Volkswagen Polo GTI review

There’s no point beating around the bush, the Volkswagen Polo GTI now starts at £31,415. Yikes. When we first drove the facelifted car back in 2022 it seemed expensive at £26,430, but now it’s on another level. Has the price shot up so much because almost all of its rivals are dead? Very possibly, and even so it’s still cheaper than the £33k+ Mini JCW.

You’ll likely want to add some options on to that base price though. Think £770 for blue paint or £965 for red. Ouch. Stick with the standard 17in wheels and the tartan cloth interior trim, then spend £980 on a panoramic roof, £410 on keyless start, £380 on a reversing camera and £355 on heated front seats. Quickly getting even more expensive this, isn’t it? If you do want to stretch the central screen, you’ll also pay an extra £950 for the ‘Discover Pro’ navigation system.

Thankfully it should actually be fairly cheap to run. Volkswagen claims 43.5mpg on the WLTP cycle, and we actually managed an average of 42.1mpg on a mixed run over 200 miles of motorway, city driving and country roads.