Small SUVs have really lost their edge in recent years. They've become soft and mediocre, barely acceptable replacements for the ordinary hatchbacks and sedans that manufacturers are pulling from our market at a rate of knots. But the reason those cars are dying off at such alarming rates is because of the coincidental skyrocketing in popularity of said soft, mediocre small SUVs.
But among the sea of bland, amorphous blobs of crossovers, there shines a beacon of hope. Ironically, it comes from the very company that first made the "bold" move to pull all of its sedans and hatchbacks from North America: the Ford Motor Company. Specifically, it's an all-new 2021 Ford Bronco Sport.
Before you sharpen the pitchforks you dusted off in response to my piece on the Subaru Crosstrek, hear this one out. The Bronco Sport is a compact SUV with fully independent suspension and a transverse, FWD-based powertrain which it shares with the Ford Escape. It is not a "real truck," but it is, in many ways, a return to form to what compact SUVs used to represent.
It's hardly a consolation for the untimely death of the Fiesta, Focus, Fusion, and Taurus, but with the Bronco Sport, Ford is attempting to bring back some of the compact SUV magic of the past, and for that, it deserves a few million pixels of digital ink.
An Escape From CUVs, Or Just A Boxy Escape?
Straight away, the baby Bronco's styling sets it well apart from the vast majority of its rivals in the compact SUV class. It's boxy and butch, with hard lines at the front and a stiff shoulder line across the rear three-quarter. It even has the signature dip along with the windows from the full-size Bronco (which, unlike this thing, will be a proper competitor to the Jeep Wrangler). It may not be as serious an off-roader as its forthcoming big brother, but it is recognizably a Bronco, which is no bad thing.
Mechanically, the Bronco Sport is much more closely tied to the Escape with which it shares a platform. It uses the same turbocharged engines; a base 1.5l inline-3 good for 181 hp, and an optional 2.0l inline-4 with 245 hp, which is standard in the range-topping "Badlands" trim level. Both engines are mated to an 8-speed torque converter automatic transmission, which unfortunately uses a silly rotary-dial shifter instead of a more traditional gear lever. All trims come with all-wheel drive as standard, a claim that not all of its rivals can make.
The Bronco Sport can be had with any number of Ford's latest technology features, including safety sensors and cameras front and back, smartphone connectivity and other little luxuries to improve livability on board. You can even spec a 400W inverter in the cargo area, which is enough power to make grilled cheese sandwiches or iron your shirts deep in the heart of the wilderness.
The Bronco Sport can also be outfitted with over 100 dealer-optioned accessories, including bike racks, kayak racks, rugged floor mats, and even a rooftop tent and awning, for hardcore camping in the slightly less hardcore Ford SUV with a Bronco badge.
You could say that the Bronco Sport is "active lifestyle" gone mad, but at least it doesn't look like a Pontiac Aztek. Quite the opposite; it has a pleasingly Land Rover Freelander-like silhouette, which looks good now and should age rather nicely. Here's hoping its mechanicals hold up as well as its design.
It Has Off-Road Chops
Cast your minds back to the late 1990s (a daily routine for the plaid-wearing demographic at whom the Bronco Sport is aimed) and remember the original Honda CR-V, the early Toyota Rav4 and even the first Ford Escape, the trucklets of our youth. These were rugged, boxy little things that were far tougher and more off-road capable than the Civics, Corollas and Focuses with which they shared components. They scampered about on dirt roads and trails and could brush off abuse with relative ease.
If Ford's marketing is to be believed, even the base Bronco Sport revives this rugged approach to compact SUV design, but if you want to push this platform as far as it'll go, you'll want to spec the "Badlands" package. Doing so gets you a one-inch lift as well as stiffer suspension and better underbody protection (though skid plates can be added as options on lower trims). It also gives you the hilariously millennial-bait "G.O.A.T" modes, which are preset for the engine, gearbox, and differentials to optimize how it handles certain types of terrain, including mud, sand, and snow.
According to early reviews of the Badlands model, it makes some concessions to its on-road comfort and NVH for better off-road capability. Some journalists may find this to be a knock against the Bronco Sport, but we think it's the way it should be. If you want a CUV from Ford with soft suspension and quiet road-handling, there are plenty of others to choose from, including its Escape twin.
The Bronco Sport, like the rugged trucklets of the past, should be a bit rough-and-tumble. It should remind you that, while it is still a unibody chassis with a powertrain sourced from road cars and CUVs, not only can it handle rough terrain, it actively wants to.
When Can You Buy One And For How Much?
The Bronco Sport, unlike its much-anticipated big brother, is already available, though fully-loaded "First Editions" are pretty much all already spoken for. However, you can still build a Bronco Sport exactly to your liking, picking from one of five trim packages and, as mentioned above, a nearly endless list of optional extras and toys to put together your ideal baby Bronco.
You could spend hours on the Bronco Sport configurator, perusing through all the options and packages you could spec, although back in November we put together a buyer's guide to help you navigate through the sea of customisability.
In terms of price, the Bronco Sport starts around $28,000, and the price can increase exponentially from there with options until you're into the $40,000 range. This is to be expected with such a pick-and-choose vehicle, but there are still plenty of ways to keep it within the realms of affordability. It starts a couple thousand dollars higher than some of its rivals, but most of those would charge you extra for AWD in base trims, where it comes standard on all Bronco Sports.
While it can be easy to dismiss yet another transverse-engine, unibody compact SUV as just another boring crossover, Ford really did put time and effort into the baby Bronco to make it into something different. It's something unique in a market where everything is starting to blend into the same bland shapes and sleepy driving experiences. This may not be the hardcore Jeep Wrangler competitor that some were hoping for (fear not, that model is coming soon), but it exists for a different type of buyer, one who will buy this for what it can do and will treat it like the rugged little SUV that it's meant to be.