The interior of the EcoSport is familiar, if you’ve spent any time in the Fiesta. There’s the same layout of buttons, a very similar instrument cluster, the electric mirror adjustment is mounted on the driver’s door, and the climate control dials are the same. The EcoSport uses cool blue backlighting instead of the Fiesta’s orange, and this makes it look very modern. I especially fancy the blue needles that must look really unique at night. There is a provision to plug in an aux cable and USB drive next to the handbrake lever, and there are a lot of storage spaces in the cabin. Ford tells us that there are nine cupholders, and two power sockets – one is mounted in the right rear door pocket. The glovebox offers cooling as well, and the 340-odd litre boot offers a parcel tray.
Steering-mounted controls are present on the Titanium, and there is a central button that activates the ‘Sync’ – the voice activation is now a Microsoft-developed feature. We’ve seen a different software in the Fiats sold in India, but Ford claims that the current-gen Sync is far more intelligent than the Fiesta’s, even going so far as to make sure that updates can be installed in your EcoSport when they come along.
It is an impressive feature, what with its ability to choose music or dial a contact off your Bluetooth-connected phone with a voice command. It will even read out the name of an artist or track, given the right keywords. It can also pair at least four phones at the same time, and is an intuitive, genuinely easy to use addition to the car.
The driver’s seat has height adjustment, an armrest and lumbar support, though all adjustments are manual. The steering wheel telescopes – something that tall people like me will certainly appreciate. Everything is within easy reach, and the stalks behind the wheel are electronic like BMW controls are – they don’t physically change position, but operate in the same way that mechanical stalks do. The indicator stalk has the ‘lane change’ feature where the indicator blinks thrice before shutting off, another small touch that is nice.
Space in the rear is adequate. At the price, the Nissan Sunny and Renault Scala will offer much more legroom, but the EcoSport is in no way less spacious than the Renault Duster. Fitting three in the back will be a squeeze if they’re full-sized adults, though. The rear seat bench feels a little too flat for the car’s cornering ability, and there is no armrest or grab handles, either. The only way to stop sliding a little when there’s an enthusiastic driver is to wear the seat belt – not a common practice at the rear in India. There is two-step seat back inclination for the rear seat. Cooling is more than adequate from the climate control system, although the vents are noisy. Despite not being the usual round vents, they can be closed completely. Plastic quality is par for the course, with the overall impression being better than that of the Duster. The contrasting red stitching on black leather in our test car was very fetching.
The boot is relatively small at 340-odd litres, but it manages to stow a couple of bags with ease. There is also the 60:40 split-folding rear seat that makes the EcoSport a versatile vehicle. However, the seats do not fold flat- something to consider if you’re planning to transport something large.
The top-end Titanium variants of the EcoSport will have ABS, EBD and six airbags. We think that two airbags will be present across some of the top-end variants, ABS will be present on most variants, but absent on the base models to meet a price target. We hope that Ford will not do the same thing it does with the Figo and Classic ranges and offer ABS only on the top-end variants.