MINI Cooper Review 2025: Price, specs & boot space

If you fancy a MINI Cooper and are reading this, you're probably well on the way to placing a deposit on one. Such is the emotional appeal of the MINI Cooper, few will buy it solely as a rational purchase. That is a huge part of this car's charm and why we love it.

There are small hatches that can carry passengers in more comfort and greater volumes of luggage. None, however, will make you smile nearly as much as the MINI in three- or five-door forms. It's great to drive, looks the business, offers a premium feel in the cabin, and just has 'it' in spades.

Anyone looking at this MINI model has a choice of three- or five-door body styles, so which you choose will come down to how often you carry passengers in the rear seats.

Beyond that, you can pick from three trim levels, plus a variety of optional extras and packs. The Sport trim has a few more options open to its buyers and comes with paddle shifters for the automatic gearbox.

Ah yes, all MINI Coopers have a seven-speed auto transmission, which is a bit of a shame in a sporty small car like this that there's no manual as a choice. However, the 156PS 1.5-litre three-cylinder engine is willing and ready to please, although it can get a little too vocal at higher revs.

The MINI Cooper is such a force in its sector that there are very few small cars you could describe as direct rivals. Among that select band is the Audi A1 and, admittedly more expensive and EV-only, Smart #1.

You could also consider the much smaller Fiat 500, the very sensible Volkswagen Polo, or France's offerings in the shape of the Peugeot 208 and Renault Clio. Japan offers up the Toyota Yaris and Honda Jazz, but neither has the pizzazz of the MINI.

MINI has long since mastered the art of making its small cars look, feel and appear more classy than almost any others in this sector. The mix of materials, fabrics, and the way they are blended together in this Cooper is top drawer.

MINI uses a woven wool effect on the door trims and dash, along with slim air vents that look great, while the coloured effect on selected items like the door handles and cupholder surround lift the interior ambience.

It all conspires to make the MINI Cooper feel more expensive and rare than it is, which is a neat trick.

Where MINI previously, and literally, tried to squeeze a square infotainment system into a round hole, this latest MINI Cooper finally has a properly round screen. It dominates the front of the cabin and adds a good deal to the glamour of the Cooper's interior.

The 9.4-inch screen is very clear, crisp and easy to read on the move. Just as well when it's used for almost every function of the car now. One downside is some of the onscreen icons are smaller than is ideal when trying to select them while driving, though this is far from a unique problem to the MINI.

Some of the menus could be a little easier to navigate too, as well, but overall it's an easy system to use. It comes with Android Auto and Apple CarPlay to easily hitch up with your smartphone. However, you will need the Level 1 Pack to gain wireless phone charging.

If you like the looks of the MINI Cooper in three-door form, you will be limited to carrying a maximum of three passengers. This is because the rear bench only has seating for two. That means two seatbelts and an obviously raised centre cushion to emphasise the point that no more will fit back here.

For some, that just won't be a problem and it also means the two people back here get decent shoulder space. There's also reasonable knee and headroom for adults once installed back there, though getting in past the front seats is a bit of a squeeze. Oddly, there are three cupholders provided here, plus pockets in the backs of the front seats. the view out is good, too, though the optional panoramic glass sunroof also offers some welcome light. Twin Isofix mounts also mean you can park the kids back here safely.

Opt for the five-door MINI Cooper and access to the rear seats is far easier. The doors open wide enough to make lifting the kids into child seats isn't too much of an effort, and the five-door has a proper bench that accommodate three passengers so long as they don't mind skooshing up close.

An extra 172mm is added to the overall length of the five-door MINI Cooper over its three-door sibling. This means more generous knee space, while headroom is the same.

That extra length in the five-door also gets you a bot more boot capacity. In normal use, the five-door provides 275-litres of luggage space, which ain't that great, but the three-door can only muster a paltry 210-litres. Fold down the split and tip rear bench and you can free up to 925-litres of carrying ability in the five-door, but 200-litres less in the three-door. A Honda Jazz or Skoda Fabia will both carry significantly more with seats up or down.

Whichever way you spec your MINI Cooper, you get the same 1.5-litre three-cylinder turbo petrol engine. It makes 156PS and drives the front wheels through a seven-speed automatic gearbox - there is no manual transmission on offer, mores the pity.

In the three-door, this means 0-62mph acceleration of 7.7 seconds, which is nippy enough to warrant the Cooper name. The five-door needs 8.0 seconds on the nose, but you won't really notice the difference unless you lined the two up on a race track. Even so, this is a car very definitely for road use as the engine major more on delivering its power in the low and mid-range of its rev band rather than reaching for the high notes.

Should you choose the Sport trim, it comes with paddle shifters for the auto gearbox. This gives the driver a little more engagement with the transmission, but for real fun you need to select the Go-Kart mode via the dial and infotainment screen that adds a slightly perkier note to the way the car drives but does nothing to the gearbox's reactions. Incidentally, there seven drive modes to pick from, but the default normal mode is more than adequate for 99% of use.

