Ford Puma Review & Prices

The Ford Puma is a small SUV that’s one of the best-selling cars in the UK. It’s also Ford’s smallest car since the demise of the brilliant Fiesta, so it’s a good thing that it contains quite a lot of that car’s DNA.

While it’s a bit sad that the Fiesta is no more, the Puma makes a good substitute for most people as it’s still a fun-to-drive, characterful small car – just one that’s a bit more grown-up and practical. It’s a bit like an old friend who’s grown up a bit since having kids - they might have swapped a weekend drinking Frosty Jack’s at Reading Festival for under-7s rugby and parents evenings, but they’re still a good laugh.

The Puma was launched in 2019 and received a major facelift in 2024 - one that gave it a whole new interior as well as an updated look for the front grille. The latest model can be considered against great alternatives such as the Volkswagen T-Cross, Renault Captur and the Carwow Award-winning Toyota Yaris Cross.

The Puma isn’t massive for passengers - three adults will be cramped in the rear and anyone over six feet tall will struggle for leg and head-room. But it’s spacious enough for child seats, and fitting them in is easy thanks to wide-opening doors and easily-visible ISOFIX points.

It claws back points with its boot. Not only is it large, at 456 litres (a whole litre bigger than the VW T-Cross with its seats pushed right forwards) but it’s a nice unobstructed space with a usefully light load cover. Underneath the floor you also get the Puma’s signature ‘Megabox’, which is an 80-litre storage compartment with a wipe-clean surface and a drain plug at the bottom.

While the branding may be a bit more impressive than the reality, the Megabox is actually really useful - providing a great place to keep muddy or smelly items in a genuinely hose-down environment. You can even fill it with ice and use it as a drinks cooler. Or, tip the false floor up, and the Megabox adds to the boot’s loading height enough that you can carry a set of golf clubs upright.

The interior was the area of the Puma which got the most attention lavished on it in the 2024 facelift. It replaced the rather old-fashioned-looking Fiesta-inspired interior with one that’s much more modern. It’s dominated by a huge 12.0-inch touchscreen which replaces most of the physical buttons.

While it feels suitably high-tech, the design is totally uninspiring, and the materials are uniformly cheap and scratchy. It’s nowhere near as nice as a Volkswagen T-Cross or a Peugeot 2008 inside - both of those cars feel much more premium.

The Puma comes with a choice of two engines, both 1.0-litre three-cylinders. They feel pretty peppy with a sporty exhaust note, and that’s matched to quick, accurate steering. It makes the Puma feel much sportier than most alternatives - a Toyota Yaris Cross or Skoda Kamiq both focus on comfort rather than dynamism, whereas it’s the other way for the Puma.

If you’re interested, you can get a great price with our best Ford Puma deals right here on Carwow. You can see other great Ford deals, too, or search for a used Ford for sale here. And remember that Carwow’s the best place to sell your old car, where our network of trusted dealers will bid to get you the best price.

Ford asks about the same for the basic Puma as Toyota does for the entry Yaris Cross. The two cars are pretty closely comparable in terms of size and practicality, so that’s fine but the problem is that the Toyota is a full-on hybrid, whereas the Puma is merely a ‘mild-hybrid’ which is basically another way of saying that it has a clever stop-start system. That makes the Toyota arguably better value for money thanks to the running costs benefits.

Unquestionably better value for money are the Skoda Kamiq (which in fairness does come with an engine that’s 30hp less powerful in basic trim) and the Renault Captur (which, again, is much cheaper in basic form but is 35hp worse off). That’s also true for the VW T-Cross, and the Puma has the biggest boot of any of them so at least it has that to offer for its higher price tag.

The Ford Puma is easy to drive around town and fun in the corners, but it's not the most refined car at higher speeds

In town

The Puma has light steering and a nice — if slightly notchy — gear change, so it’s pretty gentle on the nerves when driving around town. It’s basically a Fiesta underneath, so things like the weight of the clutch pedal, and the feel of the very powerful brakes are really good, and make the Puma very friendly and easy to drive.

