Dacia Sandero Stepway Review (2013-2020)
Dacia Sandero Stepway cars for sale
3.0
Expert review
Pros
Rugged good looks
Practical interior and roomy boot
Low running costs of Bi-Fuel model
Cons
Basic and unsophisticated driving experience
Not as much fun as a Ford Fiesta Active
Despite the SUV looks, there's no 4x4 version
The CarGurus verdict
The Sandero Stepway provides access to SUV ownership on a budget and, as long as buyers understand that from the outset, with the accompanying compromises, they should be happy enough. The Stepway certainly represents a good value-for-money proposition: it has more than acceptable looks (the rugged styling elements elevate the Sandero’s design significantly), it should be reliable, inexpensive to buy and run, and practical, too.
It won’t be a match on the road for the Fiesta Active or something more refined such as the Seat Arona, but as the old saying goes, you pay your money – in this case, not very much, relative to its rivals – and you take your choice. If you want a little more sophistication, the two aforementioned cars are better bet, as is the Hyundai i20 Active, but if a cheap, rugged-looking runabout fits your bill, the Stepway will do the business.
Picking up a genuine bargain is the holy grail for most consumers, and that’s never more true than when buying a car. Yes, British car buyers, by and large, want their creature comforts, but by the same token many also want a cheap, simple car to get them from A to B. That explains the success of Dacia in the UK.
The original Dacia Sandero hatchback was launched as the cheapest new car in the UK when it was launched in 2013. But the Renault-owned Romanian brand also had a canny eye on what buyers wanted, and then, as now, it seemed that everyone wanted an SUV, or at least something that looked like an SUV. Which is where the Dacia Sandero Stepway comes in.
The Stepway is a Sandero on steroids, jacked up, with a raised ride height to give it more ground clearance and with addition of some styling features that make it look more rugged. It's not really ready to take on rougher terrain, though, as there’s no four-wheel drive to enable it to handle anything more challenging than wet grass and a bit of mud. But as most 4x4 drivers never actually take their cars off-road, that lack of capability is a minor detail.
The SUV looks come from that higher-riding aspect and some rugged body cladding on the lower body, wheelarches and roof rails. These additions impressively transform the standard Sandero supermini into something a lot more SUV-like in its appearance, which is clearly something that British buyers like, as it accounted for around 70% of all Sandero sales (a trend that’s set to continue with the new model).
SUV popularity means that many buyers are happy to settle for even a small one. When it was new, the entry-level Stepway was more than £2,000 cheaper than the Suzuki Ignis and about four grand cheaper than the Renault Captur, Peugeot 2008 and Nissan Juke. True, it was an appreciably more basic car in pretty much every possible way, but the rugged little Dacia made a strong case for itself in the new car market, and it still does as a used buy.
Don’t be fooled by the SUV tag – the Stepway is still a small car, and it offers essentially the same space as the Sandero supermini. But that’s no bad thing by the standards of this class. There's plenty of room in the rear seats and it’s 320-litre boot capacity (1,200 litres with the rear seats down) comfortably trumps the 292-litre Ford Fiesta Active or the 267-litre Suzuki Ignis of the same era.
There’s the same hardwearing feel to the interior as you get in the regular Sandero, although you do get slightly different trim. Perhaps the most significant change with the higher-riding Stepway is that it’s easier to get in and out.
Don’t be fooled by the SUV tag – the Stepway is still a small car, and it offers essentially the same space as the Sandero supermini. But that’s no bad thing by the standards of this class. There's plenty of room in the rear seats and it’s 320-litre boot capacity (1,200 litres with the rear seats down) comfortably trumps the 292-litre Ford Fiesta Active or the 267-litre Suzuki Ignis of the same era.
There’s the same hardwearing feel to the interior as you get in the regular Sandero, although you do get slightly different trim. Perhaps the most significant change with the higher-riding Stepway is that it’s easier to get in and out.
The Stepway was launched with just two trim: Ambiance and Laureate levels, with the names changed to Essential and Comfort in 2019.
The entry-level Access trim offered on the regular Sandero wasn’t available on the Stepway, so you won’t find any that are quite so basic. When the car was launched, Ambience came with alloy wheels, LED lights and tinted rear windows as standard. A mid-life refresh at the end of 2016 saw the addition of chrome accents and a new steering wheel, plus equipment such as DAB radio with Bluetooth and USB ports.
Laureate/Comfort trim adds a multimedia system including satellite navigation and seven-inch touchscreen, cruise control, front fog lights, height-adjustable driver's seat and steering wheel and rear parking sensors. It’s still not exactly lavish, but it compares favourably to most small cars that you’re likely to find for a comparable price on the used market.
In addition to the relatively low purchase price of a Stepway, compared to its main rivals, it's also a car that is fairly cheap to run, although its use of older Renault engines does mean that some of the cars it's up against have more modern, and therefore more efficient, engine technology.
The engine line up is pretty simple, with a couple of three-cylinder petrol engines, a diesel and a Bi-Fuel petrol/LPG unit added in 2020. For the first few years after it went on sale, the Stepway only had one petrol option, a 89bhp turbo TCe 90. Fuel consumption is 55.4mpg and CO2 emissions of 115g/km, figures that were determined under the old NEDC testing regime, which means that in the real world, drivers are more likely be get a return of around 45mpg.
