Land Rover Discovery Sport 2019 review: SE Si4

The exterior is outstanding. It’s not a large SUV, this one actually looks quite compact for the amount of space it has inside. The front grille has just the right blend of rugged and stylish. It’s clean design and sleek lines give the car a sophisticated finish. 

The car I drove had Land Rover’s two-tone colour scheme with the roof in black, but that's an extra and will cost $970. Still, I think the exterior makes the car look far more expensive than it actually is.

The exterior is outstanding, especially with Land Rover’s two-tone colour scheme. (image credit: Dean McCartney)

The interior however, is on the basic end of luxe, in that everything looks polished and extremely well finished, but there are no dazzling bits of design to make you go ‘ah’ when you open the doors. 

There’s a matt black finish around the centre console area that will wear well and won’t show up dirty fingerprints, and if you close the panel on top of the cupholders it has a high-shine finish, but apart from that everything is quite subdued. A bit of ‘you get what you pay for’, really.

The interior is on the basic end of luxe with a matte black finish around the centre console. (image credit: Dean McCartney)

As standard you’ll get perforated leather seats which look great and are comfortable to sit in with 10-way power operated front seat adjustment, and an ultra-smooth leather steering wheel that feels fabulous to drive with all day. 

You can option up from there to 12-way power operated front seats (but I’m not sure the extra two ways are worth the $1130 it costs), and heated front and rear seats will set you back $1310.

A clearly visible head-up display in the windscreen costs an extra $1590, or you could just live with the dashboard which is partly digital and looks quite swish, for nothing. 

Still, it’s hard to complain about this interior, you certainly don’t feel hard done by as everything is functional and looks good. 

The interior feels breezy, whether you’re sitting in the front or back. Legroom and headroom are great in the front, even if you’re tall and there is so much space in the back seats. The rear seats can actually move forward and back, depending on how much space you need in the boot, to give either section more room. So it’s customisable depending on your needs for that day. 

Boot space is also excellent, with enough room to fit a pram, groceries or sporting equipment. At 981 litres (which is likely to be measured up to the roof), it’s plenty of room for a growing family (and the boot will also house two seats if you choose to option them in, for $2100). 

Boot space is also excellent, at 981 litres. (image credit: Dean McCartney)

Things like a full-size spare tyre (another growing rarity in this category) make all the difference if you like long distance road trips. There are two cupholders in the front, two in the back, a decent sized centre storage bin, a spot to throw your phone in the front and quite large storage in each door, complete with a section for large bottles. 

Rear passengers get their own air vents which are on the edges of each side, rather than in the centre, and were certainly appreciated by the kids when driven for two hours in 37-degree heat.  

The Discovery Sport has Land Rover’s signature circular gearshift, and while it takes a short while to get used to it, once you do it’s really easy to use. The boot has a power operated tailgate that you can open and close with a button on the key which I find super handy, and things like auto wipers actually work well, too.

As standard you’ll get all the safety biggies: front airbags for driver and front passenger plus side curtain airbags that extend to the back row, AEB, lane departure warnings and ISOFIX points on the outer two rear seats. However, you’ll have to option in blind spot monitoring and reverse traffic detection for $1210 if you want those. 

There are ISOFIX points on the outer two rear seats. (image credit: Dean McCartney)

The Land Rover Discovery Sport SE starts at $60,255, all the extras that were added to my car included the ones I’ve mentioned plus a few more, and the car as tested ended up at $80,435, plus on road costs. 

Fuel consumption is a fairly average 8.0L/100km. There’s a three year/100,000km warranty and service intervals are every 12 months or 16,000km. You can pre-purchase six years of services for around $1500.