Skoda Superb Estate (2015-2023) Review

The Skoda Superb Estate follows a very simple brief, but executes it brilliantly. Take the already spacious Superb hatch, add an even larger boot and even more carrying flexibility, then keep everything else that makes the standard car so appealing.

That recipe still works exceptionally well on the used market. The Superb Estate is not trying to be fashionable or sporty, and it does not need to be. It wins buyers over by being enormously practical, easy to drive and quietly classy in a way that many SUVs and premium-badged alternatives struggle to match.

That understated character is a big part of the appeal. The cabin is roomy and neatly designed, the engines are strong and sensible, and the estate body turns the Superb into a genuinely huge load carrier without making it feel clumsy or van-like to drive.

The current Superb Estate has moved the story on, but that only strengthens the used case for this older model. It still offers more space than most people will ever need. If you’re a long-distance motorway driver who needs to carry large loads on a regular basis, the Superb will not only shift pretty much anything you can reasonably throw at it, but it will also take you there in a high level of comfort with low fuel consumption if you choose the right engine options. Similarly the Superb is an excellent family car; the boot is large and the back seats are so spacious they will take the bulkiest of car seats and the grumpiest of teenagers.

There are no poor choices to be made here, although the 272PS petrol version only makes sense if you don’t mind fuelling and insuring it. The smallest 1.5-litre petrol engine makes a lot of sense if you don’t frequently carry heavy loads or tow but do make short journeys, as it is more than quick enough and quite frugal with it. 

In 2020, Skoda added the iV model to the Superb line up featuring a powerful and efficient plug-in hybrid powertrain. The Superb PHEV combines a 1.4 TSI petrol engine and an electric motor to develop 218PS, while its plug-in battery will cover around 30 miles on pure electricity. If you are a company car driver, the Superb iV will be tempting with CO2 emissions from 25g/km. Check out our guide to the best hybrid cars for more info. 

For most car buyers, however, diesel is the most sensible choice with the Skoda Superb Estate; the 2.0-litre 150PS is the sweet spot of economy and performance.

The standard specification of the Skoda Superb Estate is already very good - even the basic S model doesn’t scrimp on the more appealing basics, but we would suggest the SE as a good compromise between luxury and affordability, adding things like dual-zone climate control, lumbar support and adaptive cruise control as standard.

Used Skoda Superb Estate prices now start from around £10,000 for earlier, higher-mileage cars, with later facelifted versions, stronger trims and plug-in hybrid models sitting comfortably above that.

Even so, the Superb Estate still looks like very strong value in the used market. It offers the kind of carrying ability and rear-seat space you might expect from something much more expensive, yet it usually undercuts premium-badged alternatives quite significantly.

That value is one of its biggest strengths. You are getting an enormous amount of car for the money, and the Superb Estate still feels good enough to justify buying carefully rather than simply cheaply.

There’s one obvious competitor for the Superb Estate, and that’s its Volkswagen Group half-sibling, the Volkswagen Passat Estate. Almost as big, a bit posher but slightly less spacious inside, the Passat is more expensive on a model-for-model basis, so it’s a personal choice as to whether it offers something you need or want over and above the Superb.

If you want something more premium, the Audi A6 Avant is a very natural step up, while the Volvo V90 and Mercedes-Benz E-Class Estate also bring more badge appeal and a plushier image. All cost more to buy and run, though.

The Superb Estate’s strength is that it combines near-premium space and polish with mainstream running costs, which is why it remains such a persuasive used buy.

The fascia design is not dissimilar to that of the smaller Octavia, in that it goes for a somewhat old-school approach whilst still including all the modern tech you would expect. You get a pair of analogue instrument dials for starters, although there is the obligatory digital information screen between them, while on the centre console the infotainment screen sits above the ventilation controls - physical switches and knobs rather than another touchscreen - and all the buttons are clearly labelled and marked. 

Sure, that does mean that there are more buttons than you might find in a rival - the Volvo V90 goes for the Tesla approach and packs everything into a single touchscreen - but for many buyers the simpler approach is preferable, particularly when on the move.

Everyone should also find that getting comfortable is a breeze. All trim levels come with seat height adjustment for the driver as standard, and with so much space to play with you can have the seat in whichever position you need. There’s a large range of adjustment for the steering wheel too, while slim door pillars and big door mirrors make for excellent visibility.

