REVIEW | New Volkswagen Kombi T7 gets smoother and smarter

While the Volkswagen Transporter has had several nicknames over the years—including the Bulli (in Germany) and Volksiebus (in South Africa)—the one constant has been its practicality and versatility.

Since the first T1 rolled off the assembly line in 1950, the Volkswagen Transporter has become a beloved travel icon — embodying wanderlust from the hippie era to family road trips and corporate shuttle duty — and now the seventh-generation T7 has arrived in South Africa with a larger cabin and improved refinement.

The T7’s more polished nature is apparent in its lower levels of noise and vibration when driving. It feels noticeably more solid and torsionally rigid, and the little interior rattles and squeaks that sometimes cropped up in the previous-gen car were absent in the test vehicle.

The 11-model T7 range comprises panel vans, crew buses and Kombis, and the tester is the eight-seat Kombi 2.0TDI SWB Life priced at R1,174,600, inclusive of a three-year/120,000km warranty and five-year/60,000km maintenance plan.

It is a front-wheel drive model, but a R1,342,400 4Motion all-wheel drive Style version is available for buyers seeking additional traction and luxury features.

The T7’s low levels of harshness were impressive on our road trip from Joburg to KwaZulu-Natal, and so was the plush ride quality. The smooth ride prompted a passenger to remark how she was able to read for much of the long journey without getting car sick, as she usually would in a car.

Paired with an auto transmission with normal, sport and eco modes, the 130kW/390Nm 2.0l turbo diesel engine is a refined and gutsy performer, easily hauling five passengers, their luggage and a full trailer on our Joburg-KZN outing. Despite the heavy load, the bus cruised easy-breezy up hills and barely seemed to feel the trailer. It has a braked 2,800kg towing capacity and a reversing camera that allows for easy trailer coupling.

The bus returned an impressively frugal 9.3//100km average over the mostly open-road trip, and a 70l tank provides a long fuel range.

Enormous cabin has space for eight and the seats are removable. (DENIS DROPPA)

The enormous interior has stretch-out room in three seating rows in a 2+3+3 arrangement. The rear two rows can be folded down or removed to suit various passenger-cargo combos but can’t be slid fore and aft to vary legroom. The front seats are also the only ones to get fold-down armrests.

Easy access is gained into the rear cabin by means of two manually operated sliding doors, with the middle outer seats tilting forward to grant easy entry to the rear row.

The seats are comfortable and covered in artificial leather. The cabin is unornamented and businesslike, with mostly hard plastics instead of premium-feeling soft surfaces, but it’s a pleasant cabin environment, and the textured surfaces don’t look cheap.

The seats are comfortable and there are USB ports galore, but no centre storage console. (DENIS DROPPA)

The Transporter SWB is the shortest vehicle in its segment, giving it enormous passenger room but a smaller boot than some rivals. Even so, the cargo hold takes a reasonable stack of luggage, and there’s a full-sized spare wheel.

Practical stowage space in the cabin is sparse. There’s a slot in the upper dash for laptops, and there are sizeable pockets and cupholders in the front doors, but things tend to slide around in them. There’s no central storage bin in the front cabin, as VW has opted to leave this as walk-through space to the rear seats.

The Kombi isn’t overendowed with specs for the price. We’ve become spoilt with cut-priced Chinese and Indian brands bombarding us with features, but German legacy brands remain quite stingy.

For instance, the VW has no wireless phone charger, something that’s becoming de rigueur in cars these days. At the price one might also expect electrically adjustable front seats in the Kombi, but they’re manually operated, as is the large tailgate.

Standard fare does include a 13-inch infotainment display with wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, keyless start, dynamic road sign display and a rain sensor. There are also USB charging ports for all three rows, which augurs well for family harmony on road trips.

The climate control was excellent, quickly cooling the large cabin in KZN summer temperatures that reached 38 degrees.

At just over 5m in length, the SWB Transporter is sizeable, but large windows and a short front end give it good visibility, and combined with its light steering and relatively small turning circle, the bus is quite easy to manoeuvre. A reversing camera makes life simpler in parking lots, and large blind spot side mirrors provide good lane-change visibility.

Ride comfort is excellent. (DENIS DROPPA)

As is common these days, the driver-assist features can become a bugbear, particularly the VW’s driver fatigue warning, which seemingly goes off randomly even when driving for only a few minutes. The lane-keeping assist does not gel well with potholed South African roads, but it can be easily disabled by pressing a button on the steering wheel.

The Transporter’s infotainment system is user-friendly, with quick-access icons for many features instead of requiring a distracting deep dive into a digital menu.

It isn’t lavishly specified for its price, but the new Transporter remains true to its core brief: practical, versatile and immensely capable, with solid build quality and a polished driving experience. It delivers strong diesel performance and driving comfort, making it a compelling choice for shuttle operators and large families alike.