Fiat 500 Review

The Fiat 500 always succeeded because it understood exactly what it was selling. It was never just a city car. It was a fashion item, a nostalgic design statement and a small Fiat deliberately styled to tug at the heart rather than appeal only to the head. That was obvious when it launched in 2007, and it remained obvious right to the end.

That is also why it survived for so long. In purely objective terms, there were better city cars almost throughout its life. Cars such as the Volkswagen Up, Hyundai i10, Kia Picanto and Toyota Aygo were more practical, often better to drive and usually easier to recommend on merit alone. But none of them had the same sense of occasion or the same easy charm.

For this review, the focus is firmly on the older petrol Fiat 500 rather than the newer electric 500e, which makes more sense as a separate proposition. That means looking at the long-running 2008 to 2024 petrol car as a used buy, which is where the real value now lies. Fiat’s current UK range no longer lists the old petrol 500 among its live on-sale models.

Seen through that lens, the 500 makes much more sense. You are no longer trying to justify its compromises against newer, more practical cars at a similar new price. Instead, you are buying it because you want a used city car that still looks special every time you walk up to it. If that matters to you, the Fiat 500 remains very easy to understand.

For most buyers, the sweet spot is a Fiat 500 Lounge with the 1.2-litre petrol engine.

That is the safest and easiest version to recommend. The 1.2 petrol is not fast, but it is smooth enough, simple enough and well suited to the 500’s lightweight city-car brief. It lacks punch on faster roads, but no ordinary 500 was ever genuinely quick, and the 1.2 is easier to live with than some of the more characterful but less convincing alternatives.

Lounge trim is also the smart place to start because it tends to bring the right mix of equipment without pushing you into the more gimmicky end of the range. There were countless trims and special editions over the years, but a tidy Lounge usually gives you the look people want, plus a better infotainment setup and more everyday usability than a very basic Pop.

The version to avoid is anything with the Dualogic automatic gearbox. It never suited the car particularly well and can make the 500 feel jerky, noisy and more frustrating than it needs to be.

Used Fiat 500 prices start at around £6,000 for older 1.2-litre cars in basic trim. Nicer later examples, especially mild-hybrid cars in better specifications, will cost more, but the 500 still offers a broad used price spread that makes it accessible to a wide range of buyers.

That spread is part of the appeal. You can buy a fairly cheap early 500 if image matters more than equipment, or spend closer to the mid-teens on a very tidy, late mild-hybrid car and still have something that feels fashionable and distinctive.

The important thing is not to buy purely on looks. There were endless trims, special editions and personalisation options over the years, so condition, service history and specification matter more than badge wording alone.

The Volkswagen Up is the obvious alternative if you want the best city car of this type to drive. The Hyundai i10 and Kia Picanto are also much stronger on rear-seat space and practicality, while the Suzuki Ignis has its own quirky personality if you want something small and a bit different.

The Toyota Aygo is another sensible rival if reliability is a major priority. It lacks the Fiat’s retro glamour, but it is a more logical small-car choice in several areas.

That is really the heart of the Fiat 500’s position. Almost every rival makes more sense on paper. The reason to buy the Fiat is because it makes you want it more.

Practicality is not a Fiat 500 strength, and there is not much point pretending otherwise. The boot holds just 185 litres, which is tiny even by city-car standards and a long way short of what cars such as the Volkswagen Up and Hyundai i10 can offer.

Rear-seat space is equally limited. The back seats are really best treated as occasional-use chairs for children rather than proper seats for adults. Headroom and legroom are both very tight, and access is awkward because the 500 is three-door only.

The front seats are more acceptable, but even there the small cabin dimensions make the car feel tighter than some alternatives. Storage around the cabin is limited too, with only a few small cubbies and door pockets.

All of that said, none of this should come as a shock. If you buy a Fiat 500, you are choosing style over space. It is only a problem if you expect the car to be more versatile than it really is.

The Fiat 500 measures 3,632mm long, 1,683mm wide and 1,527mm high.

