[Aaron:)]

I personally love the way the new City looks. While the 3rd and 4th generations had their sporty appeal, this one looks really neat and elegant. The interiors too look really premium. On the engine front, they’ve fixed the low-end of the petrol and the NVH of the diesel. It looks like a very well-rounded package with no major faults.

I’ll need first hand experience, but in many ways the new City seems to be a proper Honda unlike the previous one.

It all boils down to pricing now. The City might be an excellent car, but if Honda prices it too high, it’ll be giving away sales to lower priced sedans and similarly priced crossovers.

AFAIK, the City will come in V, VX and ZX trims. Dear Honda, just keep the prices within 50k from the current gen, and you’re sorted. Else you’ll be sending customers to the nearest Hyundai and Skoda showrooms.

[5kmiles]

I love the way new City looks. Elegant and will age gracefully. The second gen City with the arrow shot form still doesn't look out of place. Plenty of features and niceties.

My grudges with both Toyota and Honda:
1. They treat India as a poor 3rd world market. Never bring their best products - models, variants, engines, transmissions - to India. They merrily launch these in SE Asia.
2. They price exorbitant high for what they offer vis-a-vis the competition. We will see how Honda City will be priced like it is just a 'slightly smaller civic'
3. Cutting corners while claiming to be a premium product. Poor HU for the entertainment system, no wheel well cladding, hard shiny plastics, non adjustable rear headrest. When they will price it luxury, 4-5k doesn't matter. Innova too doesn't come with wheel well cladding. Such shocking omissions.

[Shreyans_Jain]

Originally Posted by Aaron:)

AFAIK, the City will come in V, VX and ZX trims. Dear Honda, just keep the prices within 50k from the current gen, and you’re sorted. Else you’ll be sending customers to the nearest Hyundai and Skoda showrooms.

The current Gen4 City is rather exorbitantly priced as it is, for whatever premiumness the brand has exists only in the mind of their marketing team. I bought my diesel City for a bit more than 11L in 2014, and the same car with equivalent equipment goes for almost 15L today, thanks to shameless price hikes by the company. The inflation argument is bogus here as machinery and dies depreciate over time, RM prices have more or less remained stable, while so many component prices have actually reduced thanks to cost cutting pressures by the company (I know many vendors).

It is not just the quality that Gen5 needs to fix, it is the pricing as well. Fact is that the glory days of the City selling 7-8k units every month are long gone, even the combined segment doesn’t do as much. If Honda wants consistent 4 digit sales to sustain beyond the initial launch period, the must not go higher than the existing prices. In fact, if they want to regain some volumes, they should actively do a Rapid and shake up the market by slashing prices. This can actually be done if the want to, for this Gen5 can safely be called a Gen4+.

For what it’s worth, I as a Gen 4 owner don’t see any reason to buy a Gen5. The upgrades are incremental and certainly not worth so much extra cash.

[PrasannaDhana]

Originally Posted by Vid6639

So looks like they have softened it up and is now the perfect car for those who were looking at a Corolla!

Absolutely spot-on!

Thinking about it, the city offers everything that the altis did- size, space, comfort, interior quality, reliability, Japanese A.S.S peace of mind and resale.

Coming to diesels, the city is slightly better than the 85bhp of the Toyota's. It comes as a perfect replacement for someone who wanted to buy a corolla.

[Shreyans_Jain]

Originally Posted by Vid6639

So looks like they have softened it up and is now the perfect car for those who were looking at a Corolla!

Originally Posted by PrasannaDhana

Absolutely spot-on!

Thinking about it, the city offers everything that the altis did- size, space, comfort, interior quality, reliability, Japanese A.S.S peace of mind and resale.

Beg to differ on this.

Corolla Altis was always a truly global product. It wasn’t something for ‘emerging markets’ and it was never watered down at the altar of localization and cost cutting. It lived up to true Toyota standards to quality and durability.

This is something the City, at least the Gen 4 City can only dream of. Back seat comfort is much more than just legroom. Altis had a far better bench which was not only wider but much better cushioned, with proper adjustable headrests, adjustable recline angle and much more headroom. Ride quality was far better than the choppy and bouncy City. Toyota steering, brakes and suspensions last much longer.

Point is, Altis always had a full segment worth of extra quality and engineering depth over the City and no amount of chrome or bling or legroom or VTEC goodness can cover that. What will you do with the legroom when the seats start to sag and give you backache? What good are the fancy LED headlamps when beadings and trims start falling off? What good is the VTEC when the doors leak and the footwell fills up with water during rains? All these are issues I face with my Gen 4. My mother simply refuses to sit in the back seat of my City as the bouncy ride aggravates her cervical.

Point is, these things don’t happen in an Altis, or in any quality product. Unless this basic gap is quality and extreme attitude towards cost cutting is fixed, City will always remain a fancier Maruti. Dreams of appealing to D1 segment customers will remain just that.

[Yieldway17]

Don’t want to turn this thread into another CUV vs Sedan discussion but as a driver I’d any day choose a C segment sedan like City over the sub-4m and about-4m CUVs masquerading as SUVs. CUVs do not provide any benefit of proper SUVs other than slightly sitting above the road and has terrible road manners.

Don’t have to mention about the timeless classic sedan designs vs trying to imitate a muscular vehicle (and failing at it). Of course, this is subjective.

2020 City looks much better compared to the previous version and is looking like a proper classic sedan. And based on initial reviews, Honda Petrol iVTEC as usual is reported being splendid. Honda is conservative when it comes to interior features and for me who don’t prioritize electronic ICE features much, looks pretty decent.

But not a big fan of the price increase but that’s more applicable to all cars. I believe, the entire current car industry except for Renault to an extent, has forgotten about value for money as a parameter when building and pricing cars.

