Key considerations
- Available for £22,500
- 2.0-litre four-cylinder petrol turbo, front- or all-wheel drive
- 296hp hatch, 306hp AWD estate
- Tough, quick, stylish in the right colours, well-built
- Estate's 0-62mph time starts with a 4
- Strong reliability but annoying infotainment
Who remembers the days when it was thought to be impossible to put more than 200hp through the front wheels of a car? We do, but things have moved on somewhat since then, as demonstrated by the front-drive 296hp Cupra Leon that Seat put out under its new performance sub-brand in 2020.
The Cupra Leon made its debut at the 2020 Geneva show, or at least it would have done if the Geneva show hadn’t been cancelled by COVID-19. It was therefore virtually launched alongside the Cupra Formentor, the first model to be developed exclusively by the Cupra brand. That car went on to become the best-selling CUV (crossover utility vehicle) in its class in Europe. In the UK it outsold the other three Cupra products (Ateca, Born, Leon) combined by a margin of around three to two.
The Leon wasn’t a CUV or even an SUV. It was a five-door hatch or an estate. The 2.0 TSI turbo petrol engine was available in three powers: 242hp, 296hp or (in the estate only) 306hp. From the end of 2020, you could also order a 1.4 TSI 242hp plug-in hybrid version with a 113hp electric motor, a 13kWh battery and an electric-only range of 37 miles, but the versions we’ll be focusing on here are the unassisted 296hp/306hp cars. The hatch was always front-wheel drive but the estate could be had in 4Drive format – in fact, it had to be 4Drive when you had the 306hp engine, which we believe was the only engine you could get for the estate in the UK. Estates in other markets were available with the 296hp motor.
A VAQ electronic limited-slip differential was standard on all of the new Leons, as was a seven-speed DSG dual-clutch automatic gearbox. No manual transmission was offered.
Across the range, levels of standard equipment were high, with full LED lighting both front and rear (where it was ’coast-to-coast’), sports seats and suspension, keyless entry and ambient lighting. The spec levels for the 300/310 models were prefixed by the letters VZ, which was a truncation of the Spanish word veloz, meaning fast, and there were two of them, VZ2 and VZ3. The VZ3 wasn’t massively different to the VZ2, adding leather upholstery, heated front seats, Matrix LED headlights and a Supersports steering wheel.
Confusingly, the VZ5 designation Cupra used for the 390hp Formentor didn’t mean it was two levels above the VZ3. It meant that it had a five-cylinder engine. Leaving that peculiarity aside, the 300/310 Cupra Leons that we’re looking at here served up a tasty recipe of practicality, performance and pointiness.
Although the Cupra Leon was launched in 2020 you won’t find any pre-2021 cars on the UK used market because cars didn’t start to arrive here until the late spring of 2021. The cheapest example we could find for sale in the UK at the time of writing in May 2024 was a 2021 VZ3 hatch with 57,000 miles, up for just over £22,500. If you wanted lower miles than that there was a good choice of cars between £25k and £30k, with the 306hp 4Drive estates starting at about £27.5k. Only one in six Leons you’ll see in the UK will be hatches.
These prices might seem high when you bear in mind the fact that the first VZ2 300 hatches were about £36k before options when they were new less than four years ago. What you have to factor in though is the rise in new car prices over those four years. The recommended retail price of a VZ2 300 now is over £43k. Against that, the £22.5k entry price looks more attractive for used buyers.
SPECIFICATION | CUPRA Leon 300 (2020-)
Engine: 1,984cc inline four turbo petrol 16v
Transmission: 7-speed DSG auto, front-wheel drive
Power (hp): 296@5,300-6,500rpm
Torque (lb ft): 295@2,000-5,200rpm
0-62mph (secs): 5.7 (4.9 Estate 4Drive 310)
Top speed (mph): 155
Weight (kg): 1,490
MPG (WLTP): 35.8-37.2
CO2 (g/km): 171
Wheels (in): 8 x 19
Tyres: 235/35
On sale: 2020 - on
Price new (VZ2): £36,130 (£39,635 estate)
Price now: from £22,500
Note for reference: car weight and power data are hard to pin down with absolute certainty. For consistency, we use the same source for all our guides. We hope the data we use is right more often than it’s wrong. Our advice is to treat it as relative rather than definitive.
ENGINE & GEARBOX
The claimed 0-62mph time for the 300 hatch was 5.7 seconds. Despite only having another ten or so hp the 310 estate was claimed to be quite a bit quicker at 4.9 seconds. By Cupra’s own stats, the estate’s AWD hardware and extra metal at the back of the body added 150kg to the hatch’s kerb weight, not an insignificant amount. Just goes to show what a difference AWD can make to a car’s performance when it’s paired up with a modern twin-clutch gearbox and clever software.
