Production of Renault Kiger Starts Ahead of March 2021 Launch

Renault has started mass production of its upcoming Kiger compact SUV at its Chennai-based production facility, ahead of its launch next month. Renault dealers have also started accepting bookings for the Kiger unofficially with a deposit ranging between Rs 10,000 - Rs 20,000. The new Kiger is expected to launch at an introductory price of Rs 4.99 lakh, which will make it the cheapest offering in the segment as prices of the Nissan Magnite now starts from Rs 5.49 lakh.

The French automaker recently unveiled the production-ready Kiger which retains most of the design elements from the concept. On the exterior, it gets an aggressive front bumper, winged grille, tri-beam LED headlights, LED DRLs and a sculpted bonnet. Over to the side, it gets flared wheel arches which house diamond-cut dual-tone alloys. Also, the Kiger show-offs its roof rails, a floating roofline, and a shark-fin antenna when viewed sideways. The rear gets C-shaped taillights with a faux skid plate.

Coming to the interior, the Renault Kiger comes with features like an 8-inch touchscreen infotainment system with integrated Android Auto and Apple CarPlay, a 7-inch fully digital instrument cluster, automatic climate control, keyless entry, wireless phone charging, and steering mounted controls.

The Renault Kiger will share powertrain options with the Nissan Magnite, which means it will launch with two petrol engine options. The first one is a 1.0 litre 3-cylinder naturally-aspirated petrol which makes 72 PS and 96 Nm and comes mated to a 5-speed manual gearbox only. The other choice is a 1.0 litre 3-pot turbo-petrol motor that churns out a rated power output of 100PS and max torque of 160 Nm. It will be available with a 5-speed manual gearbox and a CVT.

The sub-4m compact-SUV segment is currently one of the fastest-growing and most competitive segments in the Indian auto market. The Kiger will be the latest one to join the segment, and it will be interesting to see how it fares against its established rivals.