2020 Nissan Qashqai Ti: Now with Apple CarPlay and Android Auto! Detailed expert review | 4K

G'day, I'm Paul. I've been a bit disappointed with Nissan products lately, but the one behind me actually has me excited. It's called the Nissan Qash... Qash... Qashquai. I don't know. It means horse with a white forehead, according to Wikipedia. But this one here is the top spec TI model. It is priced from just under $38,500 Australian dollary-doos, you can see the rest of the Qashqai pricing rage down in the comments section below. If you are on YouTube you can skip ahead using the time codes in the description or just use the ones that you see up there. While you're at it I would love for you guys to subscribe to our YouTube channel and also press the bell icon so you can see every single time we jump behind the wheel of something like the back car. Let's talk styling because the stupid name aside this is actually a really really good looking car. Let's start with the front here. It kind of has that Nissan family grille on it so it's got a bit of chrome there against the black and it's really offset nicely with this color. It comes with the availability of seven colors an all but vivid blue which is like the base color is an extra $600 and you can see here this grille is just kind of proudly holding the Nissan emblem. Now if you've watched our other videos you'll know that this here is the radar so it doubles as the Nissan logo and also the radar as well for the cruise control and that type of thing. You can see the parking sensors hidden in down here it has front and rear parking sensors and then over here we have the impressive headlights because this is an active LED headlamp so it turns with you when the wheel turns and then it has LED daytime running lights that look really cool. They also double as indicators so it is a really high-end setup here for what is effectively an entry-level SUV. Check out these wheels! From a distance these look sensational and up close you can see they've put a lot of effort into the design. It's kind of like they've just chopped an alloy cast in half. Just be careful with kerbs though because there's not a lot of overlap there from that Dunlop tire. Now we'll chat about the tires later on because keep in mind that with this being a 19-inch alloy wheel they're 45 profile so it is a fairly low profile tire to have on an SUV and of course like all the other SUVs in the world you have this plastic cladding stuff on the side. Jump around here to the wing mirror that has an inbuilt camera there for the 360 camera that folds as well. You've got roof rails plus this really cool looking panoramic roof up the top there. You have a button just there as well for the proximity sensing entry and then around to the rear more LED elements. So Nissan has gone to town with making this car stand out at night and it is a really good looking rear end on it as well. Despite the fact this is a smaller SUV it doesn't actually look too small or too big. It is like the perfect size and then has that shark fin antenna up the top there as well. So overall in terms of styling this is a really good looking rig. So what about the styling inside the cabin here? Nissan I think has done a pretty good job here. It is a little bit on the bland side but they've added some really cool highlights. So this whole section here stays virtually the same. The screen is is about the same size but has added functionality. I'll go through that soon. Then you've got piano black around the outside edges and this faux sort of carbon weave or whatever the hell that is. In terms of dashboard and the softness of the materials around here we have our durometer here. It's a hardness tester. It goes from zero which is soft to a hundred which is hard. So let's see what this dashboard is like. Let's give that a crack. Now that's not too bad. It's about a 60, 61 and then what about this center console? Oh that's pretty good. It's about 40 which is excellent actually. But what I love the most is these seats. So in the TI model you get Nappa leather seats. Have a look at the texturing here. That looks fantastic. It just sort of makes this feel super super premium despite the fact it's kind of an entry-level SUV. Let's jump over to infotainment and the key headline here is Apple CarPlay and Android Auto finally for Nissan. But it's not across the whole range. It is just here for Qashqai, LEAF, Navara and they will eventually roll it out to other vehicles. But that is exciting news because it finally brings this into the current century. So it's a seven inch screen. It's a touch screen as well and then there's shortcut buttons to the sides here that you can access other parts of the menu and then volume and also a tuning function and zoom for the map here. Let's start off on the home screen here. You can see that you have three different menus there to choose from. You can also configure what's displayed here. You can move things around and set favorites to appear on that home screen. We'll jump over to the map to show you the inbuilt satellite navigation system. This is actually a big improvement over cars like the Pathfinder. So it is a much quicker system. It's still not amazing but it is quicker in the sense that it transitions between screens and it's easier to put destinations in as well. So if I hit destination, putting in a street address, it takes a few clicks to get there but everything's sort of nice and quick. So it all sort of happens fairly easily which is great to see and a big change from the last generation of Nissan's infotainment system. Off onto the other side you've got the camera function. So this car comes with a 360 degree camera. Look it's okay but like other Nissan products and in fact a lot of other cars with 360 degree camera. The quality is just not there