2021 Renault Kiger Review: Will It Be A New Game Changer?

1. 2021 Renault Kiger Prologue: What is it?

The Renault Kiger’s not new for the Indian auto enthusiasts. In fact, it’s one of the most anticipated compact SUV that the French company had been hinting at in the previous stage. While the sub-four-4m SUV has turned into a trend, Renault, riding on the success of the Triber MPV, also hopped on the bandwagon with the Kiger, with an aim of eating a piece of the pie. However, while we all agree that SUVs have been the flavour of the market in recent times, the segment is so crowded and closely-fought that would take a lot to build a distinction in this field of play. Can the Renault Kiger, which has been recently revealed as a very promising product, be a new game-changer in the segment? Is the all-new Kiger good enough to hog the limelight of the hottest compact SUVs in the market? Our 2021 Renault Kiger Review will find it out.

2. 2021 Renault Kiger Exterior: How’s it look like?

Built on the Renault-Nissan alliance, the new Kiger shares its underpinnings and even its engines with the Nissan Magnite. However, the similarities between the Kiger and Magnite is marginal when it comes to aesthetics. One the other hand, the Renault Kiger stays in line with some well-established products in the brand’s portfolio like the Renault Triber and Kwid and that’s not a bad thing.

Front View

The front view of the Kiger bears a resemblance to that of the updated Kwid when it features sleek LED daytime running lamps along with multi-port lightning arrangements. The Kiger’s front bumper looks a lot sportier than the one of the Nissan Magnite sibling.

The Kiger sports a set of traditional LED headlamps with three cube-shaped enclosure, which does not only light up the road ahead but helps light up the car’s front fascia as well. While beauty is rather subjective, we think that the new Kiger gets a very stylish face here. The bonnet is well-sculpted with prominent creases, lending the SUV a muscular profile.

Side View

It’s interesting that Renault has ditched the traditional boxy SUV styling and resorts to the coupe-ish profile that is blended with a lot of muscles instead, thus enhancing the sporty appeal of the SUV to a higher level. The side profile of the Kiger looks again similar to the side of the updated Kwid as well. However, this time around, Renault endears the Kiger with a lot of plastic claddings with lavish-looking 16-inch dual-tone alloy wheels and floating roof rails.

Rear View

It’s the rear end where the designers often lose their efforts but that’s not the case for the Kiger this time. The LED taillamps are smartly designed with Captur-inspired C-shaped patterns at the rear, where stands a large rear window featuring a smartly-mounted brake light. To be honest, it’s the rear that we give Renault’s designers a big thumps-up.

Overall, it’s not an exaggeration to call out the Kiger as one of the most funky-looking SUVs of the lot. It even looks more enticing than the Maruti Vitara Brezza and even the Nissan Magnite sibling.

3. 2021 Renault Kiger Dimensions: Length, Width, Height and Wheelbase

Riding on a 2,500 mm long wheelbase, the new Renault Kiger measures the overall length of 3,991 mm, the width of 1,750 mm and the height of 1,604 mm. While the length helps the Kiger enjoys the incentives of the sub-4m vehicles, the width makes it the narrowest compact SUV of the class.

Renault claims that its new Kiger gets the best-in-class 710 mm space between the front headrests and the enormous legroom of 220 mm that’s quite a feat for the compact SUV of sorts.

4. 2021 Renault Kiger Interior: What Does It Have To Offer?

Being a compact SUV, it’s not an easy task to make the Kiger a well-equipped package to lure in the young tech-savvy SUV seekers in the Indian market, given the fact that most of the compact SUVs are decently-equipped now. However, once stepped inside the cabin of the Renault car, you will be impressed by what the Kiger has to offer.

Seating Capacity

Renault has managed to curb the niggle people often had with most of the compact SUVs, the lack of legroom for the rear passengers. The compact SUV frees up ample leg space and knee room for the rear occupants. And in spite of the swooping roofline, the headspace is acceptable on the compact SUV. Three adults can sit abreast on the inside of the Renault Kiger without much trouble even on the long drive. What could have been improved is that the rear seats are a bit too upright, which could dampen the seating comfort of the passengers after several hours of the journeys. Further at the back, the Renault Kiger comes with a segment-leading boot space of 405 litres that offers enough space to gobble heavy bags and suitcases.

