Running costs
Rating: 4.2/5

Renault now offers the standard Megane exclusively as an E-Tech plug-in hybrid. That does mean that initial purchase price is quite high, but to look at it another way, it’s one of the most cost-effective ways into a new plug-in hybrid, with prices for the Hyundai Ioniq plug-in, SEAT Leon eHybrid or Volkswagen Golf GTE significantly higher.

Like all plug-in hybrids, it claims a seemingly impossibly high fuel economy figure – 235.4mpg on the WLTP combined cycle. How close you come to that depends on how you utilise the Megane E-Tech’s 30 miles of all-electric range.

Plug in regularly and keep your journeys short and that figure will go up as you burn less and less petrol. On longer runs with a discharged battery you’ll likely see a figure between 50-60mpg. Still good, but if you don’t intend to plug in often you’d get lower running costs from the self-charging Toyota Corolla hybrid.

There’s also an elephant in the room here, which is the existence of the RS hot hatchback. The total opposite to the E-Tech hybrid, this pure petrol engine trades performance for economy and returns just 33.6mpg combined.

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Green credentials
4.3/5

No matter how you drive the Megane E-Tech, its WLTP CO2 emissions of just 28g/km mean that it’s a very cost-effective company car proposition and has a low first year VED figure.

The opposite can be said of the RS model and its 192g/km emissions.

Find running costs for a specific Renault Megane model on our specs page

Reliability
3.6/5

Renault’s not best known for its reliability, though the Megane hasn’t been a particularly problematic model since it launched. There’s only one recall, for cars built in 2017 that may involve an electrical board cracking.

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However, it’s still too soon to make a judgement on the E-Tech powertrain. This is a relatively new addition to the Renault range and it’s based on an unproven – and highly complex – type of gearbox. Time will tell whether this proves to be reliable.