The most exceptional new car released in the European market. That’s the official line at the top of the Car of the Year statutes about what this great old award boils down to.
Sure, there have been the odd eyebrows raised about some winners during the past 61 years, but democracy does such things and, besides, a year and its winner can be only as good as the cars launched within those 12 months.
The cream still rises to the top, and the quality of the field in 2025 means this year’s winner will be the kind of thick, moreish cream normally reserved for your Christmas pudding, not that red-labelled single stuff you’re only punishing yourself with during the January Blues. To put it another way: our winner will be more 1999 Ford Focus than 1996 Fiat Bravo.
The 2025 Car of the Year (COTY) will be revealed tomorrow (10 January) at the Brussels motor show, but the build-up started even before the Renault Scenic was crowned 2024 winner at the final running of the Geneva show last February.
For the first round of judging, jurors simply pick their favourite seven cars from all those launched in 2024. They must be all-new models only, so no facelifts, derivatives or different bodystyles, and they must be available to order with finalised pricing by 31 December. That creates a longlist of 42 cars. From those, the seven cars with the most votes from 60 jurors in 23 countries make it to the shortlist. These seven are then subject to a fresh round of voting from the same jurors before a winner emerges.
The seven cars – well, eight, more on which in a moment – shortlisted for COTY 2025 were assembled outside the Silverstone Museum on a windy day just before Christmas for the six UK jurors to test on the grimy, greasy, rutted, potholed roads nearby we know so well.
The best cars have always been able to excel on these roads, although these seven are not the exact seven shortlisted by Autocar editor and COTY juror Mark Tisshaw in consultation with the road test team, headed by road test editor Matt Saunders, who also joined proceedings at Silverstone. However, four of the five cars we really wanted on the COTY shortlist made the cut.
Those four are the Citroën C3, Dacia Duster, Kia EV3 and Renault 5. The fifth, which sadly didn’t make it on to the COTY shortlist, is the Skoda Superb. The Polestar 3 and Mini Cooper completed our seven. But when all the COTY jurors’ votes were counted, the C3, Duster, EV3 and 5 were joined by the Hyundai Inster, Cupra Terramar and Alfa Romeo Junior.