Of course, you need easily deployable power as well as great traction and the Leon had plenty of that. The noise of its engine on fire-up was heavily enhanced by a synthetic overlay in Cupra mode, but that promise wasn’t fulfilled in normal driving. Although there was no soft limiter it didn’t sound that inspiring when it was being revved at a standstill and you didn’t get any popping or banging then either. Pops and bangs did occur when you driving and tapping off from 3,500rpm, which was nice even if you weren’t really sure whether the noises were real or synthesised. Still, you could forgive it most of that chicanery once you were on the move and getting into the motor’s great vibrancy and urge. There were seven ratios in the twin-clutch transmission (with shortened shift times for these cars) but the strength of the kick from 2,000rpm made you wonder just how many of those cogs you actually needed. It was a very nice powertrain.
The 55-litre tank of the 310 estate was 5 litres larger than the hatch’s but its WLTP consumption figures were slightly worse, evening things out. You’d be looking at high 30s in normal to enthusiastic use. There have been very few reports of problems either mechanical or electrical other than the occasional flashing-up of all the warning lights when the 12v battery wasn’t retaining enough charge, a gripe that pops up on many of the cars that we’ve featured in these buying guides.
Cupra does fixed-price servicing in the UK. For 1- to 2-year-old cars the first-year service is £220 and the second year one £263. For cars between two and 15 years old the annual/10k minor is £220 and the major biennial/20k is £428.
CHASSIS
In both hatch or estate forms the new Leon had a 50mm longer wheelbase for better straight-line stability and of course a bit more passenger legroom. The electronic speed-sensitive steering was light to the touch but precise and provided some progressive load-up in corners. The Adaptive Chassis Control system constantly monitored road surfaces and driver inputs.
Through the Dynamic Chassis Control system with its 15 damper settings, you had Comfort, Sport, Cupra and Individual driving modes, accessible via a slider control on the infotainment screen. The MacPherson front, multi-link rear suspension worked well, although the shortened Cupra springs meant that if you wanted anything resembling ride plushness on grotty British B roads you needed to go for Comfort mode, which also brought a softer edge to the main driving responses. The ride in Sport was nibbly and in Cupra eyeball-wobbling. At least there were plenty of permutations through the separation of settings for dampers, steering, engine response and sound, and you had a big button on the centre console to let you disengage the stability control.
The 306hp version of the estate had a 4Drive permanent all-wheel drive system using a fifth-generation Haldex clutch. Relative to the hatch some testers found the estate to be a bit ‘distant’ in terms of its driver experience. In terms of overall agility and lightness of foot, few if any rated either of the Leons above something like a Honda Civic Type R, but among the regular pantheon of hot hatches (and estates) outside of the Honda and maybe the Focus ST the Cupra chassis package more than held its own and it made more sense the faster you went.
On the two-wheel-drive Leons the electronic diff didn’t quite have the same feeling of chewiness out of a corner as a mechanical diff but it did a perfectly good job of minimising traction loss. The solid feel of the Brembo brakes (ventilated all round, 370mm at the front) contributed to the car’s general willingness to please. Cupra VZ3-spec wheels were called ‘Aerodynamic’. Their part-plastic design didn’t go down all that well with serial Cupra buyers in the UK.
BODYWORK
Aerodynamically the new Leon was 8 percent more efficient than the previous model. Metallic paint colours included Candy White, Midnight Black, Urban Silver, Asphalt Blue and Magnetic Tech, which was a grey that could also be had in a matte finish. Desire Red and Graphene Grey were ‘special finishes’, and there was another matte, Petrol Blue, which looked smart especially with the copper-accented wheels that we didn’t appear to get in the UK. Maybe they were worried about their ability to stand up to British salt.
Not everyone was convinced by the front-end look of a ziggy-zaggy grille and straight side fins. The quad exhaust tips that had been long-awaited by Cupra fans were a bit of a letdown too as they weren’t actually connected to the exhaust system.
If you needed to be reminded what car you’d bought, puddle lamps in the mirrors projected the Cupra name on the ground.
INTERIOR
The Cupra Leon cabin was a nice place to be. The design was sharp and the materials were good quality and well put together. We normally find complaints about squeaks and rattles in tautly-suspended cars like this but the moaning was conspicuous by its absence here.
