2021 Haval Jolion Ultra review

• What we love
• What we don’t
• Infotainment and Connectivity
• Safety and Technology
• Value for Money

How far up the small SUV pecking order can sharp styling, a sharp price and a lengthy equipment list propel the Haval Jolion? Glenn Butler finds out.

What we love

Looks good on-road and has a stunning cabin

Value for money is strong, as is safety equipment

Plenty of space for such a small car

What we don’t

Idiosyncrasies impact cabin-friendliness

Ride quality and refinement are sub-par

Drivetrain is behind the times

Introduction

The Haval Jolion is a good car that mounts a compelling value argument in the hotly contested small SUV segment. But it’s also a car with one of the most unfortunate acronyms in the automotive world.

Somebody in Haval’s Baoding headquarters in China thought it would be a good idea to name their new state-of-the-art vehicle platform L.E.M.O.N. Lemon, says GWM, is a global high-intelligence modular technology platform that boasts high performance, high safety, and lightweight technology.

Now, this could be an unfortunate Chinese-to-English translation or maybe it’s a cunning PR plan to garner tongue-in-cheek publicity.

The Haval Jolion is the third vehicle built on GWM’s Lemon platform after the larger Haval H6 and the Haval Big Dog, which is currently China market only (now that’s a cool name, as is GWM’s other four-wheel-drive brand, Tank, but I digress).

The Jolion range in Australia has three tiers kicking off at $26,490 drive-away for the Jolion Premium. The variant we’re testing today is the top-spec 2021 Haval Jolion Ultra priced at $31,990 drive-away.

Powering all models locally is a 110kW and 210Nm 1.5-litre turbocharged four-cylinder petrol engine driving the front wheels through a seven-speed dual-clutch automatic transmission. Identical power and +10Nm compared to the outgoing Haval H2 from a re-engineered engine paired to a new gearbox.

Six colours are available: Hamilton White, Mars Red, Energy Green, Ayers Grey, Blue Sapphire and Golden Black. All colours bar the Hamilton White of our test car command a $450 premium.

Externally, the Jolion Ultra makes a good first impression. The design is modern, classy and compact, although the front grille does look a touch cheese-grater.

In size terms, the Jolion five-door may share the same 2700mm wheelbase as a Mazda CX-5, but its true Mazda rival is the smaller CX-30, against which it is 77mm longer, 46mm wider and 34mm taller. This all translates into more interior space.

The Jolion Ultra comes with 18-inch alloy wheels and tyres, a panoramic sunroof with soft cover, sharp-looking LED headlights, fog lights and DRLs, and a 360-degree camera to aid manoeuvrability.

Inside

First impressions of the interior are overwhelmingly positive. This is a very classy cabin that would not look out of place on a car charging twice the Jolion Ultra’s $32K ask.

The materials all exude high quality, from the soft etched leatherette covering the lower dashboard, to the knurled chrome transmission dial clearly inspired by Jaguar and Land Rover’s rotary transmission selector. A big 12.5-inch touchscreen dominates an otherwise minimalist cabin, and at first glance, the lack of switchgear is confronting – especially if the driver before you left the radio blaring.

The main bank of audio controls is embedded in one of the steering wheel’s three spokes, which for a guy used to having two or three ways to do things does require a bit of mental rewiring. Once you get used to it, though, the lack of clutter gives the cabin a serene ambience.

That said, easy access to air-conditioning temperature controls would be nice to have. Instead, these require a swipe down on the screen before you can access them.

The seats in the Jolion Ultra are all faux-leather, and the driver’s seat is electrically adjustable. Both front seats also have heating, but you’ll have to go hunting for it in the infotainment screen – hint: ignore the climate-control menu and look under car settings instead.

The driver’s seatbase is flat, there’s no tilt adjust to correct its pitch, and the electric motor whines noisily as you lower the seat. The seatback has good bolstering but needs more support in the middle.

The steering wheel is leather-rimmed and has chrome accents that make it look classy, but it feels a bit thin and flimsy in hand. It also doesn’t adjust for reach. The indicators’ loud clacking noise when operating is jarring in a cabin that presents with such a refined air.

In terms of storage up front, there are bottle holders in the door and cupholders in the centre console. There’s also a secret cubbyhole under the centre console, big enough for a handbag, where a pair of USB-A ports and a 12V charging port also reside.

The back seats have loads of leg room thanks to the Jolion’s long wheelbase and head room is good too. The seat base is at a good angle, if a tad short, which might become uncomfortable on longer journeys.

There are map pockets in both back seats, bottle holders in the doors and cupholders in the fold-down centre armrest. There are also two USB-A ports back here, air vents to aid airflow, grab-handles and lights.

There are two ISOFIX points in the outer back seats and three top-tether points.

