Review

Photo credit: Mazda

In 2003, the Mazda 3 came as a replacement of the Mazda Protegé. With only three generations in the bag, the Mazda 3’s third generation took place as a 2013 model. What’s the greatest part? We got our hands on the 2015 Mazda 3 GS trim level for a test drive!

Looks
This generation of the Mazda 3 a lot of lines and curves, and that spoils its once simple looks. Let’s not forget the gigantic smile the car has as a front grille. These cars have been having these "smiling faces" for two generations now, and to be honest, it doesn't really work well with the car. Fortunately, they’ve made it look a bit better; it doesn’t look as big as the previous generation. The back of the sedan version looks normal but the back of the hatchback version looks awful. It looks like the whole back has been squished. This particular car is not meant to be a hatch. But some hatches are not meant to be sedans; the Ford Focus (click here to see our review) for example is a handsome car but as soon as you turn it to a sedan, it looks way less attractive than its 5-door brethren. 

Interior and Equipment
The interior is pretty sophisticated. It has a push button start, a 7 inch colour touch screen, Bluetooth, steering wheel buttons for Bluetooth, volume and radio. There’s a standard rear view camera on the GS and GT models. Heated front seats are also standard. How nice this interior might be, there are one or two issues with it. Firstly, there's the main infotainment display. While it works perfectly well, it just looks like it popped up out of nowhere. Like you would see in other cars, a more integrated design of the screen would have been appreciated. The Mercedes-Benz CLA has the same annoying problem, tacked-on screens instead of a more thoughtfully placed and designed one. The control knob also has a problem, as we will discuss in the Driving It section. There's also an annoying HUD, but we'll come to that later as well. The rest of the interior feels upscale, but this car is also a bit more expensive than its rivals.

Photo credit: Mazda

Space
This is a very spacious car. Up front, there is more than enough room for anyone, and at the back, while your knees might touch the seat in front of you if you're taller than average, the headroom is very impressive indeed. The boot is also large, so don't expect problems in the carrying stuff around department.

Photo credit: Mazda

Driving it
This is definitely the strangest car to be in that we've tested to date.. When we tried to bring the volume of the stereo up, we didn't know how. Then, a lad from Mazda showed us where it was. It’s next to the handbrake. Who puts a volume button next to a handbrake? Mazda does. This makes operating the infotainment unit a pain while driving. Another ergonomic problem that the new 3 has is the speed reading. We tried to figure out our speed, when we realized that “Active Driving Display” was on. That's the HUD mentioned earlier. You have to adjust your position every time you want to look at the display, and that s a pretty big distraction. Then we tried to see where was the real speedometer. We found it underneath the rev counter. While driving, it isn't obvious, and we spent a number of minutes trying to solve the speed mystery. The 2nd gen Mazda 3 had a problem with the throttle. It was way to touchy, and the car spun its tires every time you tried to accelerate faster than a snail. But Mazda learned from its mistakes and fixed the problem. Even if the car is quite fun-to-drive and probably the most fun in its, the engine was the real star. We drove a GT top spec model which had Mazda's 2.5 liter, with 180 horsepower. It was nice to be in a small car with such an engine. However, the price for a top spec 3 with the big engine is very high for this type of car. The Mazda 3's automatic transmission has a semi-manual mode, which you can operate from the gear lever. But there’s a price to pay, as you really have to anticipate your speed changes because it takes at least one to two seconds for the transmission to change to actually do the gear change. A manual would be more precise, but that's the case for pretty much any slush box. All in all, the Mazda 3 was a fun car.

Owning it
Mazdas aren't terribly reliable. A lot of older 3s have tons of rust, and they were introduced ten years ago. A similar car like the Corolla or Focus won't have rust like the 3 does after such a short period of time. Consuming 8.0 L/100 km in the city and 5.8 on the highway, it is quite thirsty in the city. The highway numbers are impressive. 

Photo credit: Mazda

Photo credit: Mazda

Verdict
All things considered, the Mazda 3 is an interesting choice. It absolutely feels more upscale than its rivals, but the price is also considerably higher when equipped in a more premium fashion. If we wanted a compact car, we would go for one that is cheaper, like the Focus, Civic or Jetta. If we wanted an upscale small car, we would look at the Acura ILX. The new 3 is a bit in between two markets, and that isn't helping its sales.