What’s it like?
City cars are becoming a dying breed these days, but in the last decade there was plenty of choice in this ultra-compact automotive market sector – and the Kia Picanto was one of the best. So much so that it still soldiers on when many of its rivals have fallen by the wayside. Typifying Kia’s solid product offering of stylish looks, a decent interior and plenty of standard equipment, the good news is that the third-generation Picanto is really good to drive, despite being powered by understandably modest petrol engines. Rivals include the Volkswagen Up, Skoda Citigo, SEAT Mii, Peugeot 108, Citroen C1, Toyota Aygo and the Hyundai i10.
Which model to go for?
There is really only one engine available for buyers of used Picanto Mk3s, which is the 67hp 1.0-litre three-cylinder petrol engine. This was paired to either a five-speed manual or four-speed automatic transmission, with drive going to the front wheels. With the more commonplace manual gearbox, expect 0-100km/h in 14.3 seconds, fuel consumption of around 4.2 litres/100km and CO2 rated at 97g/km.
There was also a more potent 1.25-litre four-cylinder petrol engine with 84hp, which trimmed the 0-100km/h time down to 11.6 seconds without doing too much damage to the economy and CO2 figures. However, it was paired mainly to the GT-Line specification and wasn’t popular here, so almost all used Picantos will be the 1.0-litre car.
This drives perfectly acceptably, as long as you don’t need rip-roaring straight-line speed. It’s nippy enough for the Kia to be brisk around town, while it will just about hold its own on the motorway too. The ride and handling balance in the Picanto is also excellent, for this small class of car.
During its life, this Picanto has had two facelifts – a modest effort that took effect in 2020, and then a more substantial restyling of the vehicle in 2024, in order to keep it fresh for a good few more years yet. The latter has angular exterior lighting signatures, to bring it into line with the aesthetics of other modern Kias.
Does anything go wrong?
The Picanto is a very reliable small car from a highly dependable company, and with such simple engines there’s very little to go wrong. As a city conveyance, it’s therefore the outer condition of the Kia which will be key, as many of them will have endured bumps and scrapes on urban streets during their lifetimes.
There were just two recalls issued for this generation of Kia Picanto, and they both relate to 2024 models – one for the speed limit assist feature, and the other for a short-circuit inside the exhaust gas recirculation valve.