Volkswagen Golf GTI long-term test

The car Volkswagen Golf GTI Clubsport 2.0 TSI 300 PS | Run by Darren Moss, deputy editor

Why it’s here To see whether VW’s iconic hot hatch remains the cream of the crop in its latest form

Needs to Be fast and fun, yet pleasingly frugal, be family friendly, and comfortable on long trips

Miles covered 4236 Price £46,583 Target Price £41,333 Price as tested £48,275 Official economy 37.4mpg Test economy 33.4mpg  Private price now £35,360 Dealer price now £32,777 Running costs (Exlc. depreciation) Fuel £675

30 July 2025 – Ode to an icon

When I began running the Volkswagen Golf GTI as my company car, I had visions about racing away from traffic lights, of taking it along to modified car meetings and, perhaps, causing the odd window to shake with noise as I drove past. In short, all of the things which, as a younger chap, I thought hot hatches were all about.

Through driving one over the past few months, though, my perception has changed. Yes, the Golf GTI has given me enormous fun, but it’s also been comfortable and practical for family life. And driving my GTI back-to-back with some of its forebears shows just how far my car has come.

In early GTIs, things were a bit more visceral than they are today. There’s more of a sense of connection to the process of driving, perhaps partly because most have a traditional manual gearbox rather than the automatic of my car. Yet I prefer the latter, because it’s allowed me to take control when I want to, using the paddles on the steering wheel, but hand back the reins when I’m trudging through city traffic. And while the older GTIs give you more feedback through the steering wheel going through corners, my car’s well weighted, accurate steering always let me place the car exactly where I wanted it. 

Where those older GTIs have one up on my car, though, is with their noise. The raw, guttural throb of their exhaust notes is better than the partly digitally synthesised note of my car. If I were to have my time with the Golf GTI again, I’d be tempted to choose the optional Akrapovic exhaust, which comes as part of a £3360 Performance Package gets you 19in wheels and an increased speed limit of 167mph.

The rest of the options I chose when speccing up my car were very useful. The Area View monitor, for example, ensured that I didn’t have to report any embarrassing car park scrapes, while the panoramic glass sunroof let plenty of air and light into the rear of the car, which helped to keep the children comfortable on longer trips.

Speaking of those, I found the Golf GTI to be incredibly well suited to mega-miles journeys. The adaptive suspension did a good job of soaking up all the lumps and bumps the M40 could throw at it, and once I turned on to countryside lanes, I could put the GTI into Sport mode and enjoy a more focussed drive.

When I wasn’t hot-footing it between London and where my girlfriend used to live in Stoke, the Golf GTI also helped me to move house. This isn’t my car’s natural stomping ground, but my car’s 374-litre boot swallowed furniture, clothes and even a standing lamp with ease. It would have been even better, though, if the rear seats lay completely flat when you fold them down, like they do in the Honda Civic Type R. 

The seats were one entry on a very short list of niggles. I didn’t get on with Volkswagen’s IDA smart assistant, for example, which ignored me just as often as it complied with my simple requests. And while the Golf’s touch-sensitive dashboard controls look good in a showroom, in practice they’re fiddly, require far too much concentration to operate, and end up covered in fingerprints and dust. Proper, physical buttons, even just for the climate, would be much appreciated.

But truthfully, none of those small annoyances detracted from my time with the GTI. My lasting impression is of a car with two distinct personalities. On the one hand, it was a comfortable family cruiser, with space enough for two adults, two children and all of the detritus which a typical outing incurs. Yet when the right moment came, it could morph into one of the most engaging hot hatches on the market. I enjoyed accessing the Clubsport’s heady reserves of power whenever I could, be it to overtake slower vehicles, or to make a clean getaway from the traffic lights.

And despite that varied use, I don’t think my ending fuel economy figure of 33.4mpg is too bad. Indeed, I think it shows that so long as you’re not looking to bury your right foot at every opportunity, a hot hatch shouldn’t be that much more expensive to run than a regular family car.

The GTI formula may have been a little diluted over the years, then. The latest incarnation might be a bit wider and flabbier than what came before. But is it still worthy of the GTI name which so excited me as a child? Absolutely.

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