Vauxhall Viva Rocks Review

Despite the looks, the Viva Rocks remains very much a city car. There are rivals that offer four-wheel-drive in a small package if you need to be able to go slightly off-road, but the Rocks isn’t going to serve you well here. New drivers might find the SUV looks are appealing, and the increased ride height does make it even easier to get in and out of.

The Rocks is a decent choice for a first car because of the good standard specification and low insurance costs, while all kinds of buyers will benefit from the good fuel economy. However, if you’re looking for a lot of boot space, an exciting drive or a car that makes a strong style statement, this probably isn’t it.

There are no decisions to be made when it comes to choosing a Viva Rocks. There’s no engine options to think about with just the single 1.0-litre unit available, and it’s also only available with a five-speed manual gearbox - the automated manual is only available on the standard Viva. 

There are no specification variations for the Viva Rocks either, and because it’s no longer on sale as a new car (the Rocks was discontinued in 2019) it’s important to check the specification of used examples. As standard the Rocks comes with the Viva’s SE-spec audio system, so it has Bluetooth but no touchscreen. The more advanced system could be added in when new as an option for around £500, but few examples will have had this fitted unfortunately.

While the SUV is certainly a popular type of car, there aren’t quite so many examples of this size. The Suzuki Ignis is certainly one example however, and has the option of four-wheel-drive too if you actually need to travel off-road at all. The Fiat Panda is an old car now but also goes for the upright approach with the option of drive to all four wheels should you need it.

More conventional rivals such as the Toyota Aygo, Citroen C1, Peugeot 108 trio and the Skoda Citigo, SEAT Mii and Volkswagen Up are all adept city cars, and are perfectly able to do anything the Viva Rocks can.

If you went for a Rocks over a regular Viva in the hope that it got a snazzier interior, we have some bad news for you. There’s not much in the way of colour in here at all, and although it helps to keep the price down, a bit of spray paint here and there could have made a big difference. It’s uniform greys and blacks throughout regardless of specification, with only the occasional flash of colour from the dashboard illumination doing anything to relieve the tedium.

You do get the leather steering wheel as standard though, which helps to lift the cabin a little, but there’s not a great deal to surpise or delight. 

The quality of the materials is decent, but not exceptional. The surfaces that you come into regular contact with are sturdy enough but not soft to the touch, so although it feels like it will last pretty well it’s not going to make you feel massively welcome. The Rocks is even worse than the regular Viva because there was just a single trim level available with no options to choose from, so every car has the same plain interior.

The basic infotainment provision in the Rocks is what you will get on most examples on the market, and it really is quite basic. You get a simple FM/AM radio with an AUX input and Bluetooth for telephone calls and streaming audio, but that’s it. As an option when new the Rocks could be fitted with the upgraded infotainment system, a 7-inch touchscreen with navigation, Bluetooth for phonecalls and audio streaming, a USB input and six speakers.

The standard system is fine for what it is, with clearly-labelled buttons and a straightforward operation. The information display is clear enough but it’s not exactly large, and the blue on black text can get lost in bright sunlight. Sound quality is fine, but with just two speakers it’s hardly going to puncture your eardrums.

The higher-specification system is considerably better, as it gives the whole car a lift and stops it feeling like a bargain-basement device.

The screen itself is clear enough and responds with accuracy to inputs, although the colour scheme offers less contrast than is ideal to see in all conditions. The extra speakers mean the system is more capable of handling better quality audio, so although there’s no DAB you can stream digital radio or music apps and enjoy decent sound reproduction.

With no physical changes to the interior of the Rocks over the regular Viva, it offers the same amount of space for passengers and luggage, which means plenty of the former and not quite enough of the latter. The Viva Rocks is one of the better offerings in the class in respect of cabin space for passengers - the driver and front passenger will have nothing to complain about, with ample headroom and good legroom, even for those at the taller end of the scale.

In the rear adults don’t fare too badly either. Headroom is still pretty good for those up to around six foot tall, but that’s about the limit of its capacity. Legroom is acceptable in the rear as long as the front seat occupants don’t hog all the space, so as long as everyone makes reasonable demands you can fit four people in with relative ease.

Less impressive is the boot space, which at 206 litres is down on most of the key competitors. The best in class like the Hyundai i10 have almost 25% more.

Fold the rear seats and this increases to 1013 litres however, with a 60/40 split seat as standard, although the rear seats do not fold completely flat. Even so, this makes the Viva one of the most spacious city cars with the seats down - it’s just a shame more of that space isn’t available with the seats up.

