The five-door Jimny keeps every ounce of the three-door’s off-road charm and cult following, but on the road it’s still, unapologetically, a tractor with a grin.
Another Jimny review, you might be asking? Fair call. The little Suzuki tends to be a big conversation starter, and despite this generation being around for quite a while, the brand has managed to keep it relevant with new trim levels and special editions. Enter the Horizon, which adds some lifestyle bits to the 5 door shape to make it the latest entry to a series of interesting Jimnys out there.
For those who haven’t been paying attention, the Jimny 5 door is exactly what it sounds like: Suzuki’s beloved boxy off-roader, stretched out to accommodate two more doors and a more usable rear seat, without giving up an inch of its off-road ability. Power comes from a naturally aspirated 1.5-litre four-cylinder, sending a modest amount of kW and Nm through either a five-speed manual (as tested) or a four-speed automatic, to a proper part-time four-wheel-drive system with low range and a ladder frame chassis underneath. Pricing for the five-door manual is still being finalised for our market, but if the three-door’s positioning is anything to go by, it won’t be chasing you away on value.
Let’s start with the obvious: this thing has gravitational pull that’s larger than its size. Suzuki clearly knows exactly what it has on its hands here, and to their credit, they’ve leaned into that with the five-door rather than trying to sand off any of the character to make it more palatable. It still looks like a shrunken Gelandewagen, still has that upright, slab-sided honesty to its design, and the extra length only makes the proportions look a bit less resolved, but not entirely – I clearly like the 3 door look more, but this is a very solid effort.
Inside, it’s basic, and I mean that as a compliment more than a criticism. The amazing thing around cars that like to get dirty is that you can always say that rought materials are “easy to clean”, and “ready for everything”, and here it feels genuine. The doors are paper thin, the little storage there is is not exactly practical, and you see the three volume formula for ergonomics we’ve seen for decades (infotainment flanked by vents, and a/c controls separately). The rear seats are surely usable – I cannot sit behind myself but that’s hardly the use case – and will improve practicality, but it’s important to remember that in this shape, the rear seats don’t fold flat.
There’s a lane keep warning, but no blind spot monitoring. There’s no armrest. The sound system is simple, and wireless phone projection is about the extent of the tech onboard, and none of that bothered me. Getting in and out is easy thanks to the upright seating and generous door openings, visibility out in every direction is excellent. It’s a cabin built entirely in service of its off-road purpose, and it doesn’t pretend to be anything else.
Under the bonnet, that 1.5-litre naturally aspirated four does its best, but let’s not kid ourselves, it’s not a powerhouse. Progress is steady rather than swift (get it?), and you’ll be working the gearbox to keep momentum on anything resembling a hill. It was only on the fifth car I ever owned that I crossed the 100hp mark, so I am no stranger at all to cars where every single kW matters, and it is very much the case here as well. And on that note, I get that some people will prefer the automatic for off-roading, but for me, the manual is clearly, unambiguously the one to have. The three pedals give you the control to actually manage the engine’s limited reserves, and I would trade any inconvenience off-road for the fun it adds.
So, how does it drive? Around town, with a manual gearbox to keep me occupied and that boxy little face grinning back at every intersection, genuinely fun. I spent most of my time with it doing exactly the kind of city driving you’d expect from a loan car, and I don’t think I stopped smiling the whole time. There’s something deeply endearing about a car this small, this simple, and this obviously pleased with itself.
The solid rear axle and genuinely archaic suspension setup mean it rides and handles like a tractor, there’s no two ways about it. There is a lot of roll, the recirculating ball steering is slow and requires explicit input to go back straight. Get it up to motorway speeds and the noise really ramps up, with the engine sitting around 3000rpm in fifth, which makes for a tiring, droning companion on longer stretches. It’s underpowered, noisy, and even in this longer five-door body, it’s still not especially practical as an everyday family proposition.
But I’d be doing you a disservice if I didn’t tell you the other half of the story, because the on-road manners shouldn’t be the reason why you buy this little thing. None of that is a surprise, and none of it is really a criticism so much as a reflection of what the Jimny actually is. Because what you’re buying into with this car is genuine, honest-to-goodness off-road hardware and competency that you simply do not find anywhere else at this size or this price point. If you’re buying a Jimny to actually use it, to take it down a trail, to have a small, capable companion that punches well above its weight off the tarmac, it is hugely rewarding, and every one of those on-road compromises starts to make total sense. The part-time 4WD system is completely manual and as old-school as it gets, including a low range gear, and all it takes is a bit a maneouvering around for you to see this is not the front-wheel-drive-based-AWD-system you get in many other SUVs.
In this Horizon trim level, you add cladding to the doors, a very practical roof rack/platform, a rooftop tent I unfortunately didn’t get the chance to try out, and the gorgeous Heritage grille. If the tennis ball colour is your jam, don’t fret: you can have the Horizon in any colour in the Jimny’s pallete, both in Auto and Manual.
That’s the trade-off, and it’s one Suzuki has clearly made with total conviction rather than trying to please everyone. In an industry that increasingly blurs every model into a slightly different flavour of the same soft-roader crossover, the Jimny remains stubbornly, refreshingly itself. It is extremely likeable, full of character, and genuine to its own ethos in a way that’s becoming rarer by the year. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it, and Suzuki clearly agrees, because the recipe here is unchanged in all the ways that matter.
The Jimny asks (no, demands), that you be very clear about what you are expecting from an SUV. If you are like many of my friends, that got seduced by its cute looks but are not exactly willing to live with the “compromises” of a proper off-roader, you might be disappointed. This is a car with sharp edges, quite literally in its styling and figuratively in how it drives, but that’s precisely the point. The five-door doesn’t try to smooth any of that away, it just gives you a bit more room to enjoy it in. If you’re shopping for a genuine off-roader that happens to be small, characterful, and endlessly fun to drive within its limits, the Jimny not only deserves to be on your list, but is actually in a class of its own. If you’re shopping for a small SUV that just looks the part, keep looking.
By the end of my loan, I’d caught myself waving at every other Jimny driver I passed, like some kind of unofficial club membership had kicked in without me noticing. Thanks, Suzuki, for the opportunity, and thank you for reading this far!
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