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2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift Review

OUR TEST CAR: 2015 BMW 120d xDrive 190 HP 8AT

 
The time has come to take a close look at what is almost certainly going to be the last rear-wheel drive iteration of BMW’s first hatchback and, as I start driving it, I get a weird feeling in my chest. Yes, I’m here to tell you all about the 2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift in a review that is most likely going to sound like a swan song for this fun little hatch. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves here, let’s take it one small step at a time.
2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift - Page - 1
The 1 Series Hatchback seems like a peculiar choice for a manufacturer like BMW. When the name was first coined, it was weird and everyone regarded it as the pariah kid in the school yard. Bavarians know all about making small coupes so, to make things even better, they created a Coupe version of the 1 Series. It was a hit! Throw in the M treatment and you get the 1M Coupe, which is still regarded as one of the most fun to drive cars from Munich to date, despite using a turbocharged engine.

Over time, the 1 Series Coupe became the 2 Series Coupe and now the 1 Series range is only made up of 3-door and 5-door hatchbacks. The good news is that the chassis, layout, and even the rear-wheel drive setup have been kept intact. That means, for now, we get to enjoy marvelous driving sensations behind the wheel, despite it being a hatchback. And that’s a rare thing in today’s world.
Think of the 2015 BMW 1 Series as a sort of unicorn that is still around to make us smile.

That’s because with the facelift version we’re entering the F20/F21 chassis’ last three years of production. To put it more bluntly, get ready for the new 1 Series that will have a sedan version and will be front-wheel drive. Oh yes, cost cutting and the competition made this happen as BMW needs to keep up with the A-Class from Mercedes-Benz and the A3 from Audi in both pricing and interior space. And by God, the 1 Series needs a bit more of it.

During my time with the car, I took some of my fellow editors along, to see how this thing would handle real-life situations. Therefore, we left the big city and headed to the mountains, to see if everything would be OK during a longer road-trip.

I’m a 6-foot tall guy (184 cm) and the girl sitting behind me in the car was a measly 5-foot 4 inches (165 cm). Do you think she had enough room in the back? Well, you’re wrong. As small as she is, she had to sit as upright as possible the whole road to keep her knees from banging on the back of my seat.

The same applied to the other side of the car, as roughly the same measurements applied so you can tell that there’s not a lot of room inside the 1 Series. Not that you can fault the smallest and cheapest car in BMW’s line-up at the moment, but it does explain why the Germans will be migrating to an FWD setup in the future.

Speaking of the interior, not much has changed. Our tester was wearing the Urban Line kit and had a special blue light inside the cabin that would create a rather interesting effect once you unlocked the car at night. Other changes inside the cockpit for the facelift include the new iDrive controller with the touch-sensitive top surface, a new, slimmer frame for the bigger navigation screen and a revised HVAC panel. That’s about it. The instrument cluster remained the same, no digital stuff included here, the steering wheel is the same and it’s all familiar business on the doors too.

Up front, the seating position is just right, not too high and not too low while the space offered isn’t all that great. For example, more than one time I found myself hitting the door with my elbow while steering or getting my knee caught between the door handle and the steering wheel whenever I was relaxing on longer stretches of roads, with my foot off the pedals.

On the outside, the differences are a lot bigger. The BMW design team must’ve finally realized that the googly-eyed front fascia they came up with initially is nowhere close to what you’d call gracious, let alone beautiful. Therefore, they did something about it, before saying goodbye.

The front fascia now has new headlights that are drastically similar to those found on the 2 Series Coupe. They look a helluva lot better than before and they are joined by a newly designed set of kidney grilles that have sculpted bars.

Round the back, you’ll find new taillights that replace their ugly square-shaped predecessors and feature a new LED-illuminated strip that falls into the patterns more recent BMWs use. The front and rear bumpers were also changed, for the same reason: to fall in line with the recent changes done design-wise in Munich.

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Overall, the package does look a lot more attractive. Even in Urban Line it exudes a certain ‘je ne sais quoi’ that makes it appealing. The new M135i though is the best looking 1 Series Hatchback to date, no doubt about it. The new design also draws attention around town. Weirdly enough, we didn’t expect the 1 Series to be such an eye catcher and yet, it turned a lot of heads even though it didn’t even have a particular color on it but the mundane, all-too-common Mineral Grey.

That’s also where we learned that driving the 1 Series inside a crowded city is not a hard thing to do. The visibility is almost flawless, with the generous windows and perfectly sized mirrors allowing you to get a good grasp of everything that’s happening around you at all times. Even the rearview mirror can be used as the headrests in the back can fold to allow you to see through the tailgate.

Our tester was a 120d xDrive model fitted with the 8-speed automatic gearbox, a premiere for the 1 Series range. Up until now, you couldn’t get the 120d automatic model with all-wheel drive, but now you can. The new 2-liter B47 engine under the bonnet is truly an upgrade from the old one. We met it before aboard the new X3 xDrive20d and we can tell you for sure now that it is a lot more refined than before.

