Back in the day, the Nissan Sentra was a sub-compact before being reconfigured five years ago into a larger compact sedan. The change was subtle for the eighth generation set of wheels that’s been around for more than 40 years.
Slotted between its smallish sibling Versa and mid-size Altima, the Sentra offers a comfortable ride with available driver assists and suspension controls to improve the driving experience.
Pros:
Attractive stylingAffordableAvailable driver-assist features
Cons:
No turbo engineInfographics are lackingKey fob not well marked
The Sentra is available in three trim levels: S, SV and SR — all priced in the low to high $20s fully optioned. While easy on the pocketbook, there is no all-wheel drive available.
We found the non-turbo four-cylinder engine that produces 149 ponies performed okay around town but was lacking in highway travel. Stay in the right lane and you will be pleased with fuel economy in the 30s. In independent testing, our SR tester reached 60 miles per hour from a dead stop in 8.6 seconds.
The top-of-the-line SR $28,220 featured a lot of creature comforts not readily available with rivals. If you are looking for a bargain price with features only seen on more expensive sedans, the Sentra SR or mid-level SV should be high on your list of test drives.
Our two-tone orange and black Sentra was a standout in traffic. Standard 18-inch alloys with all season paws gave the car a sporty look while providing grip for the occasional spurt of power.
We were delighted with the roominess the Sentra has to offer with all-around seating. The front seats offer good support with headroom and legroom and a like amount for rear seat occupants. Not many cars can make that claim at this price point.
A Premium package, included in our tester, added an 8-speaker Bose sound system, leatherette seating, six-way power driver’s seat with lumbar, intelligent 360 all-around view, Nissan Connect services and a Wi-Fi hotspot.
Its continuously variable transmission offered a mostly smooth progression through acceleration, although noise levels were higher than rivals.
Sentra’s biggest hurdle is to improve market share over top rivals Toyota Corolla, Honda Civic, Kia Forte, Hyundai Elantra and Mazda 3. An optional turbo powered engine or hybrid could improve the odds.
Inside controls are straight forward, and we liked the convenience of control knobs for radio volume and tuning versus drill down tabs found in some rivals. Center-mounted climate vents are adjustable and add a nice retro look.
Nissan includes a number of standard driver assist features in the Sentra including automatic emergency braking with pedestrian detection, forward collision warning, rear automatic braking, blind spot warning, rear cross traffic alert, lane departure warning and high beam assist. Our SR also included adaptive cruise control.
We noticed in our tester that the high-beam assist was slow to react, blind spot warning lights were in obscure interior door panels instead of outside mirrors, and adaptive cruise control — while easy to use — released from full stop within seconds.