Today's car review..the Mazda 3

In our daily car review today, we are going to focus our attention on the compact hatchback market and a very special vehicle that is currently enjoying its third lifecycle on the road coming to us from Japanese manufacturer Mazda. The car that we have decided to focus our attention on today is the Mazda 3 or the Axela as it is known in the brands home country of Japan. The '3' has been a strong fixture in the Mazda line up since 2003 and has gone to war with some of the biggest and best in competition with vehicles going head to head with models such as the likes of the Kia Ceed and the Vauxhall Astra. Our post today looks into the specifications that came along with the vehicle in the earlier days and we also check out the third generation car that is currently enjoying its life on the road.

A look back in time at the Mazda 3

So if we go back to the beginning right now, we start in the year 2003. Mazda were known for offering a great range of options with the very first model and this was demonstrated by a total of seven engine selections and the options of both automatic and manual transmission systems. Both four and five speed transmissions are offered in automatic form where as the five and six were also available in manual setups.

The second addition into the range was launched in 2008 and offered six engines which contained both petrol and diesel formats carrying from 1.6 litres right the way upto 2.5 litres. The same automatic and manual transmission systems were both offered much in the same way they were with the first lifecycle for the car. If we skip forward by four years to 2012, the '3' received some updates which included the companies SKYACTIV engine technology for the very first time.

Now we arrive at the model that is currently enjoying life on the road. This latest generation vehicle was put on sale in 2013 and received some big changes compared to what we are used to seeing on the model range. Packing only three petrol engines carrying either 1.5 litres, two litres of 2.5 litres we see that all three models are offered in SKYACTIV engine form. Only two transmission systems are now offered with the car packing either a manual or automatic transmission available in just the six speed gear setup. With LED lighting, a leather multi functioning steering wheel and some decent interior leg and head room, we see that Mazda know what it takes to keep their customers happy and maintain a firm place for highly rated vehicles on the European market.

How much does the Mazda 3 range generally sell for?

We are delighted to make you aware that prices for the current '3' range kick off from a figure of £14,805 for the entry level hatchback model. However if you look at the other end of the spectrum to the range topping model, you can find a price tag of £23,340 for the MPS model.