Mazda MX-5 Mk1 review

Refreshingly simple. To put the Mk1 MX-5’s arrival into context, it would be another 18 years before Apple launched the iPhone. Which means no Tesla-style touchscreen, no fancy haptic buttons – and that’s no bad thing.

See for yourself in the pictures above. There’s merely manually operated aircon, a cassette player, a cigarette lighter, a couple of light switches, and… that’s about it. No tech-savviness required here; what you see is very much what you get. Some may say it feels slightly dated, but it all contributes to its lightweight-focused nature. 

The eagle eyed amongst you will also have noticed that the indicator and wiper stalks are the opposite way round to European-spec cars: indicators on the right, wipers on the left. Technically, this allows for gear changes at the same time as indicating, but the argument rages online as to what’s the ‘correct’ and ‘incorrect’ way round. Takes a little bit of getting used to, but it’s all part of the fun, right?

The fabric folding roof, meanwhile, is also manually operated – no point in an unnecessarily heavy mechanism, is there? Simple to release, too – all it requires is two clips undoing and then it folds back behind the rear seats. Easy.