New Subaru Forester review

Subaru made its name with rally cars, but its current range couldn’t be more different to those "race on Sunday, sell on Monday" specials. These days, its line-up consists of cars like the Subaru Forester – a rugged family SUV with four-wheel drive and genuine off-road ability.

This sixth-generation Forester is new for 2025 and is effectively a heavy facelift of the car that came before it. Changes include an all-new exterior and interior design, as well as some mechanical upgrades to improve the way it drives both on and off-road.

Those updates are designed to help it keep up with rivals – including the Hyundai Tucson, Kia Sportage and Mazda CX-5 – but are they really enough to put a Forester on your drive instead of one of those excellent family SUVs?

Read on as we put the Subaru Forester through its paces in all the important areas, including performance, comfort, practicality, efficiency and costs...

The Forester's only engine option is a 134bhp 2.0-litre mild-hybrid petrol unit with a tiny electric motor that helps out when accelerating.

That's why there's an "e" signifying electric tech in its full name – Subaru Forester e-Boxer. And unlike some mild hybrids it can run on electric power alone when manoeuvring or at crawling speed in traffic.

In theory, the hybrid kit should help the car get off the line with a bit of zing, but the engine runs out of puff quite quickly and the 0-62mph time is a ponderous 12.2 seconds. That’s slower than nearly all its rivals, including the mild-hybrid versions of the Hyundai Tucson and Kia Sportage.

In the real world, you can feel the difference between the Forester's performance and that of most family SUVs. You’ll need to constantly plant your foot on the accelerator if you want to make any decent progress. It’s disappointing that there isn’t a more powerful regular hybrid version available.

On top of that, the only gearbox option available in the Forester is a CVT automatic. It holds the engine revs high during acceleration so the car isn’t particularly quiet as you build speed. That said, it's not the noisiest CVT we've tested. Subaru has programmed artificial gear changes that makes it feel more like a non-CVT auto, and added extra insulation to the engine bay to help reduce the amount of noise entering the interior.

The hallmark of Subaru car models is that you get four-wheel drive as standard, and the extra traction benefits that brings will pay dividends if you live in a remote area where the weather is harsh and the roads are infrequently gritted.

We don't have an official wading depth for the Forester but ground clearance is 220mm and it has an X-mode for off-road driving with snow, dirt and mud driving settings.

The feeling of security is enhanced by the limited body lean in corners and decent levels of grip. The Forester rides well too. It's more supple than a Mazda CX-5 at low speeds to take the sting out of potholes, yet is controlled enough to avoid feeling wallowy when you go over a series of undulations at motorway speeds.

Unfortunately, at those speeds the steering feels very vague around the straight-ahead. Sure, it builds in weight as you wind on more lock while cornering, helping you to place the car, but it doesn’t give you as much confidence at higher speeds as the CX-5.

It’s also a shame that the Forester suffers from a certain amount of wind noise that you wouldn’t get in, for example, a Volvo XC40. There’s a fair amount of road noise too. 

"I've found that the Forester's four-wheel drive adds an extra level of confidence on those typically British and very wet days. You don’t get that with many other family SUVs." – Dan Jones, Senior Reviewer

Getting comfortable in the Subaru Forester won’t take long thanks to plenty of adjustment for the driver’s seat and steering wheel. Helpfully, the front seats are electrically adjustable so they require minimal effort, plus they come with adjustable lumbar support as standard.

We found the front seats to be super comfortable and supportive, and there’s a good amount of side bolstering to hug you in tightly when cornering.

Forward visibility is excellent, helped by the Forester's low dashboard and slim pillars. Subaru says it has lowered the rear window line by up to 40mm compared with the previous generation, and that really shows because rear visibility is very good. It’s certainly much better than in a Kia Sportage or Mazda CX-5.

Every Forester has a 360-degree reversing camera and rear parking sensors as standard, and parking is surprisingly easy for such a big family SUV. Oddly, though, you can’t have front parking sensors, even as an option.

The standard 11.6in portrait-oriented touchscreen includes Android Auto and Apple CarPlay smartphone mirroring, DAB radio and Bluetooth. On mid-spec Field trim and above you also get sat-nav with a what3words function so you can navigate to precise locations using three-word, three-metre grid references.

The infotainment system is not the most sophisticated set-up and the graphics are a bit basic, but it is very easy to use thanks to its big menu buttons and simple layout. It also responds quickly to your inputs.

Unlike the VW Tiguan – which favours touch-sensitive buttons and settings hidden in the touchscreen – the Forester uses a pleasing mix of physical and touchscreen-based controls. You’ll find physical buttons for the temperature adjustment, for example, as well as proper volume and tuning knobs. 

Unfortunately, the full set of climate controls is on the touchscreen, but at least they’re always on show in the lower section of the screen so you don’t have to dive into any sub-menus to make quick adjustments.

