The updated Mazda3 masters the art of incremental improvement

By now, you know the Mazda3. It’s a small hatchback that never seems to sell as well as it should, despite... well, quite a few things, actually.

Like that it’s much better looking – both inside and out – than it ever has particular cause to be. Or that Mazda, as a rule, pursues offbeat, out-there and otherwise overlooked areas of internal combustion – like rotaries, high-revving diesels and compression-ignition petrol engines. And that as far as we’ve seen, Mazdas have the longevity of a Toyota without getting the love for it. So what gives?

Well, it’s likely down to that dogged persistence at solving problems its own way. It impresses people like us that Mazda’s engineers can do it, but it makes no difference by and large to those who benefit from it being solved that way. Like figuring out a mechanical calendar that’s accurate for a century, only for someone to point out that their phone has the same feature.

It’s to the point where Mazda’s official bumf for the Mazda3’s five-horsepower bump won’t even say how it’s achieved. There’s a handwave of “updated cylinder-deactivation technology” for some of the efficiency gains, almost as if the bulk of Mazda’s customers don’t care how the sausage is made, as long as it tastes good enough for the money they’re spending. And by now, someone at Mazda knows it.