2026 Jaecoo J5 1.5T petrol: Detailed review – 0-100 & POV test drive

Added: 2026-06-03

[00:00:06]It's great to see there are more and more affordable vehicles being launched in Australia. This is one of them. It's the JU J5 with the petrol engine. So far, the J5 has only been available with an electric powertrain in Australia.

[00:00:18]There are two variants on sale, the Track and the Summit. Here I'm testing the topsp spec track and prices start from just 25,990 drive away which is crazy value for money or 29,990 drive away for this topsp spec model. And to be honest, I'd probably just go with the track because if you're looking to save money, yeah, just get the cheapest model. This adds a uh a big glass sunroof, fake leather seats, uh 50 watt wireless phone charger, and a couple more speakers for the stereo. But same basic fundamentals underneath. Speaking of underneath, this shares the same platform with the Cherry Tigo 4.

[00:00:50]However, the J5 petrol has a multi-link rear suspension setup. So, independent rear suspension, while the uh the Cherry has a very basic torsion beam arrangement. I would be picking the J5 on that alone. Actually, I know it's a couple more thousand, but yeah, it just makes it a bit more dynamically superior in my opinion. Torsion beam is fine, you know, for for small lightweight vehicles like this, but if you've got the option for a multilink, then yeah, I would be picking that. It just helps to isolate each side of the vehicle. So, you're going around corners, one side hits a bump, the other side is not going to be as affected with independent suspension as it is with something um yeah, with a a torsion beam arrangement. Now, there's no denying the design is definitely inspired by the Range Rover Sport. Even this tail light arrangement, the previous Range Rover Sport looked almost identical to that. That shoulder line that runs all the way down the side of the body, it is basically identical in my opinion. Now, before you start smashing away the keyboard to suggest that Cherry owns Jaguar Land Rover, that's not true at all. Jaguar Land Rover is owned by Tatar Motors based in India. Cherry is a Chinese brand. Now, Cherry does manufacture Land Rover products under Land Rover's license in China for the Chinese market. So, they do produce Land Rovers, actual Land Rovers. This is not one of them. This is just Cher's own product or Jaku's own product. So there's no real reason they should copy the design in my opinion. I mean, they've got a partnership, but you know, just because you share a project, you know, in somewhere else in the in the factory doesn't mean you can go, "Oh, that looks pretty good actually. We might just copy that and draw our own."

[00:02:26]I think it's just a bit of a cheap shot really because Jaguar Land Rovers obviously spent a lot of time uh perfecting the designs of their vehicles and to have have another brand just come along and copy it. It's just not respectful in my opinion. But anyway, it does look quite good. With the J5 petrol, you get an actual grill, whereas the uh the electric model had this kind of closed off section. It looked a little bit incomplete in my opinion, whereas now it does look a bit more like a car. And with the Summit, you get these 18-in alloy wheels. They're wrapped in 2355 Chiaoyang tires. Now, to be honest, I thought these tires were going to be pretty bad because I haven't really heard of that brand before. I took it for a drive in the wet uh on some roads that I know are very slippery and kind of just threw it around a little bit to see if it would trigger the stability control and it actually hung on quite well. Part of that is thanks to the the width of the tire. They're 235s. That's actually quite wide for a vehicle of this sort of size and weight. So yeah, if you were hesitant about those tires, um I think they're pretty good. But we'll go for a drive in a minute. I'll show you what I mean. Even with the braking tests, I did some here uh in the wet just to see. I'll do some more with the V-Box uh down on a on a public road um just to get a a proper time, but even in the wet it actually stopped. Okay.

[00:03:42]And then inside we've got a pretty basic but functional and practical surprisingly luxurious I guess with the uh you know contrast piping and stitching. You've got a nice flat dashboard. Does have this soft touch fabric across the top. And yeah, there's not too much in terms of design flare happening, but I actually don't mind that for a vehicle like this. You know, you get in some SUVs and they're kind of like a coupe and they got little bits protruding out everywhere, and it kind of just disrupts your your concentration, I guess, is the best way to say it. This is just clean, uninterruptive, and very user friendly.

[00:04:19]Although everything that you control with the vehicle, or almost everything is within this touchcreen, and it is kind of a cheap feeling touchcreen. It's just got this plastic panel around the outside. It's actually cheaper uh you got to remember actually it's actually cheaper for brands, car brands to have everything housed within a touchcreen because there's just one wiring harness going in the back or likely one maybe two and that's kind of it. There's no designing happening with the buttons.