It also brings out more power at 190 HP and more torque with a BMW-rated spec of 400 Nm (295 lb-ft). That’s enough for a small car like the 1 Series and despite being reluctant towards this configuration at first, we found that it’s quite fun to drive this oil burner in the end.

One disappointment was the fuel consumption though, despite how the engine-transmission duo was set up. BMW claims that around big cities, the car should be returning 5.1 l/100 km (46.1 mpg) while our indicator showed 8.2 l/100 km (28.6 mpg). Considering the traffic we were stuck in and what other cars return in the same conditions, it’s not a bad result. However, compared to what the Germans are claiming, it’s a dire disappointment.

Outside the city, things weren’t a lot different either. Cruising at 100 - 110 km/h (62 - 68 mph) on the highway with four people inside the car we got as low as 6.2 l/100 km (37.9 mpg) which is quite a bit more than the 3.9 l/100 km (60.3 mpg) claimed. Go even faster and try and nib on the speed limit (130 - 140 km/h or 80 to 86 mph) and the fuel consumption climbs to 7.8 l/100 km (30.1 mpg). The high fuel consumption is even more surprising considering that you always feel how the car is running at the lowest RPM count possible. It's the same problem we noticed inside the X3 too but it's not as disturbing due to the lower weight of the 1er.

Basically, BMW set it up to rev as little as possible and in ECO Pro and Comfort modes, the transmission will upshift as soon and as fast as possible. Therefore, you'll end up cruising at just a little over 1,000 RPM most of the time. Get it in Sport mode and everything in the Universe will be just fine, once again.

Outside of towns is also where you’ll be noticing the brilliance of this car and why it stands out in the crowd today.
You see, compared to its rivals, the 1 Series still uses a rear-wheel drive setup and the xDrive system on it is the one we love from older days, sending most of its power to the rear wheels. You know what that means, right?
You can actually have a lot of fun with this hatchback, fun that is otherwise impossible to attain inside an A-Class or A3 because of their FWD-based layouts.

Even when the Audi or Mercedes-Benz alternatives are fitted with all-wheel drive systems (quattro and 4Matic respectively), they are front-wheel drive biased and understeer a lot. On the 1 Series, on the other hand, that’s a thing of the past and oversteer is easily achieved, even in a car using a 2-liter diesel mill.

The range is now made up of about 10 different engine configurations and their variations, with or without xDrive. You can basically go from a 1.5-liter 3-cylinder mill on the 116i model with 109 HP to the bonkers M135i that now has 326 HP and is blazing fast and fun to drive.

All engines will be ok for the car though, maybe with the exception of the 116i that turn out to be too slow for some people’s needs. It will get the job done though, nonetheless.

In terms of absolute comfort, there could be some issues to debate here. Without the M Sport adaptive drive suspension option, the chassis of the F2x models is a bit on the loose side of things. For some that translates into more comfort, while for others it’s just too much to bear when cornering fast.

However, our tester had the €1,146 optional dampers and it felt a bit rough at times. Even in Comfort mode, the ride was a bit too bumpy. We couldn’t help but feel that was partly due to the 18” wheels along with their run-flat tires as well though. They might look nice on the outside but riding on such a small tire doesn’t do this car justice. We definitely recommend sticking with 17” rims.

2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift - Page - 1
As far as tech bits go, BMW did introduce a lot of new stuff as optional or standard on the facelift version of the 1er. Standard stuff that you’ll get on all models includes automatic air conditioning, a 6.5” screen for iDrive and Navigation (but not the Professional system). If you’re willing to pay, there’s little you can’t get on the 1 Series today.

One of the biggest improvements is the introduction of LED headlights that really stand out in the crowd. Admittedly, they can’t be had with Selective Beam but they still do an excellent job in or out of the city.

The Driving Assistant was also improved as you can now get Emergency City Braking and you get warned every time you step out of line. In clearer terms, every time you drive off your lane without signaling, the steering wheel vibrates.

Park Distance Control with cameras on every angle, cruise control with brake function and even High-beam assistant are all options that show the significant sales of the 1 Series have been taken into account by the big wigs in Munich.

When it comes to infotainment, the iDrive system is as straightforward as ever. Sure, for some people, the abundance of submenus might be a bit too much but the resolution of the display, the easiness with which the screens flow in and out of each other is staggering and probably the best in the business right now.

If you’re not used to BMW’s layout inside iDrive it will take you a while to get accustomed to it but it will still be a shorter period than in the case of the Command system from Mercedes-Benz, for example.

In terms of safety, the 1 Series facelift gets the same equipment and ratings as its predecessor. That means it comes fitted with frontal, side head, side chest and side pelvis airbags, belt pre-tensioners and load limiters as well as seat belt reminders. DSC comes as standard as well, while eCall is also available and will become standard starting with 2018.