Upfront, the Superb feels genuinely huge - head and legroom are inevitably sizeable, but it’s the width that really illustrates just how spacious the Superb’s cabin is; your front seat passenger seems quite a distance away and although the centre console is quite wide, the seat feels more like an armchair. It’s the space rather than the materials that make it feel like a luxury car.

The same applies to the rear seats. Arguably more so in fact, because the rear legroom is so generous you’d normally have to look at a long-wheelbase limousine to get something comparable. Again, giving your rear seat occupants the option to stretch their legs rather than folding them up is genuine luxury, and although the middle seat remains a short straw in terms of its shape and that you have to straddle a transmission tunnel, this is a car that you can carry tall adults in and in complete comfort.

Passenger accommodation isn’t even the Superb’s trump card. Open the boot up - electrically on SE models and up and by gesture on the Laurin & Klement - and you’re greeted with a carpeted cavern ready to swallow your luggage. 

With the rear seats in place, the Skoda Superb Estate offers 660 litres of space, which is 100 litres more than a BMW 5 Series Touring, and if you drop the rear seats this goes up to a huge 1950 litres; if you need more space than that with the seats down you’ll need to spend £60,000 on a giant Mercedes-Benz GLS SUV. 

It’s not just space either; you can have the split-level boot floor, dividers that stick to the carpet to keep your stuff in place and even a rechargeable torch. This is a car made by people who understand what an estate needs to do.

The Skoda Superb Estate measures 4,862mm long, 1,864mm wide and 1,496mm high. That makes it a very large estate, but one that uses its size brilliantly.

It feels huge inside without becoming unwieldy to use, which is exactly what you want from a car of this type.

All versions of the Superb come with a touchscreen information system, but its specifications and even the size of the screen does vary depending on the age of the car as well as the trim level.

The entry-level Superb S trim comes with a 5-inch touchscreen system incorporating DAB radio, Bluetooth and USB input, SE models upgrade this to a 6.5-inch touchscreen, SE-L models go a step further and include satellite navigation and an 8-inch touchscreen, while the top-spec Laurin & Klement model adds an upgraded audio system with 10 speakers and even a TV tuner.

In 2019 the Superb was facelifted, and as well as a revised model range the standard specification was also increased, so that the basic S model now offered voice control and Smart Link+, so that Android and Apple smartphones can be connected to allow the use of native apps.

With a strong basic provision even on the older and lower-specification models you should find that Bluetooth and DAB is adequate, but if you want navigation then it makes sense to go for a later model that has Smart Link+ included rather than paying extra for a higher-spec car with an in-built system.

Skoda as a brand has to fit into the giant machine that is the Volkswagen Group, and that means not outshining the more premium-inclined brands under the big umbrella such as Volkswagen and Audi. So the interior of the Superb is not premium, but neither is it anything close to bargain-basement. The colour scheme is certainly on the conservative side; there’s a lot of grey and black plastic livened up only by the occasional flash of silver or chrome and gloss black, but that doesn’t mean it is without appeal.

For starters, the Superb’s cabin feels very well constructed. Even where the plastics used might be on the thin side, it still feels like it would last for many thousands of miles without complaint. 

There are also plenty of materials that are pleasant to the touch; much of the main sections of dashboard are soft touch and there’s a nice use of Alcantara-like surfaces too. Choose a model with leather seats and you’ll find them of good quality too - the Superb delivers a high level of quality, just with a medium level of luxury.

The Superb has a very broad engine range so there’s something to suit all budgets, although it is likely that for most people there are just a couple of options to decide between.

On the petrol front, things kick off with a 150PS 1.5-litre all the way up to a 272PS 2.0-litre. That small engine is more able than you might think. It’s capable of 135mph in the right conditions and offers good acceleration too, although it is not the quietest of the bunch. 

The 2.0-litre TSI was available in 190PS, 220PS and 272PS forms; the first two options are effortlessly fast but are at odds with the whole point of a large estate and are most costly to fuel and insure. The 272PS version comes with four-wheel drive as standard and is a spectacularly fast and discreet machine, but is probably best suited to bank robbery rather than conventional load hauling.