The Digital Cockpit had a bespoke Sport view with information including revs, power and torque delivery, turbo pressure and longitudinal/lateral G-forces. There was adaptive cruise, traffic jam assist, traffic sign recognition, blind spot monitoring and lane centring, but the Cupra literature suggests that these were paid-for extras that were only standard on the 310 estate as part of a Safety and Driving pack, irrespective of what VZ spec you had.
VZ3 cars had wireless phone charging, leather door panels and heated ‘Genuine Cupra Timeless’ black leather seats with power adjustment for the driver. Otherwise the seats could be had in a textile/PVC ‘Sharp Code Cupra Tech’ material or Petrol Blue textile. Copper-coloured stitching was a fixed Cupra feature. Good upper body support kept you comfy even on long trips. Six-foot-plus folk had enough legroom in the back even when the front seats were set for six-foot-plus folk.
Unfortunately, the Cupra Leon was saddled with the VW group’s new and (not) improved 10-inch screen infotainment system which, despite the presence of stuff like retina display, 3D nav, voice and gesture control and compatibility with both Android Auto and Apple CarPlay (that one wirelessly) had a strangely old, laggy and clunky feel to its operation. Sometimes it took an age for the system to boot up, either from the first startup of the day or after a system crash. The decision by the VW Group to do away with as many physical buttons as possible forced owners to delve through screen menus to carry out even simple heating or audio tasks.
The 2024 refresh cars have a larger 12.9-inch screen but there’s been no rush back to buttons. One good point about the ’24-on car’s screen is that the slider on the panel is now backlit so you can see it to adjust the temp and volume at night. Unbelievably, you couldn’t do that before.
Quite a few Leon infotainment systems have lowered the audio volume, raised the cabin temperature and turned on the heated seats without being asked to do so. The usual solution for that was a new infotainment screen, hopefully on warranty.
The shifter paddles could be a bit of a stretch from the wheel and Cupra fans in the UK were puzzled and disappointed by the non-appearance of mode and start-stop buttons on the steering wheel. These had been present on press launch cars outside the UK.
One owner experienced intermittent failure of the normal buttons that were on the right side of his wheel, an issue which seemed to reset itself when he refuelled the car. Some cars liked to make calls to the breakdown service even when that service wasn’t enabled. Stopping that required a software update, but for at least one owner it took a very long time to get an appointment for the Cupra dealer to address the problem. Reversing cameras have conked out. Sometimes it has proved impossible for owners to log into Apple Music. As of May ’24, we’re not sure if that one has been sorted yet. The boot of the hatch was an OK size at 380 litres and it was well shaped. The estate carried 620 litres, both those numbers being with the seats in place of course.
PH VERDICT
Should you buy a Cupra Leon in preference to (say) a Civic Type R or a Focus ST? Well, why not? The Cupra’s character might have felt more ‘manufactured’ than the more natural vibe that seemed to be part of the DNA of the Honda and the Ford, but the Leon had a straightforward sturdiness and honesty about it that endeared it to owners, and with as near as dammit 300hp on tap it undoubtedly qualified as a hot hatch. It was very fast and very capable, although it is true to say that it was more comfortable on smoother European roads than it was on the glorified cart tracks we’re obliged to use in the UK. You had to be brave to select, let alone stick with, the Sport suspension mode, and Cupra was really for ironbutts or track-dayers only.
There’s a direct relationship between how a car is perceived by owners (and by the general public) and its ability to retain value in the used market. By that measure, the Cupra Leon is doing well. At the time of writing (May 2024) you would be struggling to find one below £22,000, and anything you did find at that sort of money would either have 60,000 miles on it or be a bit beaten up. Or very possibly both. Realistically you’ll be paying getting on for £25k for a decent example. That represents a slow rate of depreciation, but as mentioned in the overview we shouldn’t forget that the price of a new 300 hatch has been going up since 2020.
The lowest-price 300 Leon on PH Classifieds was this 2021 VZ3 with 31,000 miles on it. Only the one pic and looks like it could do with a clean so you might want to negotiate on the £24,498 asking price. For £2,400 more at £26,890 there’s this VZ2 from the same year (2021). For some reason, they’re calling it an estate when it’s a hatch, and it looks like it might have a scratch on the tailgate, but on the plus side it’s only covered 10,000 miles. This all-black 2023 VZ3 looks more the part, especially with just 6,000 miles on the clock, but you’re up to a fiver short of £29k there. The cheapest 306hp 4Drive estate was this ’23 VZ2 in white with 10k miles at £29,998. There were a couple more low-mile ’23 wagons on PH at £33k and £34k.
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