and it just seems bizarre to me that they haven't gone with a higher quality camera here given that it is hard to tell detail there especially at night time when the lights low. You'll also find here the self-parking feature for parallel and also perpendicular parks as well. So as you're parking you simply hit one of those buttons and it will commence that process of parking the car on its own. If we jump back over to the main menu car play I'll show you what that looks like. So standard sort of integration here. It's not a widescreen but it is big enough to contain all of the information that you need there. Audio this comes standard with FM, AM and DAB plus digital radio. Now depending on which Nissan model you're in some vary in terms of the functionality they have here but generally this system is going to be very similar. So in addition to the audio connection there you have USB connectivity, auxiliary, you even have a CD player that's fairly old school but it's good to see that it's there. You can also stream through Bluetooth so you can have Spotify and other music streaming functions running through there as well. In terms of the settings this is all just for your car menus and also customizing that home screen as I mentioned there before but there is an interesting feature here under info and that is the vehicle eco drive report. So this tells you what your driving is like, what it's been like in the past, which is pretty handy information to have and the feature that I really like the most here is where am I. So this is especially handy if you ever need to call emergency services and you're not sure where you are. One hit of that will give you GPS coordinates, you give that to emergency services, they'll be able to find you and then in addition to that have a look at this. We're currently attached to 16, 17 satellites so that's how we get our accurate position around the globe which is really really cool stuff and it shows you how advanced cars are becoming. Enough about infotainment let's look at the rest of the features you're getting here in the top spec Ti model and it starts down here. Dual zone climate control, it's a good system, works really well. Radar cruise control so that allows you to keep a set distance between you and the car in front. Safety tech, we have autonomous emergency braking that works at city speeds but also detects pedestrians. Auto dimming rear vision mirror, the 360 degree camera I showed you before. Front and rear parking sensors and then you also get rear cross traffic alert built into that system. Heated seats for the front row. Six-way power adjustment for the driver's seat. What does the key, the cash key, look like? Well it looks like that. It is just a standard Nissan key, very lightweight and then built into that key is your emergency entry key as well and it has push button start and also proximity entry too so it is jam-packed with features and you're not going to be really missing out on anything if you do spend this kind of money. One thing I'm really not sure about though is why there's so many blank buttons down here. It's not like you can spend any more cash on a more expensive model. Let's talk practicality and storage. Let's start over here with the center console. You've got a deep center console. I can lose pretty much half my arm in there which is pretty cool and then it has a top section as well so it's like a little tray for coins and keys and bits and pieces. Phone, where are you going to put that? Well that can sit there, it can sit here. I wonder if we can fit it down the front. You can even fit it down there and that's padded as well. That's where you can find a 12 volt outlet and then in here you also have another 12 volt outlet plus the USB port plus the auxiliary port as well. Now what about in here? How much room have we got? Hey that's actually not too bad. It's nice and deep that glove box and then it's got a storage nook for the manual which is handy. Let's see how we go with bottle storage. Fits in both of those very easily and then inside the door you can fit a bottle plus enough room for other bits and pieces. I love this steering wheel. Have a look at this. Has a flat bottom on it that feels super sporty so it's nice to hold in the hand. The seats are comfy, these Nappa leather seats. The only thing I'm not finding is much side bolster so I kind of feel like I'm moving around here. I feel like they're built for bigger people than than me. Before I get stuck into the features here in the second row I have to call this out again. The panoramic roof looks absolutely sensational. I genuinely don't know any other cars in this price bracket that have a roof that looks that cool so let me know in the comments below if you know of any other cars that I'm missing that offer something like that. Now let's chat second row. You're still getting that cool looking Nappa leather here with the ribbed seats for your comfort. You also get ISOFIX points on the two outboard seats. A center armrest here with two cup holders. Let's see how well they work. They actually work really well. There's no air vents in the back here though which is a little bit disappointing. You do get this storage nook here. No USB charging either. You've got mat pockets in the back of the seats and then bottle storage in the doors as well but it literally just fits the bottle. There's nothing else you can put in there. Overall it is actually a nice place to be seated. In terms of knee room I've only got a tiny bit there but plenty of toe room. Now this seat is in my normal driving position which is generally quite far back. If you are a shorter person or have a driving position closer to the steering wheel this is going to offer a bit more room but it is good that you can fit adults here as well and that panoramic roof