How much space is there?

• Lots of front and rear passenger space
• Very generous boot space
• Lacks some safety features you may want

It may be relatively small, but the MG ZS is surprisingly spacious – sufficiently so that it’s a usefully practical compact family car. Even our tallest testers found front seat head and legroom is pretty generous, though the car’s narrowness means shoulder room is a bit limited.

It’s a similar story in the back. Our six-foot-plus testers were comfortable sat behind someone of similar height, even if more room to spread out would be appreciated. Younger children are unlikely to complain – they have a good view out, as well as decent space. There are three seatbelts in the back, but even a trio of teenagers would feel squeezed in.

The Skoda Kamiq is yet more spacious in the back, but the ZS is on par with the Ford Puma and betters the DS 3.  

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Boot space and storage

The passenger space in the ZS doesn’t compromise the boot. There’s 448 litres of carrying capacity, not far off the class-leading Ford Puma and much more than the SEAT Arona and Nissan Juke offer. The removable boot floor boosts flexibility. With it in place, there’s no loading lip and an extra storage space below for shopping bags, log leads and so on. Removing it creates a few inches extra depth for carrying taller loads.

The back seats fold down easily in a 60:40 split, creating 1,375 litres of space. Leave the boot floor in place and there’s a more-or-less flat floor right though. Remove it and there’s a pronounced hump onto the seats that makes loading more difficult.

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But that’s as clever as the boot gets. Many rivals have all sorts of hook, tie-down points and so on. The aforementioned Puma has its ingenious Megabox storage area, as well.   

Is it easy to park?

The MG ZS is a similar length and width to most other small SUVs but it’s a fair bit taller, which can make it feel bigger than it is. So it can take a while to develop of sense of which parking spaces the car will fit into. The chunky rear roof pillar doesn’t help matters, creating quite a large spot. Otherwise, visibility is perfectly fine.

Once you’ve got head around it, parking isn’t easy enough. A reversing camera and rear parking sensors are fitted to most models and do make life easier. The top-grade Exclusive trim level also has a 360-degree camera system that provides an image of the car’s surroundings.

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Safety

• Three-star Euro NCAP rating
• Little advanced crash-mitigation kit
• Not unsafe, but misses the mark

Car safety experts Euro NCAP gave the MG ZS a three-star rating when it was assessed in 2017, with mediocre scores in every area. That rating has now expired after NCAP updated its testing procedures, so can’t be directly compared with the ratings of more recent cars.

It’s not an unsafe car per se, rather it’s score reflects the fact that Chinese manufacturers were still getting their heads around European standards when the ZS was launched. The electric MG ZS EV, which was launched in 2019, is fundamentally the same car, yet scored the full five stars.

That three-star rating was in part dictated by the fact the ZS doesn’t have autonomous emergency braking. However, the top-spec Exclusive model does have blind spot monitors and rear cross traffic alert.

All ZS models have two sets of Isofix child seat mounts on the outer rear seats that are annoyingly awkward to access.