Jeep Compass Review (2021-present)

The Jeep Compass is act of good ol’ American defiance, some might say. You see, the Compass is a car that sits in what the motor industry calls the C-SUV segment. To any normal person, that means a car with a jacked-up SUV body, but one that’s also of a relatively modest size, taking up roughly the same amount of space on the road as a C-segment car such as the Ford Focus or Volkswagen Golf.

Now, with most cars of this type – cars such as the Ford Kuga or Volkswagen Tiguan – the 4x4-inspired styling is no more than that: styling. The makers of these cars have recognised the fact that while car buyers like the rugged look of an SUV, they have no need of genuine off-roading ability, and neither do they want it. So, the car makers decided to give them what they want: cars that look the part, with chunky bumpers and a raised ride height, but are no more capable in the rough than your average hatchback: no four-wheel drive, no hill descent control, no nothing.

Jeep being Jeep, however, decided to go against the grain. After all, off-roading lies at the very heart of the Jeep brand, so having an SUV - even a small SUV - without at least some off-road ability is simply unthinkable. So, while there are front-wheel drive Compasses that mirror the style-led 'crossover' offerings of other manufacturers, these sit in the Compass range alongside proper four-wheel drive variants that stay true to the brand’s rugged identity.

Technically, the latest Compass, launched at the end of 2021, is merely a facelifted version of the previous Compass launched in 2017, but this facelift was so comprehensive that the Compass feels like an entirely new car, with significantly revised exterior styling, an all-new interior, all-new powertrains and lots of new features and technology.

As Jeep's mid-size offering, it slots into the range between the smaller Jeep Renegade and the bigger Wrangler (the Grand Cherokee once sat between to bigger two, but it's been discontinued). It competes with some excellent - not to mention popular - cars such as the Skoda Karoq, Mazda CX-5, Hyundai Tucson, Nissan Qashqai, and Volkswagen Tiguan.

Within the C-SUV segment, there’s actually quite a large size disparity between the smallest cars in the class (such as the Kia Niro and Toyota C-HR) and the largest (such as the Kia Sportage and Toyota RAV 4). The Compass sits somewhere in the middle, possibly more towards the smaller side, but even so, it provides a really impressive amount of interior space.

The rear seats have a really impressive amount of legroom, so even if you’ve got a super-tall passenger sitting behind a super-tall driver, there’s enough knee space for everyone to be comfortable. Headroom is just as impressive, so even your loftiest chums won’t have their hairdos messed up by the headlining. What’s more, the Compass is even pretty comfortable when sitting three across the rear bench. Unusually, the middle seat isn’t much harder or higher than those either side, and although it is a fraction narrower, the way the seat base is contoured means it doesn’t feel any less comfy to sit in. There’s lots of foot space in front of you, too, because the footwells are massive and the transmission tunnel in the floor has a low, flat design, meaning it’s comfy to sit with your feet on top of it if needs be.

The boot is good, too. It looks bigger than the decidedly average official figure of 438 litres suggests, and there’s virtually no load lip to get in the way when loading heavy items. In non-hybrid versions, there’s also a very large underfloor storage area, but in the hybrid, that space is full of all the extra mechanical gubbins.

In terms of quality, the facelifted car’s interior is a huge improvement over that of its predecessor, with plusher materials, funkier trim pieces and a generally more sophisticated and robust feel. Compared with other class in the class, it actually feels pretty average on that score, but at least it doesn’t feel like the poor relation anymore.

The new UConnect 5 infotainment system, too, is a big improvement on the one it replaces, with sharper graphics, shorter response times and a more user-friendly interface. Again, though, compared with those in other mid-size SUVs, it feels pretty average in each of those areas. At least it comes with wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto connectivity as standard across the range.

Some drivers might struggle to find a comfortable driving position, though. There’s lots of adjustment for the seat, and the steering column has both rake- and reach adjustment, but the latter is rather limited in its range of movement, and many will feel like the steering wheel doesn’t come far enough towards them, making the driving position feel a little awkward.

The Compass comes in two forms, the most interesting of which is the plug-in hybrid, known as the 4xe. This has a turbocharged 1.3-litre petrol engine delivering 178bhp to the front wheels via a six-speed automatic gearbox, and a 59bhp electric motor powering the rear wheels, making it four-wheel drive and adding up to a combined output of 237bhp. Now, this might sound like a very prodigious power output, but don’t get too excited because the acceleration doesn’t feel anywhere near as punchy as that number suggests. In hybrid mode – which combines the two power sources - your speed builds gradually rather than explosively, and a request for even a moderate level of acceleration has the petrol engine droning away pretty noisily to get you up to speed. The pace is perfectly acceptable, and the automatic transmission works fine, but given those impressive headline figures, you might well be expecting more sizzle.

Select Electric mode, and you can roll along at low-to-moderate speeds for up to 30 miles on a full charge of the 11.4kWh battery, meaning many people’s urban commutes could be dealt with without using a single drop of petrol. It’s not the eerie, near-silent experience you get in many other electrically driven cars, though: there very little noise from the motor as you scurry along, but there is noise from other sources, namely the wind and the tyres.

