New seven-seater Citroen C3 Aircross inbound – has the Dacia Jogger met its match?

• Petrol, hybrid and electric options
• Five or seven seats
• Chunky SUV design

Citroen has just unveiled the latest C3 supermini, but a brand-new Citroen C3 Aircross is also in the works, which will set its aim squarely on the Dacia Jogger. The C3 Aircross will be offered with seven seats and will go on sale for a budget-friendly price, giving the Jogger a run for its money, as well as its traditional rivals like the Renault Captur, Nissan Juke and Ford Puma.

Our exclusive renders show what we can expect the next C3 Aircross to look like. It gets the brand’s latest styling, which features its vintage-inspired new logo and a boxier all-round look. 

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Buying trends towards SUVs and crossovers have influenced the design of the C3 supermini, which looks chunkier and sits higher than before, and the same can be said of the C3 Aircross. Citroen has said we can expect a more rugged, SUV-style look to help differentiate the C3 Aircross from its predecessor, and a longer rear will help accommodate the extra row of seats.

Citroen has said that the new C3 Aircross will also be available in basic trims with five seats, meaning that the extra space left over in the rear should translate to impressive boot space.

Citroen C3 Aircross engines and powertrains

The Citroen C3 Aircross will get a choice of different powertrains. While the brand is likely to stick to some petrol models for a low entry price, there will also be a hybrid version, like with the Dacia Jogger, and even a fully-electric model. 

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We’d expect Citroen to forego the C3’s entry-level 74bhp petrol engine in favour of the more powerful 99bhp turbocharged 1.2-litre PureTech unit in the C3 Aircross, given its larger size and weight.

The C3 Aircross may also be offered with a choice of hybrid engines, pairing a 28bhp electric motor with the aforementioned 99bhp engine or a slightly more powerful 128bhp version.

Citroen’s next generation C3 Aircross will be the first to be offered with an electric option, which we expect to get the same 44kWh battery and 111bhp motor as used in the new e-C3, but the longer wheelbase could be utilised to accommodate a larger battery model in due course.

Interior, features and pricing

On the inside, you can expect many of the same features, such as the dashboard, instrument cluster and 10-inch infotainment screen to be carried over from the C3 – after all, this would keep costs down.

Like Dacia, while Citroen will seek to make the small SUV as safe as possible in terms of crash protection, it could omit lots of safety assist technology as standard to keep costs down. While this might sound like a bad thing and affect Euro NCAP ratings negatively, it gives the consumer a choice as to whether or not to pay for preventative safety systems they might not even use.

Citroen looks set to revolutionise the EV market, with the e-C3 version of its latest C3 supermini set to be priced very attractively for an EV, so we can expect the same of the C3 Aircross. 

An announcement on pricing for the budget SUV is a long way off, but if it’s to compete with the Dacia Jogger, we’d expect a cost of around £17,000 for the five-seater or £18,000 for the seven-seat version, with the hybrid expected to cost around £21,000. The e-C3 is expected to cost from just under £23,000, so we’d expect the C3 Aircross SUV to cost closer to £30,000, though nothing is confirmed.

Read about Citroen’s potentially game-changing new C3 and e-C3 superminis….