Audi A3 - long-term test

[Dani ♡]

The Audi A3 is one of the most po[CENSORED]r mid-size premium cars on sale, but does a mid-life facelift keep it at the top of the class? Chris Knapman is testing a pair of models to find out Our car: 1.0 TFSI Sportback 116PS Sport List price when new: £21,535 Price as tested: £27,630 Official fuel economy: 62.8mpg (EU Combined)When you arrive at your destination and the kids are fast asleep in the back of the car, it is always worth taking a moment to appreciate the peace and quiet. My wife wasn't overly pleased, therefore, with my ceaseless clicking of the Audi's infotainment controls as I scrolled through the system in search of new features. Not least, I wanted the opportunity to give the Audi Connect online services a try. To be honest, I had added this to the car's specification largely to get Google Earth and Street View, which look amazing on the Virtual Cockpit display.

However, there are also some other useful functions. For example, the car can read your emails out or have emails dictated to it, you can log in to Twitter, and you can research events before asking the satnav to direct you to them. Because the car is connected, it can also download updates, which is what it's asking to do now for the mapping software. With the cost all covered as part of the option, I had just decided it would make sense to do so. Which, of course, is precisely when the kids woke up.

The A3 has been here there and everywhere this week, and not only with me behind the wheel. My wife also borrowed it for a return trip to Oxford, and was impressed with how easy it was to sync her phone to the car's Bluetooth. I did suggest she used the built-in CarPlay but she forgot her lead and neither of us have worked out how to do it wirelessly yet, even though the car says you can. Answers on a postcard if anybody has figured it out yet. Other than that we've both enjoyed the car's motorway manners, where it is quiet, stable and has high levels of comfort, both in the suspension and in the seats. Lots of adjustment in the seat and steering wheel also means that both of us can find the ideal driving position. All it's really missing is a gadget that clears up all the old parking tickets, coffee cups and sweet wrappers left by the previous driver.

The death of the in-car CD player has been swift and quiet. One minute they were there, the next they were gone. The assumption, of course, is that everybody plays their music through their smartphones these days, and so what people really want is an advanced Bluetooth connection or Apple Carplay/Android Auto. That's all well and good, until somebody gives your three-year-old the Julia Donaldson audio book collection on CD for Christmas and you can't immediately play it in the car.

Had a nice long run in the A3 last week. It took the best part of three hours to get out of London, followed by another hour or so on dual carriageways and country roads, and aside from too much road noise from those big wheels and tyres, the A3 was hard to fault. In town the S-tronic gearbox and the car's small dimensions make it as relaxing as sitting in traffic could be, helped by the Bang and Olufsen stereo upgrade (£750) and access to my music collection via Apple Carplay. The satnav of course failed dismally to calculate just how long it can take to get across London, probably because nobody programming such a system would believe that it could be as gruelling as it really is. But the live traffic updates did do their best to get me around some of the jams. In the end it took just over four hours to cover 105.6 miles, which is rubbish, but the 43.1mpg recorded by the trip computer shows how economical this 1.4-litre turbo petrol engine can be, in part because it runs on just two of its four cylinders when conditions allow (you really can't feel the switch).

Audi is so clever about how it engineers the primary contact points in its cars that they are rarely anything other than a pleasure to use, and that includes the A3. Take the simple act of switching off and getting out, for example. You squeeze the trigger on the automatic gear-lever and slide it smoothly into park, appreciating the combination of supple leather and cool metal in your left hand, which then drop backs to tweak the handbrake button. At the same time you twist the chunky key in the ignition through to off, retract it from the barrel and at once press down with your thumb and curl your index finger, causing the key to swivel back into its chunky plastic holder. With key clasped between your bottom two fingers and the palm of your hand, you use your remaining fingers to pull the door handle, and then ease your way out, elbow first. I'll be the first to admit that this is a verbose way of explaining the steps required to get out of a car, but what's so clever about the A3 is that every element becomes something to savour. Not just because it is so tactile, but because there is a uniform weight to each control which encourages you to turn the process into one fluid movement. As such, it doesn't matter what other car I happen to have been driving, it is always a pleasure to get back into - or out of - the A3.