The plug-in hybrid version is badged as the Superb iV and it is powered by a 1.4 TSI petrol engine and an electric motor to deliver a combined 218PS. This means the iV is incredibly smooth to drive and it will automatically switch from electric to petrol power when the battery is empty.     

The diesel engine option is likely to be best suited to Superb buyers, as they offer much of the performance of the better petrol units but without the fuel consumption cost. 

The entry-level 1.6-litre TDI unit offers quite modest performance but backs that up by being cheap to run, and is the best option if money saving is the priority. The best compromise, however, comes with the 2.0-litre 140PS TDI unit; it has enough torque and performance to be quick, effortless and tow heavy loads but is also refined and economical. There’s a 190PS version of this engine if you want extra performance but for most buyers the 140PS version hits the sweet spot.

The Skoda Superb iV plug-in hybrid is advertised with a maximum range of 39 miles. However, in our road tests, we struggled to get more than 30 miles out of a fully charged battery, which means the Superb Estate's maximum range may vary depending on weather conditions and driving style. 

The Superb Estate’s priorities are obvious from the first few miles. It feels stable, easy and quietly polished, with steering that is light enough to make town driving straightforward and body control that keeps the car feeling tidy at speed.

Ride comfort is one of its strongest cards, especially on the smaller wheels fitted to S and SE trims. Larger alloys chip away at that suppleness a little, but the Superb Estate remains a very comfortable long-distance cruiser.

On a faster road it is more capable than it first appears, with decent grip and a secure, predictable balance, but this is still a car built for calm progress rather than entertainment.

Refinement is very good. Road and wind noise are well contained, the cabin feels well insulated and the diesel engines, while a little more vocal than the petrols, settle down nicely once you are up to speed.

The Skoda Superb was tested by Euro NCAP in 2015, and although it was the saloon model that was tested, the organisation declared that the results would apply to estate models also. The Superb recorded an impressive five-star rating. Its most impressive score was 86 per cent for adult protection with an identical score for child protection. The Superb’s consistent performance resulted in a score of 71 per cent for pedestrian mitigation and 76 per cent for safety assist, a range of scores above the average for the class.

As standard, all Skoda Superbs are fitted with front airbags including a knee airbag for the driver, side chest and pelvis airbags for the front seat passengers and curtain airbags for front and rear passengers. Seat belt pre-tensioners and load-limiters are fitted to the front and rear seats, while Isofix child seat mounting points are fitted in the outer rear seats as well as an airbag deactivation switch for the front passenger seat, with ESC as standard on all models.

The Superb also featured a strong driver assistance provision from its launch in 2015, with ESC as standard as well as the option of emergency city braking and post-collision braking as an option. These were later upgraded to be standard on all models, while features such as blind-spot monitoring standard on higher-specification models.

Fuel economy is one of the Superb Estate’s strengths. The diesels remain the obvious long-distance choices, while the petrols are reasonable enough if your mileage is lower.

The plug-in hybrid can look sensational on paper, but as ever with a PHEV the real-world result depends heavily on how often you charge it and what sort of journeys you do.  

Any remaining Skoda warranty will depend on the age of the car, but Approved Used examples remain the most reassuring place to start.

Skoda Plus Approved Used currently includes 1 year’s Warranty, 1 year’s Roadside Assistance, comprehensive multi-point checks, independent vehicle history and mileage checks and a service history check. That adds a useful layer of reassurance on a big used family estate.

Surprisingly given its size, the Superb manages to pull off the trick of getting itself into some quite low insurance groups if you choose the right engine. The lowliest S model with the smallest petrol or diesel engine is only in group 14, while the 2.0-litre 150PS diesel is still only in group 19. Fancier trims attract higher insurance groups - SE-L is group 21 for the 1.5-litre petrol, while the spunkier engines are higher still. The 272PS petrol in L&K trim is group 31, but that’s still not bad for a car capable of 150mph.

For most Skoda Superb Estate examples registered on or after 1 April 2017, the ongoing standard VED rate is now £200 a year. If the car’s original list price was over £40,000, it would also have been liable for the Expensive Car Supplement in years two to six, taking the annual total to £640 during that period.

That is worth watching on higher-spec or more powerful cars, because some better-equipped Superb Estates could cross that threshold when new.