doesn't eat into your headroom either which is really good news. So it's not a mammoth SUV but it's a pretty decent space back here and it is versatile as well. So 430 litres of cargo capacity here and then it goes up to about 1600 litres when you drop the rear seats. When I say versatile this is kind of the thing Nissan is good at when it comes to cargo spaces. This is the load floor at the moment. It sits level with the lip but you can do some cool things here. You can pop this into here that gives you a couple of adjustable spaces and then you have storage clips on the side as well. Now there is a method of getting rid of these and I have tried this about a thousand times now but I can't seem to figure it out. So if I slide that all the way forward this in theory should tuck in under there but it doesn't really work. So if you know what I'm doing wrong here please let me know in the comments below but we'll put that to one side for a second and we'll try popping our luggage in now to see what that looks like. Laptop bag first, we'll cram that into the side and the big suitcase, well it's not going to fit that way so I'll turn that. That fits there nicely and I'll show you what those back seats look like when they're folded. They just drop out of the way there and there you have your load space. Can you hear that? That is the noise of the Nissan Qashqai as we drive along because the suspension is probably a little too firm for an SUV like this. This is a pretty smooth road that we're driving on and it is really firm. I'm feeling everything on there, it's quite brittle and just too much I reckon for a small SUV. Why is it driving like this? Well it comes down to two things, it's the suspension tune but also the fact that it's running those 19 inch wheels and the low profile tyres that I showed you guys earlier. That all culminates into a ride that is just on the firmer side of sporty and it just doesn't need to be like that because this is not a sports car. What about the steering? Well it feels pretty good but there's probably a few too many turns lock to lock. What I mean is you need to have more steering input than most other cars to make it go around a corner instead of it having a tight turning circle. So how sporty is the Qashqai given the ride's so firm? Surely that means it is a sporty SUV. We've got a couple of corners coming up here and it actually feels pretty confident. It's running on Dunlop Sport Max tyres which is a pretty grippy tyre and it feels confident enough. It's just a shame the engine doesn't have the punch to match the handling. Under the bonnet is a naturally aspirated two litre petrol engine. It produces 106 kilowatts of power, 200 newton metres of torque. So look it's not going to rip your face off, it's not really meant to do that and it does feel sufficient for a car like this. But how punchy is the engine? Well with the CVT you're going to know every single time you get on the throttle because have a listen to this. It makes a hell of a lot of noise but as you lean into it the revs rise up gradually and it gives you that torque delivery fairly linearly so it feels like it's all coming on smoothly. It doesn't feel like there's a massive rush of it but if you do get stuck into the throttle that's when it's going to begin to make a whole lot of noise. Fuel economy comes in at 6.9 litres per 100 kilometres on the combined cycle. We've been averaging around 7.5 to 8 litres per 100km so it is pretty close to where it needs to be and pretty fuel efficient for a car this size. If you ever do want to tow you have 1200 kilos of brake towing capacity available but being a front wheel drive it's probably not something I'd be rushing out to do. You have a bunch of really useful driver assistance tech here as well. In addition to that radar cruise control you've got blind spot monitoring via this little thing here on the A pillar so that will light up whenever a car is in your blind spot. In terms of visibility it's excellent out the front. The wing mirrors are really big and then visibility out the back is pretty good as well so that means when you're in and around the city and trying to park it's going to be pretty straightforward. I also love the fact that you can hit the camera button and it will then show you when you've stopped and going at low speed what's happening on the left hand side so you're never going to end up curbing those wheels because you've got a camera looking down there the whole time. Noise inside the cabin here is actually really impressive even though you've got low profile tyres and a pretty sporty tyre as well it doesn't intrude massively even on coarse chip surfaces and aside from the engine roaring into the cabin every now and then it's actually a pretty quiet place to be seated. So what's the verdict on the Nissan VAT, the crash crash guy? Well I actually think it is a really good car. It surprised me how good it is. It is leaps and bounds ahead of Nissan's other SUV products. It's loaded with really good technology. It's pretty good value for money but it is let down by an engine that lacks just a little bit of punch and on top of that the ride is just far too firm for what it is which is just a little bit disappointing but outside of that it is an excellent SUV and it shows that Nissan has at least some idea of where it's heading with its SUV game. Now if you have enjoyed this video I would love it if you could hit the like button and then follow that with the subscribe and also press the bell icon so you can see every single time we drive new cars like this and also let us know in the comments below did you buy a that and then what did you think of it? Is it a good car to drive? What's it like to own? Is it expensive? All that kind of stuff. We love hearing about it. Until next time, drive safely.