It may be small and cheeky in character, but there's also a very grown-up, sophisticated air to the MINI Cooper thanks to its refinement. In town, its occupants are largely isolated from the hullabaloo of the outside world. Only if you encounter a large pothole will you hear much thump from the tyres.

The steering has a fluid, consistent feel that adds to the sense of the MINI Cooper being very solidly built and stable on the road. It's not buffeted by side winds, but you will hear wind noise at motorway speeds due to the upright windscreen design of the MINI, which is something the car has suffered from ever since the first BMW-era MIN arrived in 2002. There's also some tyre roar at higher speeds, but the engine is commendably smooth and quiet at all times.

At the time of writing, the MINI Cooper had not been tested by Euro NCAP  for its crash protection.

All MINI Cooper models come with six airbags, ABS anti-lock brakes, DSC traction and stability control, and automatic emergency braking. You also get lane departure warning, traffic sign recognition, and e-Call.

If you go for the Level 3 Pack available as an option on the Sport and Exclusive trims, you also get Driving Assistant Plus. This brings Active Cruise Control with Stop and Go function to use in the ebb and flow of traffic jams. This pack also comes with Parking Assistant Plus that offers a 360-degree camera view in the infotainment screen. It also has a camera recorder to store the 30 seconds before and after any collision to provide video evidence of what happened.

MINI was one of the first car companies to really champion fixed-price servicing packages and you can opt for this with the latest MINI Cooper. Take the full Monty version and it covers all routine maintenance up to four years and 62,000 miles.

As for warranty cover, MINI has your back for three years and an unlimited mileage in that time. It's not as generous as some rivals muster, such as Kia's seven-year, 100,000-mile protection, but it does give peace of mind.

That will be a comfort when you read that MINI ranked a lowly 25th out of 29 car makers in the most recent HonestJohn Satisfaction Survey, sandwiched between Peugeot in 24th spot and Citroen just behind. However, the more recent Cooper models have enjoyed a good reputation for reliability that would not see us giving a MINI showroom the swerve when shopping for a new car.

If you stick with the Classic trim for the MINI Cooper, both three- and five-door versions sit in group 21 for insurance cover. The Exclusive also falls into this group as a five-door, but the three-door tips over into group 22.

It's the same story for the Sport trim, with five-doors in group 21 and three-door models one group higher.

Compare these insurance brackets to a Skoda Fabia and the Czech car's range starts as low as group 2 and rises to a peak of group 20, so you can see the MINI Cooper does come with more costly insurance than most supermini class cars.

With the new Vehicle Excise Duty, or road tax, rates introduced from April 2025, the MINI Cooper will cost you £540 for the first year's road tax. This is because the Cooper range emits between 133- and 142g/km of carbon dioxide depending on the exact version you choose.

From the second year onwards, that falls to a much more palatable £195 per year.

The MINI Cooper range gets going with the Classic, which comes in Melting Silver paint as standard and sitting on 16-inch four-square spoke alloy wheels.

Inside, the Classic is trimmed in black man-made leather and blue fabric upholstery, or you can opt for a grey/blue combo as a no-cost option. You also get the basics like air conditioning, electric windows, and the 9.4-inch infotainment touchscreen with Apple CarPlay and Android Auto. There's also a heated steering wheel thrown in.

Move up to the Exclusive and you gain 17-inch alloy wheels, a silver grille surround, two-tone fabric finish for the dash and door trims, perforated faux leather upholstery, and John Cooper Works-style front seats.

The Sport version of the MINI Cooper comes with its own 17-inch wheel design, body kit in glass black, and those steering wheel paddle shifters for the automatic gearbox. You also have a steering wheel wrapped in perforated leather.

To gain more kit, you need to look to the three Level Packs, with considerable price increases as you move up the scale. The £2000 Level 1 Pack is all but essential  and comes with Comfort Access to unlock the doors as you approach. It also has folding door mirrors with auto dimming, and the same for the rear-view mirror. Adaptive headlights and high beam assist are part of this pack, along with heated front seats, head-up display for the driver, and wireless phone charging.

The Level 2 Pack is harder to justify as its £2000 premium adds sun protection glass, panoramic glass sunroof, and a Harmon/Kardon Surround Sound stereo.

Should you want the Level 3 Pack, you'll pay £6500 for this. It includes everything from the lower two packs, plus electric front seat adjustment with memory and massage functions. An interior camera feels like more of a gimmick to let you see what's going on inside the car via a smartphone app. MINI's own Navigation AR is also harder to warrant when you can access sat-nav from your phone. However, enhanced safety with Driving Assistant Plus and Parking Assistant Plus are welcome additions.