Cupra Formentor Review

The Cupra Formentor may seem like a rather niche small SUV, but it's designed to appeal to the masses. It has a fashionable SUV body, big wheels, a tidy body kit and a sporty drive, all factors that have made the likes of Audi's S line and BMW's M Sport the most popular versions in their respective lineups. It's a car that can appeal to your heart, then, but how does it fare when your head chimes in with its opinion? As you'll discover in our 2025 Cupra Formentor review, the answer is pretty well. 

Loosening its SEAT shackles has allowed Cupra to be more creative with design, but it still has the sturdiness and civility you'd expect of a VW Group product. Interior quality is, on the whole, good, and the cabin has space for four people. The back seats fold neatly into the floor if you need to carry a bike, and there are loads of smaller storage spaces to help keep the place tidy.

The infotainment isn't quite so well thought out, though. The screens are large and colourful, but the car's too reliant on them: even the temperature, volume and lights are operated via fiddly touchpads. Apple CarPlay and Android Auto are fitted as standard, however, so if you've got a smartphone, it's worth plugging it in to use those more intuitive systems.

More good news comes in the form of the Cupra's excellent range of engines. The 1.5-litre 150PS petrol is all things to all people, cheap to run but also pretty brisk when you need it to be. At the other end of the scale, you'll find the hot 333PS 2.0-litre petrol, and there are two petrol-electric hybrids sandwiched between the two.

Most of the range gets a slick-shifting seven-speed automatic gearbox and front-wheel drive, striking a good balance between being comfortable and also well-controlled in corners. The most powerful model adds serious performance and unbreakable four-wheel-drive traction to the mix, while the hybrids come into their own if you do lots of short journeys interspersed with the occasional longer trip.

The best all-round choice is a Cupra Formentor V2 with either the 1.5-litre petrol engine or the 204PS e-Hybrid, depending on how you use your car. The petrol version is the simpler answer if you don’t want to plug in and just want a straightforward crossover with tidy performance and manageable running costs. The e-Hybrid makes stronger sense if you can charge regularly and want to make the most of its long electric range.

Trim choice depends on your priorities. V1 already gives you a lot of what makes the Formentor appealing, but V2 is where the car starts to feel properly premium from behind the wheel. It adds the sort of equipment many buyers will appreciate every day, including heated electric seats, a rear-view camera and an electric boot lid.

The upper trims bring more drama and more power, but they also push the Formentor into much more expensive territory. That is why the middle of the range usually makes the strongest case.

The current Cupra Formentor range starts at £35,315 for the V1 and rises to £50,060 for the VZ3. In between those sit V2, Tribe Edition, VZ1 and VZ2 versions.

That means the Formentor starts in competitive territory for a well-equipped crossover with this much visual appeal, but it doesn’t stay there for long. Move up the range, and the prices quickly overlap with more premium-badged alternatives. In other words, the Formentor makes its strongest value case lower down or in a carefully chosen mid-spec form.

The Cupra Formentor is a stylish and sporty SUV, so you might consider it against models such as the BMW X2 and Audi Q3 Sportback. The Formentor isn't quite as sporty to drive as the BMW, but it's cheaper and has more back-seat space. It's also more comfortable than the hard-riding German car. The Audi, meanwhile, trumps the Formentor for badge appeal and has a posher interior, but it's not as nice to drive.

Practicality is decent rather than class-leading. Petrol and mild-hybrid versions offer a 450-litre boot, which is good enough for normal family duties and more useful than the sloping body might suggest. Plug-in hybrid models drop to 345 litres because of the battery packaging, which is a more meaningful compromise if you regularly carry a lot of luggage.

Passenger space is similarly acceptable rather than outstanding. There's enough room in the front for taller drivers to get comfortable, and the rear seats are fine for adults on shorter to medium trips, but this is not the roomiest crossover in the class. The roofline and design-led shape do nibble away at the sense of space compared with boxier alternatives.

That said, the Formentor still works well enough as a family car. The driving position is good, the cabin feels airy enough from the front, and the general layout is easy to get on with. You just need to accept that style has taken priority over maximum practicality.

The Formentor is 4,451mm long, 1,839mm wide and 1,508mm high in petrol form. Those dimensions help explain why it feels like a useful middle ground. It's large enough to work as a family crossover, but not so big that it feels awkward in town or on tighter roads.

The 2024 update helped the Cupra Formentor here. The cabin now feels more modern and better resolved than earlier versions, thanks largely to the 12.9-inch touchscreen and cleaner interface. Smartphone connectivity is standard, and the system looks and reacts more like a current car rather than something that was already starting to date.

