Skoda Scala 2021 review: Launch Edition

The Scala Launch Edition, as its name suggests, is an initial run of well-equipped cars at a sharp introductory price. At $35,990, it's not mucking about, especially considering the base 110 TSI is $28,990 with an automatic transmission.

On the Launch Edition, you get 18-inch Vega Aero alloys, leather and synthetic suede seats, power driver's seat, sat nav, auto LED headlights and wipers, wireless CarPlay (Android Auto is USB at the moment but a software update will fix that later in 2021), heated seats front and rear and auto-parking.

Another addition to the Launch spec is the 9.2-inch touchscreen (up from 8.0-inches) with wireless CarPlay. (image: Peter Anderson)

That's on top of a powered tailgate, reverse parking sensors, adaptive cruise control, wireless phone charger, keyless entry and start, leather steering wheel, dual-zone climate control, panoramic sunroof and a sports chassis picked up from the Monte Carlo and much of which is also on the base model.

Another addition to the Launch spec is the 9.2-inch touchscreen (up from 8.0-inches) with wireless CarPlay to go with the wireless charging and the eight-speaker stereo. It's a really good system, with a snappy interface, but it did keep forgetting to load CarPlay. It turned out it was silently disabling it and I had to go menu-diving to sort it out. It never really settled in, so one hopes that on the car's next visit for a service, a software flash would sort that out.

The launch edition comes with auto LED headlights. (image: Peter Anderson)

This kind of links up with the "what is it?" question. As is quite common across the Skoda range, the company crams a lot of space into any given footprint. In this case you start with a massive 467 litres of space. This figure wallops pretty much everything in its class, and in the adjacent class of SUV as well. Skoda also throws a range of nets and clever ideas, like a boot floor you can flip between carpet and rubber, depending on the filth you're loading into the boot. The only downside of this huge boot is that there's a bit of a loading lip, but I can live with mid-size sedan boot space in a smaller hatch for that. If you put the rear seats down, you'll have 1410 litres.

Rear-seat space is also excellent for the size, again walloping most of the obvious competition for knee and legroom while delivering decent headroom. We tricked our six-foot-three son into trying out the back seat with the promise of ramen. He was perfectly happy and noticed the inclusion of heated rear seats and air-conditioning vents. Three across is the usual squeeze but two adults should be quite happy back there.

Also included are two ISOFIX points and three top-tether restraints.

The boot starts with a massive 467 litres of space. (image: Peter Anderson)

Across the range you will find the very capable 1.5-litre four-cylinder turbo. Driving the front wheels through a seven-speed twin-clutch automatic, you can access 110kW at 6000rpm and 250Nm between 1500 and 3500rpm. That torque figure is especially chunky for its size and the class.

Across the range you will find the very capable 1.5-litre four-cylinder turbo. (image: Peter Anderson)

The twin-clutch Scala's official combined cycle figure of 5.5L/100km (curiously the manual came out better at 4.9L/100km) looks pretty good, but my week with the car, which was mostly suburban running, returned a Matt Campbell-matching 7.4L/100km (indicated) which is not bad going. I was also driving it enthusiastically because, well, you'll find out.

Skoda offers a five-year/unlimited-kilometre warranty, which puts it on a level playing field with its VW sibling and well ahead of its other sibling, Audi, as well as  other, pricier European rivals.

You can pay for your servicing as you go, averaging out at a high-ish $443 per 12 months/15,000km visit over the first six years/90,000km (whichever comes first). It's not an outrageous sum - and Korean turbo cars aren't far off that figure if you crunch the numbers - but it's worth knowing because Skoda offers a pre-payment for three years/45,000km ($800, $339 saving), or five years/75,000km ($1200, saves $1001) bringing the average down to an almost Toyota-like  price. Bit of a slam dunk, really.

If you're from the future and reading this to suss out the Scala as as second-hand buy, you're in luck - if the car you're looking at doesn't already have a pre-paid service pack applied and has already had its first service, you can pay $1300 for four years, saving you almost a third off the pay-as-you-go prices.