Unusually, the Forester doesn’t get a full-width digital driver's display like most rivals. Instead, it gets two physical dials for the rev counter and speedometer. The dials are easy to read on the move but the small screen between them shows far too much information in a very small space.

Overall, the interior feels solid and there’s a good variety of materials used on the dashboard, with stitching and fake leather. But while it feels like it will stand the test of time, it has nothing on the plusher-feeling interiors of a Mazda CX-5 or Volvo XC40.

"I really like the utilitarian feel of the Forester’s interior. Everything feels like it’s been designed to be as practical and durable as possible, which can’t be said for a lot of family SUVs." – George Hill, Used Car Writer

Even if you’re well over 6ft tall you won't struggle for head or leg room in the front of a Subaru Forester. Its boxy shape yields loads more head room than you get in a Mazda CX-5 and it gives the front interior a pleasantly airy feel.

Storage space is plentiful, with enough room for a large bottle in the door cubby area, two centrally mounted cupholders, a storage tray under the centre armrest and a wireless phone-charger below the infotainment touchscreen.

Back-seat passengers get plenty of leg room and space for their feet, with loads of space for a 6ft adult sitting behind someone of the same height. Thanks to the width of the interior, you can easily fit three people in the rear, and the flat floor means the middle-seat passenger gets plenty of foot space without straddling a large gearbox tunnel.

If you need to carry more people, it’s worth noting that there’s no seven-seat version of the Forester, as there is with the Skoda Kodiaq. If that's what you're looking for see our best seven-seaters page.

Up to five occupants do, though, get plenty of storage, with map pockets on the back of each front seat. The back doors can each take a large bottle, plus there's a useful cubby higher up that doubles as a handle for pulling the door shut.

The Forester's rear doors open up to a near 90-degree angle to give you better access, which is likely to be helpful if you need to strap a baby into a child car seat for example.

The back seats don’t do anything particularly clever – they simply split 60/40 and fold flat. The seats of the Hyundai Tucson and Kia Sportage split in a more useful 40/20/40 configuration while the ones in the Ford Kuga can slide and recline.

The Forester has a 508-litre boot capacity. That's less space than in some family SUVs – including the CX-5, Sportage and Tucson – but enough to swallow the average family's shopping or a couple of buggies. It also has a low loading lip and a wide boot opening, which makes it easy to load and unload.

"I don't think you can argue with the amount of space inside the Forester. You don’t get seven seats as you do in some rivals but five people will be very comfortable." – Lawrence Cheung, New Cars Editor

No version of the Subaru Forester is particularly cheap, with even the entry-level Limited trim costing as much as the top-spec versions of the Hyundai Tucson, Kia Sportage and Mazda CX-5.

Things don’t get much better when you look at depreciation, with the Forester predicted to lose its value faster than any of its family SUV rivals. That can have an effect on PCP finance rates and push up monthly payments.

The Forester lags behind in terms of running costs too. Officially it can average 34.9mpg, which is way below the mild-hybrid versions of the Sportage (44.8mpg) and Tucson (44.1mpg). Indeed, you can buy one of those rivals in more efficient regular hybrid form for less than a Forester.

Company car users might want to look elsewhere too. With CO2 emissions of 183g/km, the Forester attracts a higher BIK tax rate than its rivals. You'll be even better off with a plug-in hybrid (PHEV) version of a rival or, for the biggest tax savings, an electric SUV.

Given the pricey nature of the Forester, it’s good that even the entry-level Limited trim comes with plenty of standard kit.

In fact, it’s the one we’d go for because it keeps the price down but comes with 18in alloy wheels, automatic LED headlights, automatic windscreen wipers, heated and electrically adjustable front seats, wireless phone-charging, keyless entry and start, dual-zone air-conditioning and adaptive cruise control.

Stepping up to mid-spec Field trim adds a few extras, including faux-leather seats, a powered tailgate, rear privacy glass and a heated steering wheel. It also gets a few exterior styling changes and sat-nav.

Top-spec Touring gets blacked out exterior trim and 19in alloy wheels. It also adds a panoramic glass sunroof and heated rear seats, but it’s too expensive to recommend.

The Forester was awarded a full five-star rating when it was safety tested by the experts at Euro NCAP in 2024. It comes with a good amount of standard safety kit, including lane-keeping assist, rear cross-traffic alert, automatic emergency braking (AEB) and blind-spot monitoring.

Subaru didn't feature in our 2024 What Car? Reliability Survey but the previous year it came 27th out of the 32 brands ranked, which is not a great showing.

The Forester comes with a three-year, 60,000-mile warranty, which is pretty standard. A couple of brands are more generous, with Kia offering a seven-year warranty and Toyota up to 10 years if you regularly service your car at an approved centre.

"I find the efficiency of the Forester’s engine disappointing, especially because it's a mild hybrid. For comparison, the Kia Sportage is available as a mild hybrid, a regular hybrid and a plug-in hybrid – and they're all cheaper to run." – Oliver Young, Reviewer

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