MERCEDES-BENZ A-CLASS

Can a mid-life facelift for Stuttgart's plush family hatchback get it back among the UK's best-sellers and help prevent an SUV stranglehold?

- JAMES DISDALE

TESTED 22.3.23, OXFORDSHIRE ON SALE NOW PRICE £35,580

Take a look around you and it would be easy to assume the SUV has won the battle for on-road supremacy. Yet look at the sales charts and a slightly different picture emerges, with a far greater variety of cars. Sure, there are plenty of high-riders in the top 10, but they're mingling with small and large hatchbacks, from mainstream and premium brands alike.

TESTER'S NOTE 

Standard kit has been boosted across the range, with all models now getting 64-colour ambient lighting, a reversing camera and Apple CarPlay. JD

One of the more surprising showroom successes has been the Mercedes-Benz A-Class, its blend of smart styling, upmarket vibes, cutting-edge tech and the lure of that three-pointed star a combination working like catnip. Some juicy PCP finance deals did it no harm either. The entry-level Mercedes was the fourth-best-selling car in the UK in 2021, having attracted more than 30,000 buyers, ahead of such mass-market luminaries as the Volkswagen Golf and the Nissan Qashqai. Quite the result.

However, by the end of 2022, it had slipped off the chart - and the picture hasn't looked any rosier in the early months of 2023. Of course, the increased drive towards electrification hasn't helped, but it's clear that the mini-Merc's mid-life facelift hasn't come a moment too soon.

Even so, in light of the 2030 ban on new ICE car sales looming and the inevitable drain that's putting on R&D budgets, Mercedes has done a makeover, rather than making wholesale changes.

There's tech titivation (natch), some equipment enhancements, a smattering of trim tweaks and even some enriched electrification, but externally the overhaul is of the blink-and-you'll-miss-it variety.