The SCe 75 engine was added to the Stepway range in early 2019, but only with Essential trim. A power output of just 74bhp means that it’s not the quickest variant – and that’s a kind way of describing a car that takes 16.7 seconds to complete a 0-62mph acceleration test – and achieves 43.5mpg to 45.6mpg (according to the newer, more accurate WLTP test).
For better economy, the dCi 90 diesel, with its 74.3mpg (NEDC) official fuel consumption figure is the one to choose. It was replaced in 2019 with an updated new-generation Blue dCi 95 diesel, which officially achieves 58.8 to 62.7mpg (WLTP).
If you have access to LPG in your local area (which is by no means a given), the TCe 100 Bi-Fuel has two fuel tanks, one for petrol and one for LPG, and can run on either fuel (you press a button to switch between the two). The economy figures are 37.6mpg for LPG (which is half the cost of petrol at the pumps) and 47.1mpg for petrol.
Car tax (Vehicle Excise Duty) is affordable, thanks to the Stepway’s low CO2 emissions. Both versions of the diesels emit just 98g/km, so cars registered before April 2017 (dCi 90) will be free to tax, while cars registered after that will cost £165 a year. The petrol cars have emissions ranging from 109g/km (TCe 90) to 117g/km (SCe 75), so that means £20-30 for pre-2017 cars and £165 for later models, while the 135g/km emissions of the pre-2016 1.2 will cost £165 a year.
The Stepway is a relatively cheap car to buy, so it’s also cheap to insure, with different versions ranging from group 3 to group 9. Servicing is straightforward, with Dacia specifying 12,000-mile intervals. Dacia also offers fixed-price servicing, with prices ranging from £169 from a minor service to £259 for a full service plus MOT (at time of writing).
As the Stepway is built using an older Renault vehicle platform, most of its parts and components have been tried and tested over a number of years on other cars built by Renault (such as the mk3 Clio), so any issues should have been ironed out in the years before the Dacia started production.
Indeed, there are very few reports of real problems for owners. There are a few mentions of issues with catalytic converters, engine management systems and rust, but these are surprisingly few and far between.
As a result, the Stepway has a good record in the various customer satisfaction surveys since its launch in the UK. The Dacia brand also recorded 12th place in one reliability table of 31 manufacturers.
Stepways originally came with a three-year, 60,000-mile warranty (with a two-year paintwork guarantee and six-year anti-corrosion policy on top), which can be extended to five years or seven years for an extra fee. Some of the more recent used examples may still have a decent amount of time left on the extended warranty if this was purchased, but others will have expired by now.
There have been four recalls for the Sandero model, of which the Stepway is a variant. Diesel cars built between 2013 and 2015 were recalled for a potential fuel leak in June 2018. Some 2015 cars had a steering defect, with a risk of the drive rotor at the ball join on the steering rod breaking due to excessive stress, so there was a recall in August 2018. The other two recalls – in August 2018 for cars built in late 2012 and January 2019 for cars built in April-August 2018 – related to concerns about airbags not deploying. If buying a car that might have been built in these slots, check whether it has been taken to a dealer to have the car checked out.
- From 2020, Dacia introduced an LPG Bi-Fuel engine option, replacing the diesel variants, and designed to be less expensive to run and emit less CO2. Running on LPG, the Stepway Bi-Fuel emits on average 11% less CO2 than an equivalent petrol engine and Dacia claims it can travel more than 800 miles with the two tanks, a 50-litre petrol tank and 40-litre LPG tank.
- Used Stepways are good-value cars, although they do hold their value pretty well. Three- to four-year-old models are available for around £9,000-£10,000, a saving of around £4,000 on the entry-level version of the new Stepway that has now replaced them. The last of the first-generation models, registered at the beginning of 2021, will set you back around £14,000 to £16,000.
- Although Dacia doesn’t really go in for optional extras, there are a few to look out for. Metallic paint was a cost-option on all models. Leather upholstery and a rear parking camera were also available on the up-spec Comfort model.
- The most fuel-efficient version of the Stepway is, as you might expect, one with a diesel engine. The dCi 90, which has an output of 89bhp, a 0-62mph time of 11.7 seconds, an official consumption figure of 74.3mpg (as calculated under the older NEDC testing regime) and CO2 emissions of 98g/km. From 2019, the diesel was given a power boost of 5bhp, which reduced fuel economy to 72.4mpg.
- If you want your Stepway to be run on an alternative fuel, the Bi-Fuel car, from 2020 onwards, uses both petrol and liquid petroleum gas (LPG), although the availability of LPG in the UK is a bit patchy, so you should check your usual filling stations before committing to buy. The LPG fuel economy isn’t as good as petrol – 37.6 mpg, compared to 47.1 mpg – but LPG is less than half the price of petrol.
- If you want a Stepway with the most up-to-date technology, you should try and pick up a car in Comfort trim from early 2019 onwards, as these have an upgraded multimedia and infotainment system, with an improved satnav system, as well as Android Auto and Apple CarPlay smartphone integration.