Those compact dimensions are one of the car’s strongest practical advantages. They make it extremely easy to thread through town, squeeze into small parking spaces and live with in places where bigger cars quickly become a nuisance.

The infotainment story depends heavily on age. Early cars were very basic, but later facelifted models brought a much more modern 7.0-inch touchscreen with Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, and that is the setup worth targeting.

It is not cutting-edge now, but it is clear enough, mounted high enough and easy enough to use once you are familiar with it. The main issue is that the screen can reflect sunlight badly, which makes it harder to read on bright days.

As ever with the 500, mid-spec and later versions make the strongest case. The very cheapest cars are attractive on price alone, but you do notice the older tech.

The Fiat 500 is a classic case of style doing a lot of heavy lifting. The glossy painted panels and cheerful colour combinations make the cabin feel more special than it really is, but once you start poking around, the cheap plastics are obvious.

That does not necessarily ruin the experience. In some ways, the 500’s charm survives because the interior still feels cheerful and recognisable. But it does stop the car from feeling especially classy, and some rivals are much better resolved.

If you go in knowing that, it is easier to accept. The Fiat 500’s appeal is rooted in design and character, not material richness.

Over its long life, the Fiat 500 was offered with a wide spread of engines, but the key ones worth thinking about today are the 1.2-litre petrol, the later 1.0-litre mild hybrid and, with more caution, the 0.9-litre TwinAir.

The 1.2 petrol is the safest all-round choice. It is simple, reasonably smooth and easy to live with, even if it is never especially quick. The mild hybrid is the newer and more economical option, and while the hybrid system is modest in what it actually does, it helps the 500 on paper and suits the car’s city-focused brief well enough.

The TwinAir is the more characterful engine, but not in a way that really improves the car. It can feel flat, sounds odd and often does not deliver the economy buyers hoped for.

The 500’s soft suspension causes more problems than benefits. It leans around corners more than you might expect in such a small car, and around town it can thump and bounce over potholes rather than gliding over them.

That means the Fiat never really feels especially polished. There are rival city cars that manage a better balance of comfort and agility, and that makes the 500 feel older than its styling suggests.

Refinement is broadly class-typical. Wind and road noise are not outrageous for something this small, but the engines can become vocal when worked hard, especially on faster roads where the Fiat’s limitations are more obvious anyway.

Safety is one of the clearest reminders of just how old the Fiat 500 became by the end of its life. It was originally tested by Euro NCAP in 2007 and scored five stars, but when it was retested in 2017 under much tougher standards, that fell to three stars.

More significantly, the 500 lacks a lot of the driver-assistance technology that became normal on newer small cars. There is no modern autonomous emergency braking setup, for example, and the broader active-safety story is much thinner than in more recent rivals.

That does not make it unusable, but it does mean buyers should be realistic. The Fiat 500 is very much an older-school small car in safety terms.

The petrol versions of the Fiat 500 are affordable when it comes to fuel - advertised economy ranges from 47-61mpg. Older models are offered with Fiat's 1.3-litre diesel, which officially returns 72–83mpg. The 0.9-litre TwinAir petrol has official figures of 67mpg.

At this age, the original Fiat warranty matters far less than condition and maintenance history. The Fiat 500 is now all about buying carefully rather than relying on any manufacturer backing.

A full service record, evidence of regular maintenance and tidy interior and exterior condition should matter far more than trim level alone. As with many fashionable small cars, it is easy to be distracted by the look of the thing and forget to buy on mechanical merit.

Insurance is one of the Fiat 500’s more reassuring ownership points. Most versions sit between groups 7 and 15, which keeps premiums manageable for a wide range of drivers. The odd special edition sits lower, but broadly speaking, the 500 is an affordable car to insure.

That also helps explain why it remains popular as a first car or fashionable second car.

Road tax depends on age. Cars registered from April 2017 onwards sit under the later flat-rate VED system (currently £200), while earlier cars fall under the older CO2-based setup, which can make them very cheap to tax.

That means some earlier 500s are especially appealing from a running-cost point of view, while later mild-hybrid cars do not necessarily gain much tax advantage despite the badge wording.