[00:04:44]There's no engineering of the the physical mechanical movement of the button. It's just a big screen. So, what they're mainly paying for is the software. And the software in this it's okay. I I wouldn't say it's the best.

[00:04:55]like the climate settings are down here.

[00:04:57]You've got to push the fan and it pops up a more detailed menu for the climate controls. But then if you go into things like radio, you've got this four, you know, box layout and then you pick that and then you go through if you want to swap from radio to Bluetooth while you've, you know, in a uh in the vehicle settings, for example, you've got to go through a lot of presses just to get back there. I mean, you do have some steering wheel controls, including for the volume, which is good to see, but the passenger to, you know, bump up the volume a bit. It's a bit more complicated than just a simple knob. I don't think there's anything wrong with a simple volume knob. I don't I've never driven a vehicle and thought, "Oh, that stupid knob, you know, takes so much stress just to turn that um to to adjust the volume." So I think that is a uh a way of cost cutting there that that JKU has yeah have applied this big screen just to get rid of everything so they don't have to worry about engineering anything else as part of it. You do have some other steering wheel controls. I find them a little bit confusing. Uh you've got the menu layout there so you can flick around the different display options and so on. Yeah, as I said this has got the uh 50 watt wireless charger, the the topsp spec summit. You got some cup holders, some under console storage as well. And these seats are quite comfortable. Plenty of space as well.

[00:06:08]It's a kind of upright cabin orientation, so they've got nice big tall windows. Good view out the front. I can easily see between the mirror and the pillar. The the pillar itself is quite thin. Got a perched up view as well, so I can see over the bonnet. Kind of got a good idea of where the corners of the vehicle are. And out the back there, you've got a decent view. I mean, the rear windscreen is not very tall.

[00:06:32]Um, but the pillars aren't overly chunky like you might see in a coupe style of SUV. This is, as I said, very much like an upright cabin orientation, traditional wagon or station wagon. So, plenty of lights coming in, especially with that big sunroof opened up. And then up at the back, we've got a decent amount of space. I love these carpet mats that Ju is doing. They remind me of Honda mats. They're very similar to that, or especially back in the sort of 2010s. Now, this is going to annoy some people, but I actually don't mind that little hump in the middle. It's only small. I've said it in some of my EV reviews where by I always put stuff in the back like shopping, some light shopping or a camera bag or whatever.

[00:07:12]When you've got no step there, it slides back and forth. I know you should probably just put it in the boot, whatever. Then it's going to bounce around there, too. But I actually use these footwells for storage. So, having a little step there, it's only small, as I said, so it's not going to take up too much space, but it will just stop things from bouncing uh from left to right.

[00:07:29]Obviously, some people are going to be annoyed by that, especially the EV owners that love the flat floor, and I get it. Does make more spa, make it feel more spacious and actually does provide more space for the middle seat passenger. Um, but yeah, just a little uh a nitpicking thing that I have. You do have a uh single climate vent, which is a little bit annoying in my opinion, like on a hot summer day, what one kid gets the the cold air and the other one doesn't or they got to take turns. You got an old school USB uh A port down there. But you do have pockets in the backs of both seats, even a flip down armrest with cup holders and decent size pockets in the doors. They're just all It's all plastic, but you can at least fit a nice big bottle there. You do have some fake leather across there just to give it a bit of, you know, classier touch. This is all plastic, but at least it is a different texture than the standard stuff. It feels durable. you know, it's probably going to stand the test of time, especially if you got kids running in and out all the time. And right off the back, you've actually got a decentiz boot, electric tailgate with this Summit variant, which is actually, yeah, surprising for this price level.

[00:08:31]You've got pockets on the sides with these little netted sections. Your tire repair kit. Now, this is the weird area.

