T
he Audi A3 Sportback is celebrating its 20th
anniversary this year.
The original, based on the second-generation A3, arrived in 2004. Owners appreciated its two additional doors and extra cabin and luggage space. Very soon, the five-door was outselling the threedoor, and with the 2020 arrival of the fourth-generation A3, Audi got the message and binned it.
What took it so long? Even the Mk3 Sportback of 2012, under the microscope here, appeared to have the field to itself – as today’s sevento-one ratio of used five-doors to used three-doors illustrates.
Both share the Volkswagen Group’s MQB platform, albeit slightly extended in the Sportback to provide an extra 35mm of space between the front and rear wheels. Unfortunately, our testers were unimpressed by the rear passenger space, declaring knee room to be merely adequate and head room limited. And farther back, the Sportback’s 380-litre boot is only 15 litres larger than the three-door’s, although with the rear seats folded it grows to a more useful 1220 litres.
It’s not an especially roomy family hatchback, then, but at least it’s powered by some rather good four-cylinder turbo engines.
For their blend of power and economy, the best petrols are the 148bhp 1.4 TFSI with cylinderon-demand technology and its successor from 2016, the 1.5. Either side of them are a choice of 1.0 and 1.2 engines (the former really sparkles around town) and a 1.8, replaced by a 2.0 in 2016.
There was a 296bhp 2.0 four in the S3 and a 362bhp 2.5 five in the RS3, which deserve their own guides.