Tested: 2023 Volkswagen Jetta Sport 1.5T Manual Feels More Expensive Than It Is 2023

Begin your Volkswagen Jetta Sport with the important thing. Keep in mind them? An ignition secret’s to a automotive what a snail mail is to e-mail.
So final century. This key additionally says rather a lot about what you’ll be able to count on from this model of VW’s compact his sedan. It is a easy, primary, easy automotive. Nothing particular right here. However since this Jetta additionally comes with a 6-speed handbook, sport badging on the B-pillar, and a surprisingly low MSRP, he felt compelled to seek out out if this was his GLI on a funds.

HIGHS: Velvety engine observe, composed dealing with, spacious rear seat.

The Sport matches into the Jetta lineup one up from the bottom S, a modest $900 upcharge to a really affordable $22,650 beginning value, some $10,030 lower than a GLI. Within the Sport’s case, primary doesn’t suggest completely bereft, although. The Sport comes with a good quantity of kit. Its commonplace 17-inch alloy wheels and the LED headlights and taillights on all Jettas hold it from wanting like a penny-pincher from the surface.

There is no mistaking that the Sport’s roomy inside is outfitted to a value, nevertheless. It is effectively assembled and there are a number of niceties readily available, such because the 8.0-inch digital instrument cluster, a pair of entrance USB ports, and engaging fabric seats. However exhausting plastic abounds, the usual HVAC system is manually managed, the entrance seats lack bun heaters, and the tiny 6.5-inch infotainment display is a glance again in time. As a result of it is not VW’s newest touchscreen system, although, it does at the least function each a easy person interface and quantity and tuning knobs. Our check automotive had however one possibility, the $955 Driver Help bundle, which provides adaptive cruise, rain-sensing wipers, a number of driver-assist options, and a satisfyingly thick-rimmed, flat-bottomed, leather-covered steering wheel.

That steering wheel is sort of as good because the one within the GLI, and it’s the sportiest factor concerning the Sport. No worries, although. This can be a pleasant, pleasantly refined automotive. It begins, actually and figuratively, with the Sport’s engine, a turbocharged 1.5-liter four-cylinder that develops 158 horsepower at 5500 rpm. It keys to life with a quiet hum that hardly rises above a whisper, is easy throughout the complete sweep of the tach, and makes the Sport really feel dearer than it’s. It is no shock our six-speed handbook automotive’s straight-line sprints—60 mph in 7.0 seconds and a quarter-mile in 15.5 seconds at 92 mph—aren’t any match for the 228-hp GLI six-speed’s—60 mph in 6.1 seconds and the quarter in 14.6 seconds at 100 mph. Nonetheless, not a nasty exhibiting for the Sport, because it matches the efficiency of the final Jetta automated we examined, with a 1-mph larger lure pace within the quarter-mile.

Sadly, the Sport’s efficiency falls to its knees relative to the feisty GLI in regular city driving. Although the specs say the Sport makes its full 184 pound-feet of torque at 1750 rpm, our proper foot stated in any other case. In metropolis visitors it is simple to catch the engine napping off-boost; let the revs drop beneath 2000 rpm and it is as if gerbils have changed the horses beneath the hood. Flooring the accelerator has minimal impact. That shortfall of prepared torque confirmed up graphically in our top-gear acceleration check the place the Sport took an interminable 28.7 seconds to go from 30 to 50 mph; the GLI did it in 12.3 seconds. The Sport does rather a lot higher at larger engine and highway speeds, posting a 13.6-second 50-to-70-mph time to the GLI’s 8.4 seconds. It is enjoyable to maintain the engine in its perky zone because of the easy-shifting six-speed handbook. Clutch motion is gentle too, so this can be a pleasantly involving automotive to pilot, even at decrease speeds.

The Sport proves adept at the remainder of the driving expertise, if not intoxicating. A supple journey and assured steering imbue it with a surprisingly refined persona that enhances the engine’s quiet methods. Volkswagen even made some minor efforts to make it extra partaking to drive than the bottom S mannequin by decreasing its suspension 15 millimeters and becoming it with a bigger entrance anti-roll bar. Whereas it is not a automotive that begs you to flog it down a two-lane, when leaned on, it stays composed. And although it may well’t match the sharper responses of the GLI, the Sport’s 0.87-g skidpad grip is 0.01-g higher, whereas its 176-foot cease from 70 mph is barely two ft longer. The limiting issue right here is that each automobiles are shod with all-season tires; a sports activities sedan just like the GLI deserves stickier rubber.

Out on the open highway, the 1.5T proves itself impressively miserly at consuming gasoline, with the Jetta averaging 44 mpg in our 75-mph freeway fuel-economy check. That is 2-mpg higher than each its EPA freeway determine and the final Jetta automated we examined and opens up the likelihood for 580 miles of freeway vary.

LOWS: Inside’s plethora of plastic, antediluvian touchscreen, it is not a cut-price GLI.

No, the Jetta Sport cannot fairly muster the strikes or the efficiency essential to be thought of a reduced GLI. However with a roomy rear seat, a velvety engine, and respectable highway manners, it is way over a budget-priced individuals service. Ignition key apart, in fact.

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