[00:08:38]Under here, you've got space for at least a space uh space saver spare, even the uh the bolting or the mounting bracket for a spare wheel. So, if it was my choice, I'd rather have a space over spare than a tire repair kit because if you get a a puncher in the sidewall, then you can't use tie repair kits. But also, um, tire repair kits don't always work, and they cost a lot of money to get all that glue out of the the original rim when you do go and change the tire. So, I'd ra I would rather have a space saver spare just so you can get back on the road. No matter what happens to the tire, you can just swap that over, put a space on. You might have to go a little bit slower than, you know, highway speeds, but at least you can get to where you need to go, get that tire changed without having to deal with the tire repair kit. But yeah, it's very interesting that there's a plenty there's plenty of room there for a uh a spare wheel. You've got a 12vt socket on the side as well, which is some hooks.

[00:09:36]That's actually really good for this price range. Little discrete hooks on the sides there. Yeah, very practical overall. As I said, it is a little bit kind of basic in terms of its uh format or design, just a station wagon. But, you know, that's great to have that these days, I think, when there's so many weird and, you know, designs that are trying to stand out. I don't just mean looking like a Range Rover. I mean like the actual format of the vehicle, stay upright station wagon just makes it easy to drive, easy to live with. And under the bonnet, we've got a 1.5 L turbo petrol 4-cylinder engine producing 108 kW and 210 new m. It's matched up to a CVT automatic only with front-wheel drive only, too. There's no four-wheel drive option. That puts it at the higher end of power outputs for this category of vehicle. 108 kW is actually not too bad. Although fuel consumption is not the best. It's rated officially at 7.5 L per 100 km on the combined cycle, which is yeah, that's not very good actually compared with a lot of others. Even if they're not hybrid, they are usually, you know, sevens or even mid sixes or something like that. I've been driving for a little bit now and the dashboard is saying 10, but we'll go do some uh you know more thorough driving. See if we can get that dropping down a little bit. I think in the real world you could probably achieve 8 and a half or something like that. So, it's okay, but it's it's not as good as some rivals out there. So, out on the road, this is an easy SUV to drive like most small SUVs in this class. Uh just in terms of the controls and as I said, visibility is great. Uh the view is a little bit perched up and I would prefer the seat to be, you know, you could lower it down a little bit further than that, but that's actually the lowest it goes. And then the steering column, it does have rake and reach adjustment, but it kind of doesn't drop down low enough. You can pull it right towards your chest, which is good. But overall, the the driving position is, you know, pretty much perfect. It just has a more perched up view, which some people in this class or some buyers in this class might prefer that because it makes you feel like you're you're high above some of the other um you know motor motorists around you. With that CVT automatic, look, this is not the uh the optimum choice for driving enthusiasts. It's just a bit boring and it it wors and whines a lot like that. It's just it just I don't know. It doesn't sound appealing.

[00:11:52]doesn't give you that feeling of progression of moving along like stepped gears, but I mean a lot of the rivals have a CVT and they do help to improve um you know economy. So even with that 7.5 rating with a CVT, you'd expect a little bit better. But yeah, I mean a dual clutch automatic is probably not the the ideal choice for this type of vehicle either because, you know, you got that, you know, rolling and so on when you're on hills. So that that's probably not going to suit most buyers.

[00:12:22]I think this is probably a better balance. When you're driving around the city and suburbs, you're not really going to notice. It's just when you get out onto an open road like this, you'll hear it um flaring away. And we do have different drive modes to choose from with this dedicated button. Sport, eco, and normal. Put it in sport mode. Full power.

[00:12:44]Yeah, it does feel a little bit more responsive, mainly with the pedal. So, when you push it all the way to the floor, it's not really making any difference, but just sort of little movements, it starts to respond a bit quicker. It doesn't have adaptive dampers or anything crazy like that.

[00:12:57]It's more just altering the powertrain calibration.

[00:13:01]As I was saying though, these tires actually hold on quite well for the wet.

[00:13:07]Like, I'm pushing it fast down through here, and there's no moments of slip. Like normally uh in some vehicles anyway, you you can start to feel it slipping a little bit, whereas this is not doing that. It's actually holding on quite firmly and it's giving me confidence as well. So if you're driving down a an unfamiliar winding road, obviously you should slow down anyway, but in the wet, you know, a corner might suddenly appear. It's good to know that this does have, at least on this surface, reasonable grip.

[00:13:43]But yeah, in that sport mode, it's it's mainly the throttle sensitivity. I'm pushing the pedal a little bit and it's responding more so than if I just had it in eco mode or normal mode.

[00:13:57]I feel like it does have stepped gears as well in the uh the sport mode, whereas in normal mode, it just does the typical C CVT thing. I'll just try to show you that. I'll slow it right down to full full throttle.

