Scorpio-N vs XUV700: Compared in detail after back to back test drives

The XUV700 felt more premium, my dad loved it and so did my sister. The rear also looks miles better than Scorpio-N.

BHPian kanahanin recently shared this with other enthusiasts.

Went for a TD with my family in my hometown in Maharashtra, there were somethings that were clear in my mind before the visit:

AT would be preferred.

The car is going to be for my family and I had to keep future needs in mind.

We went and were provided a Z8L AT trim to TD. We also took a manual AX5 XUV700 for a drive and did an analysis between both:

Scorpio-N:

• Felt premium and the interiors were nice. It gave a very commanding view of the road. Mom loved the extra legroom in middle row (was given considering our current car is an i10 Magna which is roughly 10 YO).
• The sunroof felt puny compared to XUV700, mom loved it initially but liked the sunroof XUV700 more.
• Mom and me liked the macho styling of the Scorpio, though I got to admit the initial reports and opinions of the rear looking ugly were 100% true and my mom was the first one to pick on that. Maybe it was the color but the rear of the Scorpio-N is ugly, in her words "it looked a taxi vehicle".
• The rear seats and luggage space are a joke. XUV definitely wins here hands down. One advantage of XUV is we can fold rear seat partially to have 6 sitting and extra luggage. For scorpio you can either seat 7 people uncomfortably or put some luggage in.
• The electronic kit was new and I quite liked it. Especially since i was thrown off by driving AT first time. The rear cameras etc. helped.
• The suspension was good but not magical, the amount of body roll was very noticeable. My mom didn't like it but she was okay with it. Surprisingly we couldn't make out a lot of difference between this and XUV700 except the body roll was much more noticeable in he Scorpio-N.
• I liked the green color the most. Given black and white are common and come with their own headaches Green was the best of the lot for me and my family. My father though wanted to go for white.
• As much as i loved it the looks were pretty okayish IMO. Yes it looks imposing but the looks wear out after a while
• The premium for AT and 4wd are too much. While 4wd was not even close to the must have list I wanted to see if i could squeeze it in by stretching my budget but 2.45 is a no go. Surprisingly the premium for AT was so much that my father convinced me against it. Given the traffic in my hometown is non existent and the vehicle would mostly do highway runs, my father said there was no need for AT. I agreed half-heartedly and the bookings in my small town basically seem to reconfirm his angle.
• Waiting times are at this point impossible to predict. The assumption is if everything goes well the earliest we would get our car would be sometime next year. Given we were no where close to the Z8L model budget wise we had no hope seeing the car in the next 6 months.

XUV700:

• After the price reveal I was sure that my dream car wouldn't fit in our budget so I turned to XUV700. It was the best car for all our use cases.
• The monocoque chassis was the best for our choice of terrain. As much as I'd want to do offroading the car would be limited to highway runs and there was no pressing need for a BOF style chassis. I wanted too but I didn't need it.
• The body roll was considerably lower. Suspensions were on par IMO but I couldn't understand the differences so I'd say no comments on this particular aspect.
• The car felt more premium, my dad loved it and so did my sister. Looks wise both internally and externally XUV700 was better and in a word 'posh' instead of macho. The white (which is what my father wants) looks ultra premium and the subtle chrome finishes etc. make this a better looker. The rear also looks miles better than Scorpio-N.
• The luggage space feels much bigger than the Scorpio-N and the option of partially folding rear seats makes this a no nonsense option.
• Unofficially I was quoted around 3-6 months to get AX5 MT petrol delivered. This was reasonable for me and the had the exact same model in a different color available for deliver.
• The car has spent much more time in the market. Little niggles and problems would've been sorted out from my understanding. The comment on this thread about introductory pricing being slightly low due to expected niggles in a brand new product was in my mind and this is what caused me to lean towards XUV700.
• Oh and before I forget, my sister absolutely loved the panoramic sunroof in XUV700.

Given all this points we have decided to go with AX5 Petrol MT version for XUV700 instead of the Scorpio-N. I would love to hear the forums opinion on the choice. Some doubts I have now.

• Would it be better to get MX variant and add accessories?
• Is AT worth extra 2 lakhs? Given the run would be in small town and highways. I felt the clutch and gear shifts we very smooth in XUV700.
• Any major miss on choosing petrol?

Would appreciate any help. In any case scorpion is running very close to XUV700 price points and has very less to show for it. Low luggage space, cramped 3 row, pricy 4WD limits the amount of off roading work you can extract out of it are just some of the things I observed.

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