The boot is a decent 430L with the back seats in place, expanding to 1133L with the 60/40 split fully folded – although they don’t fold down far enough to present a flat loadspace. The boot has a hard cargo blind that doubles as a parcel shelf, and there’s a space-saver spare tyre under the floor.

Interestingly, the car’s key has a boot button… That does nothing. If this weren’t the top-spec Jolion, the button would make us think there was a higher-spec variant with an electric-opening boot. Maybe there is overseas, but not here.

Infotainment and Connectivity

The Jolion Ultra comes with a 12.3-inch multimedia touchscreen (compared to a 10.25-inch display on lesser models) that, just like the cabin, presents beautifully. The graphics are very classy and intricate – with a choice of two visual themes – but that can make them hard to use, especially in a moving car with the Jolion’s firm and sometimes jiggly ride.

The controls also aren’t as intuitive as they could be. For example, the home screen offers controls for radio, phone, audio, picture gallery and video gallery. Does any car really need those last two?

The eight-speaker sound system puts out a decent sound, but AM radio reception is sub-par, and it is hard to figure out how to tune manually when the auto-tune misses your desired station. After two minutes of searching I gave up, but I admit, I didn’t check the climate-control menu.

The Jolion Ultra has wireless phone charging and wired smartphone mirroring for Android Auto and Apple CarPlay. It does not have digital radio or satellite navigation.

Safety and Technology

ANCAP has not crash-tested the Jolion at the time of writing. The only two Havals tested so far are the H2, which earned five stars in 2017, and the H9 large SUV that was rated four stars back in 2015.

A good level of safety features is standard across the Jolion’s three-tiered range. This includes seven airbags, electronic stability control, emergency brake assist with cyclist awareness, secondary collision mitigation and tyre pressure monitors.

The Jolion also has active cruise control, forward and rear collision warning, lane-keep assist (which is a touch crude), intelligent speed assist and a drowsy-driver monitor.

The Jolion’s rear-view mirror hub has a USB port, presumably for powering your dash-cam, should you install one.

To aid low-speed manoeuvring, the Jolion has reverse parking sensors and cameras all around.

Value for Money

The Jolion Ultra is very well specified in terms of equipment and safety for $31,990 drive-away, which makes it fantastic value.

As per all GWM Haval vehicles, buyers get a seven-year/unlimited-kilometre warranty, five years of roadside assist, and five years of capped-price servicing, the latter requiring services every 12 months/15,000km (or 10,000km to the first service only), and equating to a total spend of $1550.

All models claim to consume 8.1L/100km on the combined cycle, with support for 91RON regular unleaded offered across the range. During our test we hovered in the 10s, which is not great for a small SUV.

Driving

If value is the Jolion’s strength, driving is its weakness.

Let’s start with the positives. The Jolion’s steering is light, and the drivetrain accelerates with moderate enthusiasm when pushed. Apart from that, well, the Jolion will get you where you want to go, it just won’t do it with the refinement, comfort, composure or competence of other cars in the heavily populated small SUV marketplace.

The Jolion’s 110kW and 220Nm turbocharged petrol engine is loud, suffers from turbo lag and has poor throttle response. Every increase in accelerator pressure comes with a marked delay before the engine and transmission respond.

When it does respond, it often drops gears instead of relying on what is a decent whack of torque for a car weighing just 1400kg. And those gear changes are not as smooth as we’ve come to expect from dual-clutch transmissions, either.

Engine noise is not the only refinement factor; the Kumho Solus tyres kick up a fair bit of noise as well. Wind noise is also noticeable off the A-pillar each side of the windscreen and the wing mirrors.

The Jolion’s suspension is okay on smooth roads, but that’s faint praise. When the road surface deteriorates, the Jolion does not have the smarts to isolate occupants while maintaining its dynamic poise. Instead, the ride gets choppy and brittle, and takes longer to settle after a hit than popular rivals.

Conclusion

The Haval Jolion is a car that, from the moment I laid eyes on it, I wanted to do well. It looks very sharp outside and inside, and I sincerely hoped that the driving experience fulfilled that visual promise.

To begin with, the value equation is strong, it has a good active safety set, and it is relatively spacious for a car with a small overall footprint.

But in everyday driving, the fundamentals are not quite right. The drivetrain is busy, loud and not particularly responsive or economical. The ride quality and driving dynamics are below average, and the cabin’s ambience is overpowered by a combination of engine noise, tyre noise and wind noise.

In addition to that, there are some user-experience issues in the cabin that need refining to make using the Jolion just as rewarding as it visually promises.

All of those negatives can be fixed with a little more development time and effort. Until then, a sharp price can make up for all kinds of shortcomings, and the Jolion’s price is definitely sharp.

Keyword: 2021 Haval Jolion Ultra review