[00:14:17]So, it sure sort of had two steps there, whereas sport mode had a more distinct or definitive step. So, now we'll try that in sport mode.

[00:14:30]slow right down full throttle.

[00:14:39]You know, I guess it's pretty similar.

[00:14:41]There was a definite sort of second gear or, you know, a step in between all of that and it just goes back to sort of CVT behavior.

[00:14:54]Yeah, definitely a uh good handling package for what it is and for the money you're paying. I don't mind this ride quality as well. It's got this sort of torness to it. It's not too sloppy.

[00:15:05]Although, when you wiggle the wheel like that, it does wobble a little bit. You can feel the rear end sort of catching up to the front. Whereas some rivals like a Mazda CX3 is probably one of the better handling in this class. Very stable, very confident. It does handle better than this, but it probably would have a lower center of gravity with this being, you know, with a bit of a coupe profile. This is very much upright.

[00:15:33]Yeah, it's not too bad. It just does sort of wriggle around a little bit.

[00:15:37]Now, this engine does or it is compatible with 91 ron fuel. So, that could save you some money in the long run as well. Although, with a turbocharged engine, I would recommend at least 95. It just helps to reduce the chances of pinging or knocking.

[00:15:51]Although, modern computers these days can kind of get on top of that. But, it means that yeah, the computer has to compensate. that usually means increased fuel consumption. Whereas, if you just put 95 to begin with, it's going to um yeah, reduce the chances of pinging happening happening in the first place.

[00:16:07]But it is good to have that option there at least if you do want to save some money. First impressions then, look, I think this is a reasonable package for the money you're paying. Um, as I said at the start, I probably wouldn't bother with the Summit topsp spec variants.

[00:16:20]Like, just get the base model and and save the most money you can. I don't think resale value is going to be that good. Uh, JU is a new brand in Australia, so we don't have any history to go off in terms of not just um, you know, issues that could happen, but how the company deals with issues as well. I think that's the big one that some people forget when they're buying from a new brand. Ordering parts in, like how long are the parts going to take um, if something does fail or even if you accidentally, you know, clip the the side mirror there, how long is it going to take to get a new one ordered in? So, with an established brand, that stuff is usually already set up. someone has ordered a mirror before. In other words, whereas for JKU, it's going to take some time before, yeah, they get that whole system working and and running smoothly in my opinion. Anyway, I haven't bought one. I don't know how long it will take to order a side mirror in. I'm just suggesting that based on, you know, my history with other brand vehicles. I think it is a hurdle though. Like, it's a it's at least a hesitation. But again, you're paying not much money for this.

[00:17:20]So, the benefit could outweigh that potential risk. I think the handling is a little bit better than the Cherry Tig 4. Partly thanks to the independent suspension. Um, it just seems a little bit more dynamic, a little bit more comprehensive, especially dealing with, you know, Australian country roads and so on where there's a lot of bumps. Uh, especially midc corner. This does feel quite uh controlled and and predictable.

[00:17:42]It's still a little bit sort of sloppy when you flick the steering wheel side to side. Not that you do that in regular um daily driving anyway, but if you do it in some of the rivals like the Mazda CX3, that's very planted and and very well sorted, whereas this does feel a little bit sort of sloppy in the back end. I think the ride quality and the comfort is all right. Some people might find it a little bit firm over sharper bumps, but I don't mind it. I think it's if you're spending a lot of time on country roads, you kind of want that rather than too sloppy and too too slow reacting. When it does hit a bump, it will just keep shuttering along. whereas this is, yeah, it remains pretty controlled. Fuel consumption is not that good in my opinion. Like even 7.5 L per 100, the official rating, if you stack it up against pretty much any of the rivals, they they use less than that.

[00:18:26]And in the real world, I'm averaging 10.2 right now. So, I don't think that's very good. Although, this does have only 1,000 km on the clock, so it's probably not fully run yet. But even so, 10 L per 100 is is pretty high. I've done some drive uh highway driving. I have done performance testing. and then down the winding road. Yeah, even then I'd still expect or I have seen lower than that in many of the rivals even without hybrid power. All right, let's go off now and do the performance test and see how it goes. I'll have more information in the written review linked in the description of this video as well.

[00:19:10]Heat. Heat.

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