The Best hot hatches 2025 – the most fun, and the one to avoid

A good hot hatch will have you grinning from ear to ear as you thread it along a winding country road, revelling in its pulse-quickening acceleration, its evocative soundtrack and its agile handling – a truly great hot hatch will do all of that, yet will also be comfortable and practical transport for your family.

Unlike a full-blown sports car, a hot hatch still needs to perform the duties of a regular family car, but on top of that, it needs to be exciting to drive. It's a tall order by any measure, but thankfully there are plenty of hot hatches on the market to choose from – with a variety of power types. Gone are the days when this class was ruled by petrol power, because some of the best hot hatches you can buy today are fully electric.

To sort the best from the rest, our experienced team of road testers have spent thousands of hours at the wheel of every hot hatch on the market, testing them over hundreds of miles both on public roads, and back to back against key rivals at our private test track. We've assessed their performance, handling and that all-important grin factor, but also focussed on the areas which matter most to family car buyers – namely comfort, practicality and reliability.

In this story, then, we've listed the 10 hot hatches we think best deserve your money, and the car which takes our top spot is our class champion. We've also revealed the hot hatch which we think you should avoid, and answered some of the most common hot hatchback questions at the bottom of this page.

If you want to lean more about any of the cars featured here, just click the links to read our in-depth reviews, or see the latest offers via our free New Car Deals service.

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