Interior Design and Comfort

The dashboard of the Kiger itself looks much like the one in the Triber compact MPV. You won’t find the soft-touch materials on the Kiger that makes it fall short of the Venue or Sonet’s level but the plastic quality is actually better considering the price. Interestingly, when it comes to the level of sophistication, the fully-digital instrument cluster of the Kiger is a notch higher than that of the Nissan Magnite sibling. It features legitimate readouts and the colour themes are soothing to your eyes.

The feature highlights on the cabin of the Kiger include an 8.0-inch touchscreen infotainment system with wireless Android Auto and Apple CarPlay, a 7.0-inch TFT instrument cluster, rear AC vents, 8-speaker Arkamys sound system, high centre control with 7.5-litre storage, rear armrest with cup holders, among many others.

Safety & Security Features

Renault packs the Kiger with a range of smart tech and safety features including 4 airbags, ABS with EBD, rear parking camera, seatbelt with pre-tensioner and load limiter for the driver. That said, the Kiger does miss out on some safety bits that are given on the Nissan-badged sibling like traction control, TPMS, 360-degree parking camera, vehicle dynamic control and tinted glass. The Magnite also endears itself with seatbelts for both driver and co-driver seats. However, do note that Renault has played it smart by offering five accessory packs available to all variants of the Kiger while the Magnite only has a Tech pack on offer.

5. 2021 Renault Kiger Performance: How’s it like to drive?

Engine Specifications

The Renault Kiger borrows the same 1.0-litre NA petrol mill and a 1.0-litre turbocharged petrol engine, good for 71 BHP and 99 BHP of power, respectively. While the 1.0-litre Energy petrol engine is available with a 5-speed MT and an Easy-R AMT, the transmission options for the turbocharged engine is either a 5-speed MT and an X-Tronic CVT unit.

First-drive Impression

We got a chance to test drive the naturally-aspirated version of the Kiger and we come back very impressed. It comes with a peppy engine actually, except for the pronounced turbo lag once crossing the 1,800 rpm mark. Once passing 2,000 rpm, the engine is really in its elements and send us a robust performance after that. When putting the Kiger into Sport mode, the throttle responses dynamically and we even get a stronger surge of performance this time. However, the only grouse we had is the engine noises, especially at higher speeds. It is obvious, the Kiger’s 1.0-litre engine is not scoring well in terms of refinement and NVH level compared to other competitors in the segment.

While ride and handling have been the forte of Renault and luckily, the Kiger inherits this good trait. With its compactness, the Kiger can glide over the small undulations seamlessly. Despite being unsettled a little bit through the bigger undulations, the passengers won’t have as much to complain as when they sit inside the Kia Sonet. The steering is heavier in the Sport mode that gives us a bit of confidence as twisting around the narrow turns. In the meanwhile, it becomes light in the Eco mode so that navigating through congested streets is now stress-free. There’s body roll when making quick lane changes and that’s something we could expect from a tall SUV of this price point.

6. 2021 Renault Kiger Price and Verdict: Is the new Kiger worth buying?

With the price range of Rs 5.45 – 9.72 lakh (ex-showroom), the 2021 Renault Kiger has come to us as a compelling package of its price point. True, the Kiger doesn’t show its strong suit in any department but certainly has a lot going for it, especially the value for money proposition The Kiger is currently the most affordable B-SUV on sale in India, just undercutting its Nissan-badged sibling. So if you are looking for a fairly comfortable well-equipped compact SUV that is exciting to drive and good to look at, the Kiger ticks your checkboxes. All that said and done, if the Magnite garnered a good number of bookings within a short period, the Renault Kiger is surely the next big thing in the segment of compact SUVs this time around. 

For the last generations of Renault Kiger, please visit Indianauto.