• Space for four inside the Juke
• Boot surprisingly spacious
• Not many storage areas

How good the Nissan Juke’s practicality is depends on how you want to view this car. But as a compact SUV for empty nesters, it scores well enough.

There’s plenty of space in the front in terms of head- and legroom, though it’s a slightly different story in the back. The roofline slopes as you move rearwards, and the door opening is quite narrow, meaning it’s easy to hit your head on the way in as you manoeuvre yourself around the body work.

However, rear space isn’t too disappointing, as long as there’s nobody too tall in the front seats. Headroom is reasonable, but it can be dark in the back on higher-spec models with privacy glass and black headlining.

In some ways the Juke can be forgiven. View it as an urban runaround and the extra practicalities of a five-door are bonuses. View it as a family car though, and it’s less impressive. By no means is it bad, though.

The Juke isn’t a large car, despite its bulbous front end suggesting otherwise. It’s compact, with surprisingly good visibility to help manoeuvre the car.

For example, the lumps on top of the headlamp units help judge where the front of the car is, although the windows at the back of the car are much smaller, so you’ll be thankful for reversing cameras on higher-spec models.

The door mirrors are particularly large – comically so for such a compact car, but this helps with visibility as well.

Boot space is decent in the Juke, especially when you consider how compact its exterior dimensions are. For a front-wheel drive version of the Juke, the boot size is 354 litres with a split-level boot floor that expands to 1,189 litres when you fold the rear seats down.

If you go for a 4WD version of the Juke, however, boot size takes a significant hit. In this form, it’s 207 litres with the seats up and 786 litres with them down.

General storage isn’t quite as impressive, though. There are a couple of useful cupholders up front, but the door bins are small and there is a limited amount of space elsewhere.

Safety

• Five stars from Euro NCAP
• Was tested back in 2011, though
• Extra safety kit available

Independent safety assessors, Euro NCAP, awarded the car the full five stars, however this was in 2011 before more stringent tests were introduced.

All models come with six airbags, Isofix child seat points in the rear, anti-whiplash headrests and brake assist.

There is also the addition of Nissan’s Dynamic Control System on Acenta models and above, providing further peace of mind.

Nissan Safety Shield package is also available on most models, bundling in 360-degree cameras, blindspot warning and lane-departure warning to add extra driver assistance systems.