For those less concerned about their carbon footprint, the Compass can also be had in non-hybrid form. This version has a 1.3-litre, four-cylinder turbo petrol engine (there’s no diesel engine option available) sending 128bhp to just the front wheels via a six-speed manual gearbox. Despite the enormous disparity in the total power outputs of the two versions, the petrol Compass doesn’t actually feel much slower than the hybrid version. It chunters along fairly easily without you having to apply too many revs, and although the manual gearshift has a fairly spongey, hollow-feeling action, the engine is flexible enough that you don’t need to make too much use of it.

Elsewhere, the Compass feels entirely acceptable on the road, without really dazzling. The suspension can struggle to smother small, high-frequency bumps, meaning that rippled surfaces can cause a case of the jitters, but otherwise, the ride quality stays fairly smooth and comfortable. Tackle a corner, and you’ll experience plenty of grip and traction, regardless of whether you’re in the front-wheel-drive or the all-wheel-drive model, but you will notice the body leaning over a fair amount. It’s the steering that takes the shine off the handling more, however: it’s slow to react initially, but once you turn the steering wheel through the dead spot around the straight-ahead position, it actually starts to turn quite quickly. Throw in the inconsistent weighting and complete lack of feel, and you never really know where you are with it, and you’ll find yourself constantly making small corrections.

As we’ve said, the 4xe plug-in hybrid versions are four-wheel drive, and these actually have a half-decent amount of off-roading ability for (the admittedly small number of) buyers who want the dynamic ruggedness to match the ruggedness of their car’s looks. Select the Trailhawk version, and you forego some of the luxuries of the S version, but in return you get various off-roading gizmos to make it more adept in the sticky stuff.

The fantastically named Nighteagle is the most basic of the Compass models, and even this version comes with alloy wheels, rear privacy glass, front- and rear parking sensors, a reversing camera, powered door mirrors, heated seats and steering wheel, keyless entry and go, a cloth-wrapped dashboard and the full 10.1-inch infotainment touchscreen with 10.25-inch digital instrument screen. Next up is the Compass Limited, and this adds various visual enhancements, full LED headlamps with automatic high-beam function, adaptive cruise control, wireless phone charging and a leatherbound dashboard.

However, this is where it gets rather confusing, because the Nighteagle and Limited trim levels are only available on the petrol model. The 4xe plug-in hybrids come in two different trims entirely. S is the first of them, and this is the range-topper that comes with further visual enhancements, a handsfree powered tailgate, satnav, leather upholstery and a powered driver’s seat. As we’ve mentioned, the Jeep Compass Trailhawk foregoes a few of these luxuries, replacing them instead with various bits and bobs to help improve the car’s performance off-road. These include extra off-road driving modes, along with mud and snow tyres.

As we alluded to earlier, the Compass is not a particularly cheap car to buy new. Prices start at around £30,000 for the front-wheel-drive petrol versions, while the four-wheel-drive plug-in hybrid versions will set you back somewhere in the region of £40,000. Yes, the Compass is reasonably well equipped, which will account for some of the cash, but crucially, key compact SUV rivals from the likes of Ford, Vauxhall and Peugeot can be had for significantly less.

The Jeep will depreciate in value at a very similar rate to most of its mainstream competitors, too, despite the fact that it’s like to sell in considerably smaller numbers, and will therefore be rarer on the used market. This means that, compared with rivals, you’re no more likely to find used car bargains on the Jeep.

According to the official WLTP figures, the plug-in hybrid version of the car will return fuel economy upwards of 140 mpg, but take that figure with a pinch of salt big enough to fill in the Grand Canyon. Because of the way the official tests are designed, they flatter plug-in hybrids to unrealistic proportions, so it’s unlikely you’ll ever get anywhere near that figure, and what you do end up getting will depend entirely on how you use the car. Keep the car charged up and run on electric power alone as often as you can, and you’ll likely do quite well on fuel. Run the petrol engine on a regular basis, however, and it’ll prove quite thirsty, because not only is the engine hauling you and the car about, it’s also got to haul the extra weight of all the hybrid gubbins.

If it’s the regular non-hybrid Compass that you’re interested in, reckon on about 40 mpg, and console yourself with the fact that you’ve paid around £10,000 less for your car.

Jeep doesn’t sell many cars in the UK, and as a result, the brand doesn’t feature in any of the regular reliability surveys. However, the Compass is built out of hardware borrowed from sister company Fiat, a brand that has a less-than-illustrious reputation for reliability. In the latest reliability and owner satisfaction surveys from JD Power, What Car? and Auto Express Driver Power, you’ll find Fiat nestling extremely close to the bottom of the rankings.

Underneath, the latest Compass is largely the same as the car released in 2017. There were six recalls issued on that car for various things, so you’d hope that many of the initial wrinkles in the car’s reliability would have been ironed out as a result.

We’ve heard anecdotal evidence of some owners complaining about glitches with the car’s screens, such as the touchscreen or driver’s display not dimming as they should for night-time driving. On the one hand, you could argue that these systems are all-new in the latest car, so the problems will no longer exist. On the other, you could say that the newer system is more complex, and so there could be more potential for trouble.

Back in July 2018, Fiat announced a five-year warranty on all its new cars, but this has since been rescinded and you now get a three-year, unlimited-mileage arrangement instead, which is still better than the average. On the plus side, new Fiats do come with free servicing and roadside assistance for the first three years of ownership.