Citroën has had a good thing going with the C4 Cactus, its distinctively designed compact hatch which first appeared on the market some four years ago.
Good to drive, comfy and quirky, the C4 Cactus has sold some 270,000 units to date with 30,000 units finding buyers in the UK alone.
Today, we have this new look C4 Cactus and it takes just a few miles behind wheel to ascertain that this latest edition, extensively revised for 2018, has moved the C4 Cactus on to the next level.
For one thing, it’s extraordinarily comfortable to drive, smooth and refined and there’s a new quality look and feel to the reshaped cabin, too. At Citroën’s recent drive day, I drove four different versions of the car. Then a couple of weeks back, another spell on some picturesque B-roads near Castle Combe was another insight into the new Cit’s all round appeal.
Truth be told, in its class, the C4 Cactus has been one of the revelations of year so far. It just drives so differently, with a soft, supple dynamic style redolent of classic Citroëns of the past yet without the same precipitous angles of body roll and overly soft suspension.
It handles keenly too, in its own idiosyncratic way. In a world of me-too cars, I really like things like that, plus its engagingly left field character.
Not that I’d have guessed as much when I first saw the new C4 Cactus firmly under wraps at Citroën’s design studio in Paris. In the metal, frankly, it looked rather tame, especially alongside the sparky C4 Cactus that we’ve known to date.
Conspicuous by their absence are the Air Bumps that have been the car’s forte to date. Widely praised by the media for trying something new, the big Air bumps adorning the sides of the original C4 Cactus certainly garnered rave notices in the press (and protected the doors), but in the showroom alas they proved too divisive.
So they’ve gone now, or at least been radically downsized. The C4 Cactus thus looks much cleaner now, if less innovative, with updated front and rear ends also part of this extensive 2018 facelift.
The real story however is surely the big step up in comfort and refinement. Two factors here, the extensively revamped interior with Citroën’s sumptuous Advanced Comfort seats and underneath the Cactus’ reworked suspension featuring ‘Progressive Hydraulic Cushions,’ first seen on Citroën’s big C5 Aircross SUV in China.
Citroën is now making ride comfort central to its brand message. Inside, those broad, designer chic armchair-like seats (available in three colours) are something else.
With the PHC suspension, Citroën has added two hydraulic cushions to each damper unit to bring tighter than normal control over compression and rebound strokes. Simple tech compared to the hydropneumatics Citroën pioneered in the past, but it works.
Citroën obligingly found perhaps the roughest local section of chaussée déformé (rather similar to above) yet the C4 Cactus sailed over it unperturbed, all the road harshness absorbed away to nothing while the body remained composed and level throughout. Impressive.
In the engine department, you get a choice of three 1.2-litre, three cylinder PureTech petrols (82 ps, 110 ps, 130 ps) plus a single 1.6-litre four cylinder diesel (100 ps).