The EuroNCAP ratings showed that it offers 91 percent protection for adult occupants, 83 percent for child occupants, 63 percent for pedestrians and 86 percent in safety assist. It’s then ‘safe to say’ that the 1 Series will keep you safe and sound.

Prices for the 1 Series start at €23,700 in the 5-door guise which is just €814 less than the entry-level A-Class and €1,250 more than the cheapest A3 you can get. However, it should be pointed out that those are just starters and that the entry-level diesels from the A-Class platform are in fact Renault engines. Our tester had a price tag of €54,433 and was decked with almost all the options you can put on it.

So what’s the final verdict: is the 1 Series better than the A3 and A-Class and if so, why? Well, when you’re dealing with a car that has such a wide range of models on offer, it’s hard to make definite statements. Its character can vary from a maddening slow poke to an unbelievably fast hot hatch in the case of the M135i.
This is the best iteration of the model so far, no doubt about it.

However, comparing them all one by one, we get to see a couple of big differences. The A-Class and A3 offer more space inside and in the boot. There’s no denying that. Furthermore, they might be offering an even better choice in terms of interior design but that’s all relative and depending on each customer’s taste. On the other hand, the BMW is still an enthusiast’s car.

The chassis is perfectly balanced and the rear-wheel drive setup is one insurmountable advantage that just makes this model the best in its class in terms of dynamics.

And that’s something that we need to hold onto dearly for now because the future 1 Series will inevitably become front-wheel drive. We explained the reasons behind this decision in the beginning of this review and they all make sense. Unfortunately, if you want a hatchback that’s fun to drive you need to hurry up and get a 1 Series facelift while you can. Fortunately for you, this is the best iteration of the model so far.
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autoevolution Jun 2015
72
Value for money: 6/10
History
8
Exterior
7
Interior
7
In the city
8
Open road
6
Comfort
6
Tech facts
7
Gadgets
8
Safety
9
Conclusion
7
82user rating 32 votes
Rate this car!
 
Key Specs
USEU
Engine
1,995 cm3 I4
Fuel
diesel
Power kw
140
Power hp
188
Power rpm
4000
Torque val
295
Torque rpm
1750-2500
Transmission
8-speed automatic
Traction
AWD
Acceleration
6.6
Top speed
138 mph
Length
170.4 in
Width
69.5 in
Height
55.9 in
Wheelbase
105.9 in
Ground clearance
5.5 in
Cargo volume
12.7 CuFT
Weight
3208 lbs
Seating
5
Power
140 KW/188 BHP @ 4000 RPM
Torque
295 Lb-Ft @ 1750-2500 RPM
Engine
1,995 cm3 I4
Fuel
diesel
Power kw
140
Power hp
190
Power rpm
4000
Torque val
400
Torque rpm
1750-2500
Transmission
8-speed automatic
Traction
AWD
Acceleration
6.8
Top speed
222 km/h
Length
4328 mm
Width
1765 mm
Height
1420 mm
Wheelbase
2690 mm
Ground clearance
140 mm
Cargo volume
359.6 L
Weight
1455 Kg
Seating
5
Power
140 KW/190 HP @ 4000 RPM
Torque
400 Nm @ 1750-2500 RPM
fuel efficiency
mpgOfficialOurs
City46.128.6
Highway60.333.6
Combined54.729.7
fuel efficiency
l/100kmOfficialOurs
City5.18.2
Highway3.97
Combined4.37.9
base price
$
-
base price
34,950
Photo gallery (64)
2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift gear shift2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift driving experience control buttons at night2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift taillight at night2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift on the road, rear view2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift on the roa2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift dynamic shot2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift front fascia2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift LED headlight2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift fog light2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift headlight2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift side mirror2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift LED Adaptive lights mark2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift side view2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift wallpaper2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift wheel2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift rear 18" wheel2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift front 18" wheel2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift urban line badge2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift door handle2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift wheel hub cap2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift front three quarters view2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift side view2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift wallpaper2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift rear fascia2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift taillight2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift taillight2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift badge2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift reflector2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift tailpipes2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift shark fin2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift shark fin antenna2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift boot2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift battery2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift rear seats2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift rear headrests2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift steering wheel2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift driver's seat2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift door panel2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift window controls2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift front compartment2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift driving position2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift steering wheel2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift trims2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift pedals2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift gear shift knob2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift rearview mirror2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift roof lights2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift driving experience control buttons2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift cruise control buttons2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift steering wheel buttons2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift HVAC Controls2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift rearview camera2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift lights knob2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift air vent2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift manual handbrake2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift start button2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift instrument cluster2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift rear seats2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift Navigation Professional2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift iDrive screen2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift electric seat buttons2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift urban line door sill2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift engine bay2015 BMW 1 Series Facelift B47 Engine