Another thing the Puma inherits from the Fiesta is a tight turning circle, so urban u-turns are a doddle. There’s an optional rear parking camera with a 180-degree view that’s really helpful when parking, which is good as the rear visibility is only OK — a common issue for small SUVs such as this with a fairly small rear window. It doesn’t help that you don’t really sit up all that high, especially when compared to the seating positions of alternatives. You just feel like you’re sitting in a conventional hatchback.

The ride quality is pretty firm, too. You certainly feel urban bumps more than you would in, say, a Peugeot 2008 or a Renault Captur and the problem is worse again for ST-Line models because they get stiffer springs and dampers for the sportier specification level.

On the motorway

The Puma’s not the quietest car at speed, but then you hardly expect Mercedes S-Class refinement at this price. It’s absolutely fine on the motorway, with really little enough to complain about. The modest 1.0-litre turbo three-cylinder engine might not sound like much, but the 155hp version picks up strongly at motorway speeds when you need to get a move on, and even the 125hp version feels a little more muscular than you might expect, thanks to the extra little bit of assistance that the mild-hybrid system adds. Brilliant on the motorway? No, but entirely acceptable.

On a twisty road

Twisty roads are where the Puma really comes to life. The Fiesta that it’s based on is a sharp-driving little hatchback, but the Puma’s longer wheelbase (the gap between the front and rear wheels) and stiffer suspension give it a more aggressive, more up-and-at-‘em feel to it. It’s really good fun on a proper British B-road, and is arguably slightly more enjoyable to drive than the Fiesta. The only problem is, again, that ride quality. Although it does smooth out a bit at speed, on a road with lots of bumps you’re going to get seriously jostled and bounced around the place. The properly sporty ST version, with its 200hp engine, is even more thrilling on the right road, but it’s also even more firmly sprung and it has really hard, tight-fitting seats.

Clever boot, but hard plastics and the figure-hugging seats on sports models won’t be for everyone

The Puma is fine up-front for practicality. There’s a decent storage area in front of the gear lever and no fewer than three cup holders too. The door bins are a bit small, but acceptable enough for the type of car (although they’re made of very hard plastic so anything in there is going to rattle plenty). The glovebox is fine, and some models get an extra storage box under the front seat armrest, which is useful. Sportier models get quite narrow-fitting bucket seats, which aren’t the most comfortable if you’re on the broad side…

Space in the back seats

It’s not a very roomy car in the back, the Puma. It’s OK if you’re only trying to carry two people, but Ford may as well not bother fitting a middle rear seatbelt, as there’s definitely not enough room for three adults in the back. Three kids might just fit, but you’re going to struggle when it comes to bulky child car safety seats. That said, getting two child seats in is easy enough as the doors open wide, and there are ISOFIX anchors in the outer two rear seats.

Headroom isn’t great, and if you get a model with the optional panoramic glass roof, then it’s even worse again. A Skoda Kamiq has the Puma well beaten for rear seat space.

Boot space

The Puma’s boot makes up a bit for the back seats. At 456 litres, it has one single, solitary litre extra compared to a Volkswagen T-Cross (and you have to have the T-Cross’ back seat pushed right forward to get that much space). It’s a big, square space and although there is a slight loading lip, it’s not too bad. You get some helpful tie-down points, luggage hooks, and a 12-volt socket too. The light, flexible luggage cover is easy to use too, and stores under the floor when you don’t need it.

The rear seats split-fold in 60:40 ratio, and while the floor isn’t completely flat up to the front seats, you do get 1,216-litres of space. Annoyingly, though, the rear seatbelts get easily trapped when you’re putting the seats back up.

The Puma’s party trick is the ‘Megabox’. A silly name for a useful 80-litre storage box that sits under the boot floor (and which means you don’t get a spare wheel), the Megabox is designed for either hiding away valuables, or for carrying tall items like… a lamp? A potted plant? An upright set of golf clubs? It also has a drain plug, so if you’ve filled your Megabox with something grubby and smelly — sports gear or mud-encrusted wellies maybe — you can just pull the plug and hose it all out. Which means you could also leave the plug in, fill the Megabox with warm water, and use it as a portable foot spa. What other SUV can offer that, eh?

Blocky looks might be to your taste - but the cheap plastics definitely won’t be

The Puma’s 2024 update brought with it a totally new dashboard to replace the old Fiesta-derived one that went before. Unfortunately, while technology levels took an uptick, design, ease-of-use and material quality all took a dive in the process.