There's still some reliance on touch controls where physical switches would be easier, which remains a weakness, but overall, the tech offering is strong enough. Higher trims add features such as a top-view camera, matrix LED lights, a head-up display and a Sennheiser sound system, depending on model.

Material quality is mixed in the way many sporty crossovers are. The Formentor has enough interesting trim details, copper accents and seat designs to feel special at first glance, and the upper trims really do lift the sense of occasion. But look more closely, and some plastics lower down the cabin still feel a bit ordinary for a car at this price.

That means the Cupra Formentor looks more premium than it always feels, but it still has more character than many mainstream rivals.

The current Cupra Formentor line-up gives buyers a broad choice. The regular petrol range starts with the 1.5-litre TSI 150PS, available as a manual or mild-hybrid automatic depending on trim. Above that sit the e-Hybrid versions with 204PS or 272PS, then the faster 2.0-litre petrol VZ models with 265PS and 333PS. There’s also a limited edition VZ5 model with a 390PS 2.5-litre, five-cylinder engine.

That means there’s a Formentor to suit a range of very different buyers. The 150PS petrol is likely to be enough for most people and keeps the car’s running costs under better control. The e-Hybrids are the versions to look at if you can charge regularly, because their electric range of up to 77 miles is much more useful than older plug-in hybrids could manage. The VZ models make the strongest emotional case, and the 333PS version is genuinely quick, but they’re also the ones that stretch the Formentor furthest from sensible family-car territory.

The Formentor stands out because it's more enjoyable to drive than most family crossovers. The steering is neat, body control is tidy, and the whole car feels lower and more settled than many SUV-shaped rivals. That doesn’t make it a sports car, but it does make it feel more precise and more involved than the class average.

Around town, the Formentor is easy enough to manoeuvre, though the styling does bring some visibility compromises. On the motorway, it feels stable and grown-up, particularly in the smoother petrol and mild-hybrid versions. On a twistier road, it has enough composure to remind you that this is a Cupra rather than just another crossover.

Refinement is good rather than exceptional. Some bigger wheels and sportier trims can make the ride feel firmer, and a few rivals are quieter over rougher road surfaces, but the overall balance still works well. The Formentor manages to feel sporty enough to justify its image without becoming tiring day to day.

The Cupra Formentor was given the full five-star rating for safety when it was crash tested by Euro NCAP in 2021, so you can expect it to stand up well in an accident.

All models get adaptive cruise control that can accelerate and brake the car for you, along with lane assist that keeps the car on your side of the road using the steering rather than by dabbing the brakes like lesser systems.

To that lot you can add road-sign recognition, which displays signs on the infotainment screen – handy for those tricky 20mph in-town limits – and high-beam assist, which dips your full-beams when another car is detected. 

VZ2 models and above get the Driving Pack XL. It adds a blind spot warning system that detects cars in your blind spot, lane change assist – if it is safe to do so, the car pulls out automatically when you indicate to overtake – and emergency assist, which means the car can steer around collisions in an emergency. You also get exit assist, which will warn you if you try to open your door in the path of a cyclist. 

The regular petrol and mild-hybrid versions of the Formentor return official WLTP combined figures of around 34.9 to 47.9mpg depending on engine and trim. That’s respectable for a crossover with this much performance and style, though it's not especially frugal by class standards.

The e-Hybrid is the more interesting option if you can charge often. Official electric range is up to 77 miles, which is enough to cover many commutes without using petrol at all. DC charging from 10 to 80 per cent takes as little as 26 minutes in ideal conditions, which makes the latest Formentor plug-in hybrid much easier to live with than older PHEVs.

The Formentor comes with a five-year, 90,000-mile warranty in the UK, which is a stronger package than you’d get from several mainstream rivals. Plug-in hybrid models also get the usual separate battery cover, which adds reassurance if you are considering one as a longer-term buy.

Routine servicing should be manageable rather than painful, and there is nothing in the regular petrol line-up to suggest unusually painful maintenance costs compared with close rivals.

The Cupra Formentor falls into insurance groups 19 to 35, depending on engine and trim. The lower-powered petrol versions sit at the more affordable end, while the faster 333PS models push right to the top of the spread.

That is not especially cheap by family-crossover standards, but it fits the Formentor’s positioning as a more style-led and performance-oriented choice.

For most Cupra Formentor models registered under the current system, the standard annual VED (Vehicle Excise Duty, or road tax) rate is £200 after the first year. That is the figure most buyers will care about as an ongoing running cost.

Pricier versions with a list price above £40,000 will also attract the expensive car supplement for five years from the second tax payment. That means £640 a year in total VED during that period, so it's worth checking the final list price if you are looking at higher trims or adding options.