BMW X1
The 2023 BMW X1, X Drive 28, This BMW’s smallest and cheapest crossover, starting at just under $39,000. And for the 2023 model year, it has been redesigned inside and out.
And powering this thing is a potent two-liter turbo, which makes this an ideal city type of car if it didn’t totally suck at doing these two things, and hint it has something to do with low-speed situations.
But let’s kick things off with the outside first. This tester that I have for the week is the XDrive 28 I, model, and it comes in the awesome Sanrimo Green metallic premium paint BMW X1
it also has the $4,200 premium package which gets you a heated steering wheel, auto-dimming mirrors, heated front seats, 3D surround view, and a bunch more to list. All in with destination, you can get this for $46,795.
Now looking at the exterior, its looks like a BMW X5, but if you applied a 90 % scale factor to it, it looks big from a distance.
But once you park next to another SUV or walk up close, you really notice its subcompact stature. BMW X1
And once you jump inside, you really feel it there too. Now for 2023, the BMW X1 gets a very subtle facelift.
If you look at the headlight, these are now much more simple compared to the previous generation.
And the BMW grilles, they got bigger. Surprise, surprise. The BMW likes their large grilles. And this one has one trick behind it.
This has an active grill shutter. So similar to what you’d find in EVs, basically this will stay closed when you first start the engine so that it’ll warm up the car a little bit faster and this will open up later on to provide more airflow to the engine bay.
All of these aerodynamic changes makes the front end of this BMW X1 much more slippery. So it has a coefficient of drag of 0.27. BMW X1
That’s very good for these types of cars. As for the rest of the bumper, it has been restyled to give it a cleaner and less busy look compared to last year’s model. The sheet metal on the side has received a slight revision as well.
And for this X Drive 28 I model, it still has the black cladding on the side here, although this is a gloss colored, which looks pretty nice.
But if you want to get color matched wheel arches, you have to go with the M35 I. Of course, that’s more expensive and has more power.
And I like small details like the silver metallic mirror caps here because this makes it look like it’s some special edition.BMW X1
And if you look on the side, you have these flush door handles, and this will improve aerodynamic efficiency.
And as for the back end, this has the slimmer LED tail lights, and there’s also a restyled hatch with a slightly different spoiler, and it looks more sporty than the previous generation.
And for the X Drive 28 I, trim, there’s a lack of tailpipes back here. So overall, I can’t really dislike the X1 styling. BMW X1
It is an attractive design that has big X5 vibes. Only when you walk up close to it do you really realize how small it is.
And once you step inside as well,Inside this BMW X1 has a pretty major revision. It now looks just like any other modern BMW interiors.
It has a single panel with the two screens. There’s a new steering wheel design and also new center console. Notice anything different here? There’s no eye drive dial in the center console, so this is a lot smaller than what it could have been.
There’s also a new door car design and new seats, and I think these seats are just okay. There are a couple of motorized adjustments, so you can adjust the backrest and the forwards and backward. BMW X1
And also you can extend the leg support here. But there are two downsides. If you’re a fairly large person, these thick bolsters here, which will normally support you for those side-to-side motions, might be a little bit too form-fitting for you.
And also there’s no lumbar adjustment here. So this is obviously a younger person’s car with no back problems.
So if you need more back lumbar support adjustments, then you might want to consider other cars. BMW X1
We can open big sunroof to allow more light in. And here you can see the general size of this car.
The space has slightly increased compared to the previous generation because this vehicle has a longer wheelbase and also a wider track, and that’s what’s felt inside here.
Now you can technically fit five people in here, though the second row is going to be slightly crowded, just judging by how much space you have between the two front seats here.
There’s not a lot of space between the shoulders. Jumping into the second row, there’s decent legroom here at 37 inches. BMW X1
There is a little bit of room and headroom for the second row is fairly decent at 39.3 inches. I’m 5’8, and there’s plenty of headroom for me here.
Comfort-wise, I do have some vents here and a couple of USB-C ports, and I could fold down this armrest and that exposes the cup holders.
Besides that, there’s really no other amenities for the second-row occupants. As for cargo space, the hatch is motorized, so you could just let that open.
There’s a good 25.6 cubic feet of storage behind the second row. Underneath you also have a spare tire. You can get more room in the cargo space if you fold these seats down.BMW X1
These are 40-20-40 split designs. But the only downside is you have to do it from the second row. With the second row folded down, the space grows to 46.9 cubic feet. Not bad for a small crossover.
Interior-wise, yes, this is going to be a fairly small car. This is a subcompact crossover, and this is what you get in the class.
It’s going to be cramped. It’ll be ideal for a one-person type of car, but once you add a second person, a third, a fourth, and possibly a fifth, you’re going to find that this is a very small car to serve that purpose.
And another small things that I find annoying with small cars is that there’s not a lot of footroom here. BMW X1
And also it feels like you’re sitting in a tub here so that when you’re stepping out, it feels like foot is always tripping against this portion of the car.
Now let’s talk about the technology, and I really like curve panel design. This is on the new BMW Designs.
You’ll find this in the BMW iX, the M2, the three series. It’s everywhere. The infotainment system is entirely touch screen.
You do have a volume dial down here. But all of this is just a touch screen, and you have buttons that will disappear depending on which screen you’re in.
And this is the new standard BMW infotainment system, so you can customize these screens to your liking. There’s a fancy-looking clock that just says the time.
It’s very weird, not very easy to read, but whatever you don’t like, you could just remove and then you could reorder certain things to however you see fit.
I do like that the bottom portion of the screen is reserved just for climate controls, and it’s always there regardless of what screen you’re on.
But if you want to turn on features like the heated seats and also the heated steering wheel, you have to go through a couple of button pushes.
There is an automatic program that will turn on as necessary, and I like to keep that on. I do like the features in this infotainment system. There are a lot of apps.
There are infotainment apps and vehicle apps, and there’s a lot to sort through. I like the interior lighting in here. You could just change the cockpit brightness, and you can also change the ambient lighting. BMW X1
It’s nice that you could customize the car just your liking this way. There are pretty dramatic lighting effects on the outside, too.
There are high beams that gradually turn on, and there are also puddle lights for this car and blinkers that pulsate.
The way these blinkers turn on and off, it’s different. And two other features that I like in this car are the augmented reality.
So if you have navigation plugged into here, a screen will pop up that shows the forward-facing camera and it will overlay some arrows to show you which streets you actually need to turn on.
So that’s a nice helpful feature and you could find that in other BMWs as well. I also like the 360-degree camera view, you can just pull that up and very easily, you could see all around you. BMW X1
I like the wireless charger in here, and this is just like any other wireless charger, but it has a bonus. It has a roller coaster-type bar here that will keep your phone secured.
So when you put your phone into here and you just set that bar against it, and that will stay secured for the rest of your drive, I like that.
And lastly, we can’t forget about the extra screens here. You have your digital instrument cluster, and you could change the type of content that you’re going to see and also change the different layout.
And what I like about this is that it’s very clean, very simple, very modern looking. And there’s also a way to change the heads-up display.
There’s a fairly decently sized heads-up display, and you can only toggle between the standard view and the sport view. BMW X1
Speaking of sports views, there are different modes in this car, and to change the modes, you click on the My Modes button, and then there’s Personal, Sport, Efficient, expressive, and Digital Art.
Personal is your default type of driving. Sport amps things up a little bit. Your throttle response becomes more responsive, and then also the steering gets a little bit heavier and inefficient.
So this will actually improve your miles per gallon somewhat because you are using less power in other driving aspects like climate control and also other things that draw power.