The dashboard centres around a huge 12.0-inch touchscreen which almost seems too big for the space it has to occupy. It has to be big as it contains almost all of the Puma’s controls - a few shortcut keys underneath it are all you get outside of the steering wheel buttons.

This means that even your climate controls are operated through the touchscreen. The screen itself is big, clear and quite responsive, but it’s still a pain trying to hit some of the smaller onscreen buttons when you’re on the move. Luckily Ford’s SYNC software doesn’t have too many of these, certainly not as many as you get in an MG ZS.

You also get a standard 10.0-inch digital gauge cluster. The design around this is particularly uninspired, though, almost as if it was an afterthought. All the information you need is there, it’s just not as attractively displayed as you get with a Volkswagen T-Cross’ digital gauges. Further spoiling matters is the steering wheel. It feels like the same one from the Ford Transit Custom (minus the clever tilting tabletop feature) and as a result it seems far too big for the little Puma. Its square shape is a bit bizarre, too.

Poor material quality is another bugbear. While items like the steering wheel and gear shifter are soft and premium to the touch, the dash plastics themselves are a combination of fingerprint-susceptible piano black and hard plastic with an unpleasant veined texture. Compared with the solid build of a Yaris Cross or the plush finish of a Peugeot 2008, it’s rather jarring. At least the Puma’s seats are comfortable and, on higher-spec models, swathed in pleasant faux-suede upholstery.

The Puma is sometimes referred to as a hybrid, but it’s not really. It’s not like a Toyota hybrid that allows the car to drive on just electric power for small bursts. It’s a ‘mild-hybrid’ which means it gets a tiny rechargeable battery which allows the stop-start system to shut the engine off earlier in around-town traffic, and keep it off for longer. It also runs some of the car’s electrical systems to take a bit of strain off the petrol engine, so that helps a bit with economy, and it can also boost the engine’s power and torque just a little when you’re accelerating hard.

It doesn’t actually add up to an economy figure that’s all that brilliant, though. The 125hp version of the 1.0-litre ‘EcoBoost’ three-cylinder engine quotes a best-effort of 52.3mpg on the combined fuel economy test, but you might struggle to reach that in real-world conditions. The 155hp is thirstier still — an official 50.4mpg, but we only got 42mpg out of it on test. The 200hp ST version is worse again, 41.5mpg is claimed but if you’re using its performance then you’ll do much worse than that. A Toyota Yaris Cross Hybrid has a more sophisticated hybrid system and it can do better than 60mpg in real-world conditions. 

At least the mild-hybrid system does keep emissions under some control — The basic 125hp engine has emissions of 122g/km, so you’ll pay £190 for your first year’s road fund licence.

The Puma scored five stars when tested by Euro NCAP in 2019, but a retest in 2022 dropped this to four stars. That doesn't mean that it's got any less safe, of course - just that the goalposts have moved. The scores are therefore pretty mediocre - just 75 per cent in the adult occupant category, and 69 per cent in the safety assist category.

Basic Pumas come with rear parking sensors, forward collision warning with automatic braking that can detect pedestrians and cyclists, cruise control with a speed limiter that can rear road signs and automatically adjust, lane-keeping steering, and automatic headlights with an automated high-beam system that dips the lights for you at night. Oh, and rain-sensing wipers too. All Pumas also get Ford’s useful ‘QuickClear’ heated windscreen which is a real boon on a frosty day. Higher spec models get radar-guidance for the cruise control, which will keep you a safe distance from the car in front, along with a blind-spot warning that will stop you from pulling out into the path of another car. There’s also an evasive steering feature that can help you steer around danger, swerving you away from a potential collision.

The Puma and Fiesta share almost all their mechanical bits and pieces so in general it should be fine, but do watch for small niggles. The 48-volt mild-hybrid system is pretty new, so we’re not sure how well that lasts in the long term, and some of the cabin trim could be nicer, so it remains to be seen how well that will all hold together. The Puma has had three recalls since it was introduced in early 2020 — one for loose hybrid battery connections; one for problems with the driver’s airbag; and one for a software issue that affects the emergency e-call system.