2015 Maruti Ciaz review, road test

The first thing that strikes you about the Ciaz is that it’s a large car. Its 4490mm length and 1730mm width ensures it looks larger than some rivals. That said, the overall styling tilts towards ‘safe’, especially when compared to some of its boldly styled peers such as the Verna and the City. The face of the car follows an ‘offend nobody’ approach and the small, three-slat grille makes it easily identifiable as a Maruti. Standing out on this otherwise conservative nose are the nicely detailed projector headlamps and the faux vents at the bottom of the bumper. In profile, the flowing shoulder line and neatly executed roof look great and the big 16-inch wheels on this top-spec ZXi variant (lower trims get 15-inch wheels) complement the car’s size. What’s most striking though is the resemblance the Ciaz’s rear bears to the Honda City’s. The stretched tail-lights look like they have come from the same mould as the City’s, and from afar, it’s easy to mix-up the two cars.

Despite being the largest car in its segment, what’s impressive is that it’s the lightest too. Thanks to the liberal use of expensive high tensile steel in the body shell, the petrol Ciaz tips the scales at a bantamweight 1025kg; 42kg lighter than the SX4. Using high-tensile steel has also improved the Ciaz’s torsional stiffness, making it feel more tightly bolted than the SX4, despite its longer wheelbase.

Of course, lowering fuel consumption also got importance at the design phase with a focus on making the Ciaz as slippery as possible. Suzuki engineers spent a lot of time in the wind tunnel to get the coefficient of drag down to an impressive figure of 0.29.