Does the Dacia Duster still deserve its ‘best-value’ crown? Mat compares it to the new Chery Tiggo 4 to find out

I love the Dacia Duster. It’s a hardwearing and super-practical family SUV that just so happens to be as cheap as chips. However, there are loads of new Chinese brands which are challenging the Duster for budget supremacy – and Chery is one of them.

The new Chery Tiggo 4 is the cheapest full hybrid SUV on the market by quite some margin. In fact, if it wasn’t for the MG3 hatchback, it would be the cheapest hybrid car, full stop – prices kick off from just under £20,000.

The cheapest full hybrid Duster costs £23,345, and for that price you can have a top-spec Tiggo 4 Summit – which comes loaded with kit. The Tiggo 4 is also more powerful – but is it a better car? I’m going to compare it and the Duster side-by-side on pricing, standard equipment, practicality and what they’re like to drive to help you decide whether one of these two small SUVs is the right car for you.

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Dacia Duster hybrid vs Chery Tiggo 4: prices and deals

The Duster hybrid is badged as ‘Full Hybrid 155’, and not to be confused with the ‘Mild Hybrid 140’ which isn’t a proper hybrid car. It’s available in three trim levels – Expression, Journey and Extreme. Prices start at £23,345, though you can save a bit of money through Carwow and pick one up for £22,679.

The basic ‘Expression’ trim gets a rear parking camera, 10.1-inch infotainment screen, digital dials, air-conditioning and wireless smartphone connectivity. Step up to the Journey and you get climate control, built-in navigation and a surround-view camera, while the top-spec car gets heated front seats and steering wheel as well as clever modular roof bars.

The Tiggo 4 is even more straightforward. There’s just the one engine, and two trim levels – Aspire or Summit. The basic car gets keyless entry, two 12.3-inch displays, full LED lights, climate control, wireless smartphone connectivity and a rear-view camera with parking sensors.

Step up to the Summit, though, and you also get privacy glass, an electric driver’s seat, heated seats and steering wheel, 360-degree camera and wireless phone charging. List prices already undercut the Duster, but you can get a discount buying through Carwow which brings the Aspire model down to less than £18,000 and even the Summit down to just £19,735.

There’s a similar price difference when leasing. Over three years, on an 8,000 miles per year contract with 12 months initial payment, the Duster will cost you £332 for an Expression model, £355 for a Journey or £357 for an Extreme. The Tiggo 4 is quite a lot cheaper, at £255 per month for the Aspire or just a fiver extra at £260 for the Summit.

Neither of these are particularly cheap, though, and you can get much better value leasing an MG ZS, Geely Starray or even a Nissan Qashqai for the same or less money.

Dacia Duster Hybrid vs Chery Tiggo 4: interior and technology

The Duster’s interior genuinely looks really cool. From the rugged seat upholstery to the map-contour floor mats, it’s like if Bear Grylls did car interiors.

It feels well-built, but material quality is definitely lacking – the plastics are hard, scratchy and feel hollow, and the seat upholstery is far from plush. The infotainment system is really basic, but it works quite well, and you get nice physical buttons for the air-conditioning so you can leave the touchscreen running Apple CarPlay or Android Auto instead.

The Tiggo 4 looks a lot posher. The twin 12.3-inch screens are set under one sheet of glass so they have a Mercedes-like seamless appearance, and the rest of the cabin is quite slick with artificial leather trim and chrome detailing.

It’s still not exactly a luxury car. Lots of the trim feels hollow and cheap too, but the overall effect is rather plusher than the Duster. The screen isn’t as good – it has more features, but is harder to use with lots of tiny onscreen buttons. And while we’re glad there are separate climate controls, they’re on a touch-sensitive panel which isn’t particularly responsive.

Dacia Duster Hybrid vs Chery Tiggo 4: space and practicality

These cars are pretty similar in size. The Duster is a tiny bit longer, the Tiggo 4 a tiny bit wider, and they’re virtually the same height.

On paper, their boots are the same size too – while petrol-powered Dusters have a cavernous 517-litre boot, this full hybrid model has 430 litres of space – the same as the Tiggo 4. The Chery has one really annoying feature, though – a large hump in the boot floor under which sits the 12V battery. It really gets in the way when you’re loading bulky items.

The Duster has more space for rear passengers, too, though the small rear windows mean those sat in the back of the Tiggo 4 will feel slightly less claustrophobic.

Storage for smaller items is okay in the Duster but it’s best in the Tiggo, which supplements the usual door bins, cupholders and glovebox with a huge open storage area under the centre console.

Dacia Duster Hybrid vs Chery Tiggo 4: engines and driving

These two cars both have hybrid engines, but they operate differently. The Chery uses a 1.5-litre petrol engine and a powerful electric motor, and most of the time it runs on electric power with the engine acting as a generator. This means it feels quite smooth, but when you want more performance the weedy little engine feels quite strained.

The Duster’s 1.8-litre engine is paired up through a complex arrangement of clutches and electric motors, and you’ll notice it cutting in and out a lot more often than the Chery system. It’s smoother, though, and quieter.

The Chery has the edge on performance. With 204hp on tap it can do 0-62mph in 8.9 seconds, half a second faster than the 155hp Duster. The Duster is, however, much nicer to drive. It feels very natural – the steering has a good weight to it and though it doesn’t quite iron out bumps like a Rolls-Royce, it tackles them really well. Plenty of ground clearance and good grip means it’s a pretty good off-roader, too, even though this Hybrid model is only two-wheel drive.

Driving the Tiggo 4 feels a little strange. The steering is very heavy just off the centre, and then quite light everywhere else. Its soft suspension handles small bumps in town quite well, but over a speed bump it feels quite uncontrolled and tends to bounce around a lot.

As for fuel economy, there’s a clear winner. The Tiggo 4 has an official consumption figure of 53.2mpg, and in the real world you’ll see around 48mpg in mixed driving. The Duster’s official consumption figure is 61.4mpg, and that’s genuinely achievable – in fact, if you’re careful you can see almost 70mpg. Over 10,000 miles a year, that would save you almost £500 in fuel costs.

Mat’s final verdict: which car should you buy?

The Chery Tiggo 4 isn’t a car you buy with your heart. It looks awkward, isn’t that nice to drive, and has some annoying features. It feels like a cheap car – but it’s actually a very cheap car, and you can’t ignore that sort of value for money.

The Duster is a more attractive proposition – it’s roomier, more efficient, nicer to drive and genuinely looks quite stylish. But it’s much more expensive, so it depends if those are the sort of things you value more than the Chery’s powerful engine, posh-looking interior and generous equipment levels.

For me, it’d be the Duster every time – but I can see the appeal of the Tiggo 4, and for the price it’s a really good little car.

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