Peugeot 2008 review
The Peugeot 2008 is an SUV you can buy with your heart and your head. It looks cool, is cheap to run, easy to drive and has a big boot. But it’s a shame the back seats aren’t roomier.
- Cash
- £20,414
- Monthly
- £250*
- Used
- £15,995
What's good
What's not so good
Find out more about the Peugeot 2008
Is the Peugeot 2008 a good car?
The Peugeot 2008 is a small SUV with a bold look, comprising strong colour schemes and a variety of slashes and creases that make rivals such as the Volkswagen T-Cross look more than a little tedious.
If small SUVs are more rugged versions of small cars, then the Peugeot 2008 is a 208 that’s kitted out for a paintballing trip. It has the same great tech you get in the 208 hatch, but is better prepared for some diving about in the mud with its chunkier tyres and raised driving position. Brilliant. So good, in fact, it won the Best Small SUV category in 2021 carwow Car of the Year Awards.
And the French flair loses no momentum when you get inside. It has two massive infotainment screens and a bold design. Not to mention interior quality that feels up there with the best SUVs in this price range.
Those screens are worthy of special mention, though. The first is a fairly conventional centre touchscreen that is used to operate everything from the sat-nav to the heater.
The second screen is more interesting and replaces conventional instruments behind the steering wheel. It has a 3D effect with visible depth and it’s also fully customisable with slick animations when you switch between views. It’s a neat piece of kit no other car this price offers up.
We think the best version of the Peugeot 2008 is the 130hp 1.2-litre petrol in GT-Line trim. Click on the green button to the right to see what you could save!
And not many do better than the Peugeot for front-seat room. It will easily accommodate two tall adults and there’s plenty of scope to move the seat and steering wheel, though lumbar adjustment – which helps keep you comfy on long drives – isn’t even an option.
Tall passengers will have their knees brushing the front seats if they’re sitting behind someone else who’s tall. On the upside, there is plenty of head and foot room.
Hit the road and you’ll find the 2008 is a great all-rounder. Its steering is light in town, but weights up to give you more confidence at faster speeds. The slick six-speed manual gearbox (an eight-speed auto is optional) is the perfect match for the Peugeot’s sporty small steering wheel and, with little body lean to speak of, it’s a fun car to hustle about.
That’s particularly true if you choose one of the three PureTech petrol engines – the 130hp version being the pick of the bunch because it is both sprightly and cheap to run. Want to eke out as much fuel economy as possible? Then you’ll want the 100hp diesel which makes up for its noisy running with punchy performance yet great miles to the gallon.
But what makes the 2008 stand out from alternatives is its eye-catching styling that proves cheap-to-run and practical family cars can still be desirable. For that reason alone, it’s worth shortlisting against cars like the Seat Arona and VW T-Cross.
If you’re sold on the idea, head over to our Peugeot deals pages for the best possible prices.
How practical is it?
The Peugeot 2008 has loads of room for a young family and a boot that’ll happily swallow all their kit. That said, rear-seat legroom is tight if you have to carry four tall adults.
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What's it like to drive?
The Peugeot 2008 is light and easy to drive in town, comfortable on the motorway and grippy in corners, although the extra performance and cost of the top-of-the-range petrol isn’t needed.
What's it like inside?
The Peugeot 2008’s wacky cabin and huge screens look like they’re from another planet. Although, you might have to be an alien to know how to operate them.
Style
Style is not something the 2008’s interior has in short supply – in fact, it looks great.
For a kick-off you get a pair of huge infotainment screens that make the displays in other cars look like tiny calculator screens. Quality up front is also up with the best in class with soft materials used everywhere but the lower parts of the interior.
Then there’s Peugeot distinctive iCockpit cabin design. Instead of forcing you to look at the instruments through the wheel, Peugeot has another way – fit an unnaturally small steering wheel and place all the instruments above it. Sounds great in theory, but in practice – say you have your seat set low and the steering wheel in its highest position – your view is often more restricted than it would be in a conventional setup.
And that’s not the only part of the Peugeot’s interior that prioritises form over functionality, observe exhibit B – the strip of switches that run across the centre of the dash. They have a stylish appearance and an expensive metal feel, let down by the fact they – and the touch-sensitive buttons above them – are a real fiddle to operate.
Then there’s the drive mode switch that’s located behind your hip on the centre console making it tricky to feel for if, say, you’re trying to select Sport while cornering on a decent piece of country road.
Choose a VW T-Cross or a SEAT Arona and you’ll find their cabins are paragons of sensible, but also boring and drab by comparison.
There are six trim levels on offer, called Active, Allure, Active Premium, Allure Premium, GT Line and GT.
Active cars feature 16-inch alloys, air-conditioning, electric heated door mirrors, rear parking sensors and LED headlights, while Premium adds a self-dipping rearview mirror and sat-nav. Allure adds larger wheels, climate control, power folding mirrors and leather-effect trim. The Premium version has the 3D iCockpit and 3D Navigation.
GT Line cars come with 18-inch alloys, heated front seats, twin exhaust pipes and black trim highlights, and GT cars add black 18-inch alloys, keyless entry and start, adaptive cruise control and an opening panoramic sunroof.
Infotainment
Top-of-the-range cars get a 10-inch centre touchscreen and a digital display behind the steering wheel. 2008s will get Apple CarPlay and Android Auto fitted as standard, so you can use the easy-to-navigate menus of your smartphone on the car’s big screen.
That’s a good thing because Peugeot’s own touchscreen isn’t the easiest to use. First to the positives though, the 10-inch centre screen is clear and colourful and it takes only two button presses to get from the main screen to inputting a postcode. The sat-nav computes routes quickly but there is a bit of lag if you try to pinch or swipe on maps like you would on your smartphone.
It’s the lack of intuitiveness that’s the bigger problem, though. There’s a confusing mixture of buttons, switches and touch-sensitive knobs and while there are hotkeys for some functions – such as air recirculation – others require a deep dive into the infotainment screen. Not so easy when you’re driving.
The optional screen behind the steering wheel features 3D graphics – like a head-up display over a digital background – which look cool, and the slick animations are on another level from any other car like this.
Peugeot 2008 colours
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Metallic - Orange fusion
- Free
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Special solid - Bianca white
- From £300
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Additional metallic - Cumulus grey
- From £575
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Additional metallic - Nera black
- From £575
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Additional metallic - Nimbus grey
- From £575
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Pearlescent - Pearlescent white
- From £725
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Signature - Elixir red
- From £725
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Signature - Vertigo blue
- From £725
- Cash
- £20,414
- Monthly
- £250*
- Used
- £15,995
Build your own 2008 on carwow
Save on average £2,059 off RRP
*Please contact the dealer for a personalised quote, including terms and conditions. Quote is subject to dealer requirements, including status and availability. Illustrations are based on personal contract hire, 9 month upfront fee, 48 month term and 8000 miles annually, VAT included.