[PrasannaDhana]

Originally Posted by Shreyans_Jain

Point is, these things don’t happen in an Altis, or in any quality product. Unless this basic gap is quality and extreme attitude towards cost cutting is fixed, City will always remain a fancier Maruti. Dreams of appealing to D1 segment customers will remain just that.

Well, you just compared outgoing City to the altis. My opinion is that, from the reviews, the seats, interior quality, ride have all improved over the gen 4 city. And this might be a good contender for someone who wants to buy an altis. Well, altis was never a great performer nor a handler too. It was another lukewarm car in the D segment.

Agreed with the quality argument though. We will have to wait to see if the new city is as niggle-laden as your city is(surprising to me that you have so many issues with your car).

[frozen.ash]

If lessons are to be learnt from history, then continuing the previous generation of a model along-side the latest launch is a recipe spelled out for DISASTER. The manufacturer would, in such cases, strategically decide to charge a higher-than-otherwise premium for the newly launched vehicle as a "segment differentiator" just to make a few extra bucks from the early adopters of the new model.

The buyer, as we've seen in previous such cases, very soon figures out that there are comparable models available at that other showroom/ brand that offers very similar features and specs at far better value, and goes on to buy the competitor's vehicle. The new model would hence end up being labelled a dud right at the time of launch with far fewer numbers sold than anticipated.

Let me remind you guys of a few such cases where this has happened in our market on earlier occasions:

1. When the A-Star (globally the new Alto) was sold along-side the Alto
2. When the Verna (the one before the fluidic Verna) was sold along-side the Accent
3. When the Global Fiesta was sold along-side the Fiesta Classic
4. When the Laura (globally the new Octavia) was sold along-side the Octavia
5. When the Innova Crysta was sold along-side the Innova (though one wouldn't term the Crysta a failure mainly because it did not have a suitable alternative among other brands)

(I am sure there would be more examples that I have missed out on.)

Hope Honda does not repeat this mistake and extensively over-price the new City especially when there are quite a few capable and attractive competitors available in the segment who would be eagerly waiting in anticipation to purge off the Honda City customers' cheques towards their own accounts.

[NICHE]

Originally Posted by frozen.ash

5. When the Innova Crysta was sold along-side the Innova (though one wouldn't term the Crysta a failure mainly because it did not have a suitable alternative among other brands):

Has Toyota sold innova and innova crysta at the same time? I don't think

[for_cars1]

The City shouldn't be compared to any D segment car. No matter what improvements in space or features are made, it will always give the feel of a C segment car.
The City can never be on par with an Octavia or Altis or even the Civic. At best, it can be compared with a Verna, Rapid and other C class cars.

Any prior D segment users who are now switching for whatever reason to a C segment car should not expect a D segment experience out of a C segmenter. You get what you pay for.

Ofcourse getting good quality is a basic minimum common expectation across all segments.

[Venkatesh]

Honda City 2020 launch confirmed for July 15 and is expected to be priced between Rs. 9 lakh to Rs. 13 lakh.

https://www.carandbike.com/news/2020...ls-out-2257056

[self_driven]

Originally Posted by frozen.ash

If lessons are to be learnt from history, then continuing the previous generation of a model along-side the latest launch is a recipe spelled out for DISASTER.

While I agree with some of your arguments, selling 2 generations of a car side-by-side isn't a recipe for disaster in every case. Take the Dzire and Dzire Tour for example. Even Hyundai has been doing this for a while. The i10 was sold alongside the Grand i10 for a while. As of now, the Grand i10 is still on sale even after introduction of the Nios.

Failure or success depends on a lot of factors. Looking at the past results, I can only say that popular brands have much better chances of getting away with such a strategy.

Personally, I am not a fan of this because as you said manufacturers enjoy greater leeway to price the newer model atrociously while milking the older one at the same time. It's understandable (and appreciable) if there is a commercial vs private use condition as in the case of Maruti cars.

[nasa_hubble]

I think the City is going to be a segment leader once again. Honda seems to have improved the earlier weaknesses while maintaining the strengths. Frankly, The Verna with its cramped interiors, quirky new Hyundai design language and poor mechanicals (quality and reliability issues) with respect to the City, only sells as much due to a decent diesel engine and lower price.

In this segment, the City is the "aspirational" product. I agree, that the quality of the City had reduced compared to the earlier models, but by that standard even Maruti should not be selling as much. I hope (but don't think so) that Honda has worked on it now.

A petrol powered C-Segment sedan of choice is the City. The way the Diesel prices are now almost equal to the petrol prices, it makes little sense to plonk more money for a diesel engine unless one has a running of 20-25k km's per year. Diesel Mass-market car sales are bound to fall anyway.

As for the price, the market leader always commands a premium in all segments.

[saisree]

Why are we debating on Honda selling two models at the same time? Don’t understand why it is wrong. They are giving more choice to the customer and it’s up to the customer to decide on what he needs.

Apple sells iPhone7 and the new 11 model now and we are not concerned or debating about it

[fhdowntheline]

Originally Posted by nasa_hubble

I think the City is going to be a segment leader once again. Honda seems to have improved the earlier weaknesses while maintaining the strengths. Frankly, The Verna with its cramped interiors, quirky new Hyundai design language and poor mechanicals (quality and reliability issues) with respect to the City, only sells as much due to a decent diesel engine and lower price.

As much as I love my City ZX, I wish Honda had focused on the HR-V. The C-segment sedan market is nosediving, for the lack of better words. Compact SUVs offer more urban/semi urban practicality, tech features, butch looks (which are all the rage amongst masses) and simlar or better performance levels. The new City looks nice and has some interesting features, but none that will sway a potential buyer from a Seltos or a Creta. If anything, it continues to be under tyred and offers the same levels of performance (albeit with a newer engine design).