As for the cabin itself, the amount of storage space is better than is typical for a city car. As well as a decent glovebox and door bins that are big enough to fit a water bottle, there are a couple of additional cubbies on top of the dash - not big enough for big items but useful for securing smaller items out of sight. Back in the boot there are also a couple of hooks for securing shopping bags, which shows that some thought has been put into making the Rocks as practical as possible.

There’s just a single engine option available for the Rocks but thankfully it’s a decent unit. You get a 1.0-litre, three cylinder unit, almost standard on every modern city car, and without the help of a turbocharger it offers a modest 72PS and 95Nm of torque - also pretty much par for the sector.

The performance on offer from the Viva Rocks is respectable but not exceptional. It does its best work in town and at lower speeds, with a useful amount of torque providing enough acceleration for it to keep up with the flow of traffic. 

At higher speeds the Viva is less impressive, as the 1.0-litre unit starts to run out of puff and requires more frequent gearchanges and higher revs to maintain speed. The reality is that the Rock’s performance is broadly in line with all of its competitors, it’s just that the way it delivers that performance at higher speeds is relatively lethargic - particularly in comparison with those cars that can call on a turbocharger for additional acceleration.

Despite the extra ride height (which generally doesn’t help aerodynamics) the Rocks delivers the same combined fuel consumption as the regular Viva, at 62.8mpg combined. That should mean you can get 50mpg without too much effort.

The standard five-speed manual gearbox is a hassle-free device, happy to shift between gears with little effort. The automated five-speed transmission is less appealing to use, although it does deliver improved economy over the equivalent manual model.

Again, with no mechanical changes to the Rocks compared to the regular Viva other than the ride height and the addition of some bodywork, it performs almost exactly the same in terms of noise and refinement. Happily the extra bodywork and greater ride height don’t generate any extra wind noise, so the Rocks is actually one of the better performing cars in the class as a result.

The engine is a big help here, as it avoids the three-cylinder thrum that affects some competitors cars, and manages to be smooth and relatively quiet even when revved quite hard. At a cruise it largely fades away into the background, so longer journeys can be conducted in relative peace - once you’re up to speed of course.

It’s a similar story for other noise sources. Few cars are bothered by wind noise at low speeds but this frequently changes once you get on the motorway. The Rocks managed to dodge this problem though, staying pretty refined and avoiding wind noise around the door mirrors and windscreen pillars, which are the most common causes.

Road noise is generally well controlled too, and only at higher speeds does it begin to intrude. Even so, it’s still one of the best cars in the class in this area.

The Viva Rocks and its European equivalent, the Opel Karl Rocks, have not been tested separately by EuroNCAP, as they were deemed effectively identical to the regular version.

The Viva - or rather it’s European equivalent, the Opel Karl - has been tested twice by Euro NCAP. Once in 2015 when the car was first launched, and again in 2017 - this was because the testing standards had changed significantly in the period, so that many cars on sale were retested.

In the most recent 2017 test, the Viva scored a somewhat disappointing three stars overall, compared to a four-star score two years prior. It scored a relatively low 61% for adult protection and 60% for child protection, with pedestrian mitigation at 58% and safety assist way down at only 25%. The latter score was particularly low because the Viva cannot be specified with many of the modern safety systems, in particular automatic emergency braking.

As standard, all versions of the Viva are fitted with six airbags, including side and curtain airbags for both driver and passenger, seatbelt pre-tensioners and load-limiters, Isofix mounting points for the outer rear seats plus an airbag de-activation switch for the front passenger seat. A further plus is that all Vivas are fitted with lane assist as well as cruise control and a speed limiter as standard, but there are no further safety systems on the options list.

With just the single version of the Rocks available there’s just a single insurance group too. Group 4 is very low indeed, and on a part with regular Vivas so you’re not paying extra for the joy of your semi-SUV. That means it’s still low enough for keen new drivers, and older drivers should find their premiums are blissfully low.

There’s not much good news here sadly, as the Rocks arrived too late to benefit from the pre-April 2017 VED rules. Because there’s just the single engine option and no EcoFLEX model like on the regular Viva, the Rocks puts out 118g/km of CO2, and that means an annual VED bill of £150 whether you like it or not. Go for a pre-April 2017 standard Viva though and you could pay £20 or even nothing at all.

There’s not much thought to be given here, because if you choose a Rocks over a standard Viva you get no say on specification, other than what the original owner decided to add from the options list. 

As standard you get the fancier bumpers and side sills, 15-inch alloy wheels, cruise control with speed limiter, daytime running lights, front fog lights, body-colour door mirrors, tyre pressure monitoring system, Bluetooth radio, air conditioning, electrically operated front windows, leather-covered steering wheel, Isofix points and six airbags.