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Vauxhall Vivaro Review

Sam Worth
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What's good?

– Born and breed in Britain
– N/S and O/S slide doors as standard

What's bad?

– Notchy gearbox
– Painful to use infotainment system

What's the score?

6/10

Overview

The Vauxhall Vivaro has been around from the early noughties, and for most of its life, it’s been using the same body and skin as the Renault Trafic. But from 2019, it came out of the Trafic shell and is now built on Group PSA’s all-new EMP2 platform, along with the Peugeot Expert and Citroen Dispatch. All three of them, in fact, are the only vans that can wear a ‘made in Britain’ badge, as they’re all built from Vauxhall’s long-standing factory, in Luton.

This all-new British-built van is available in two sizes, L1H1 and L2H1. And as you can probably guess, they both have the same 1397mm loading height and the same loading width as well, 1636mm. The L1 has a 2512mm load length (3674mm inc. FlexCargo) opposed to the longer L2, with 2862mm (4024mm inc. FlexCargo). Before you ask, builders… Yes, you can fit pallets or 8×4 sheets of plywood in the back lying flat. The L1 has a payload up to 1458kg, while the L2 has 1415kg. Both sizes are available with a 2.7-tonne and 2.9-tonne gross vehicle weight. It’s getting a bit technical with all these thingamajigs-ey measurements, but let’s face it, size matters.

The cheapest Vivaro called Griffen, starts at £21,323. But that’s not £21.3k for some poverty spec van with dreary plastic bumpers and steel wheels with cheap Halfords look-a-like trims. The Griffen gets 16-inch alloy wheels, body-coloured bumpers with rear parking sensors, FlexCargo with a bench seat, multimedia audio, air conditioning, and an alarm system. Strangely, though, the actual poverty spec model, Edition, which has less features than your nans mobility scooter, starts at £25,058.

I tested the Sportive model, and it starts at £27,308. Standard features include LED DRL’s, metallic paint (push the boat out eh Vauxhall), body-coloured bumpers, FlexCargo bulkhead (panel van only), a six-way adjustable driver seat and a remote-control alarm. If you’ve got your thinking cap on, it would be a wise choice to go with the cheaper, more equipped Griffen.

Drive

In a way, it felt like driving a car and doesn’t have much of a van feel to it behind the wheel. I found the steering felt a tad vague and reminded me of the Corsa E, which wasn’t particularly great.

So, if you’re on the hunt for a van with precise steering and a ‘av it’ attitude, I’d steer away from the Vivaro – pun intended. That’s not to say that it slacks on the back roads, but it’s just not the best on the market. The Ford Transit Custom and VW Transporter feel better suited down the country lanes.

Compared to its predecessor, the body feels more balanced and much better handling overall. But let’s face it, 90% of van drivers won’t give two sods about the vans handling, apart from Amazon drivers who probably turn their daily delivery routes into a Grand Prix track.

Engine line-ups vary from a 1.5-litre with 100bhp, to a 2.0-litre with 178bhp. Auto and manual boxes are available, but not both transmissions can be mated to all engines.

I had the least powerful 1.5-litre 100bhp engine with 199lb-ft and a six-speed manual. I would say the power was just about there, but there wasn’t any van stuff in the back. So, I’d recommend anything but the 100bhp engine, unless you’re transporting feathers. Vauxhall claim the engine should get around 40mpg, which is roughly the same on all engines available.

Something I did notice was how petite the wing mirrors are. It’s almost as if Vauxhalls designing team wanted to give the Vivaro Shrek ears. They’re bloody tiny. Strangely, though, visibility isn’t as bad as you’d think, but it would’ve been kind of Vauxhall if they made them a tad bigger.

One of two biggest downfalls on the Vivaro was the gearbox, because it feels notchy. It was as if every time I changed up a gear quickly, the clutch wasn’t engaged all the way, so there was an ever so slight grinding feel, which wasn’t pleasant. Even the gear knob itself has an odd shape to it, not at all comfortable.

The second thing I really struggled with, was the steering wheel. It has a raised lip on the entire middle section of the wheel, which meant whenever I steered the wheel with the palm of my hand, it got uncomfortable, very quickly.

Interior

The Vivaros interior does look somewhat plain compared to its rivals. Even the steering wheel, for example, has no buttons or toggles on it whatsoever. It seems Vauxhall has taken the simple and durable design route, as most touch points have a rough, plastic-ey feel to them. Am I complaining? No, not really. I didn’t expect there to be Alcantara and quilted leather. It’s a van.

So, once you get past the plain, durable look, you’ll notice for a van, it’s decent. The door pockets even have five different sizes compartments. There’s enough room in the bottom door pocket to store about 20 bottles of Red Bull. I think I may have just sold this van to every Amazon delivery driver now…

Like most vans nowadays, there’s a place in the middle section seat to store all those invoices for customers, and space under the passenger seats to store a load of Yorkie bars. High spec panel vans come with the FlexCargo, which allows longer parts in the back to follow through to underneath the outer passenger seat. You can also raise the passenger seat, so even longer parts can travel to the end of the foot well. However, doing so eliminates the passenger’s seat – unlike the current Renault Trafic, where only the front flap underneath the seat folds up. Looks like the apprentice is walking, then.

The Dynamic model and up, gets a 7-inch touch screen infotainment system, which is, I’d go as far as saying, the most annoying and complicated system fitted to a modern vehicle. Everything you try to do just seems like a mission, and it’s just not user friendly. The system is compatible with Android Auto and Apple CarPlay (thank the lord), but even trying to connect my phone to use Android Auto, which sounds like a 2-minute job, ended up taking me about 20 minutes, after several YouTube tutorials and reading a Reddit post. Utterly useless.

Something else I wasn’t particularly keen on, was the arm rest, because it felt so flimsy. It’s almost as if it’s a drumstick wrapped in only a few layers of bubble wrap. Half the time you rest your arm on it, it slides off.

Verdict

I would like to say this all-new Vivaro is a whole lot better than its predecessor, and in many ways, it is. But, on the other hand, some parts have slackened. I think the trouble is, it doesn’t feel as sturdy as others on the market. Plus, there’s too many niggles that I’d find irritating to live with, especially that bleeding infotainment system.

And personally, I prefer the look of the Renault Trafic, although I doubt van drivers will care, especially delivery drivers, as they’re bound to have a dent on every panel before the first service is due. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a seriously well-valued van (for the Griffen), and for most people using it, they’d happily live with it. It’s a good van, but just not the best.