Volkswagen Passat Saloon (2015 - 2021) boot space, practicality and safety

• Spacious, accommodating interior
• Large, square boot offers a lot of space
• Access limited due to saloon body style

The Passat is a long car, and that translates into a generous amount of interior space. Up front, a wide range of adjustment for both seats means it’s very easy to get comfortable and stretch out, and even with a tall person in the front, space in the rear seats is plentiful.

Access is easy and – unlike the sleeker Arteon – headroom is good enough for tall adults to sit comfortably without having to slouch. It’s not as good as in the Passat Estate, but four adults will fit comfortably in the saloon. A fifth will be fine for shorter journeys, but will have to straddle a large central tunnel and share the footwells with those in the outer seats.

There’s a good amount of storage in the back – pockets on the rear of the front seats and large door bins big enough for a large water bottle, while an armrest in the middle boosts comfort.

Open the boot and there’s a generous 586-litre load area that’s well-shaped and deep. It’s bigger than the boot in a Vauxhall Insignia Grand Sport and Ford Mondeo, but trails the Skoda Superb’s 625-litre offering. The main problem is it’s more difficult to get to than all the others because it’s just the saloon bootlid that opens, not the rear window like its hatchback rivals, severely limiting its usability.

The rear seats fold to open up a total of 1,152 litres of space, but this is only useful for longer items rather than bulky items. But if you regularly need to load the car up like that, a saloon won’t be the type of car you’re considering. The Passat Estate is the better option here.

How safe is the Passat?

• Five-star Euro NCAP safety rating
• 2019 facelift brought more safety kit
• Plenty of driver assistance kit, too

First tested in 2014, the Passat scored a five-star safety rating and that still applies following the 2019 facelift. In fact, the mid-life tweaks brought in a raft of upgrades that included various safety and driver assistance technologies.

As standard, the Passat comes with a full suite of airbags – driver and passenger, driver’s knee, curtain airbags front and rear and a front side impact airbag. On top of this there are two Isofix points in the rear, tyre pressure loss indicator and a post-collision braking system that holds the brakes on in the event of an accident. This prevents the car from being shunted into another in front.

There’s also standard-fit lane-assist to warn you if you go to drift out of your lane (and then nudge you back across), parking sensors all-round and adaptive cruise control with traffic jam assist, working up to speeds of 130mph. The system also reads traffic signs and is able to adapt the system to whatever the prevailing speed limit is on the road.

As part of this system, Front Assist measures the distance between you and the car in front and features autonomous emergency braking. All of this tech is part of the standard-fit Travel Assist system.

The safety and driver assistance kit list can be bolstered with a selection of options that fall under what VW calls IQ Drive – the umbrella term for all driver assistance and safety tech. Extras include 360-degree cameras called Area View, IQ Light matrix LED headlights and a head-up display. There’s also a Trailer Assist system that reverses the car and trailer automatically using the mirror adjustment switch.