We like
Good value for money, plenty of standard equipment, competitively priced, settled at higher speeds, planted handling, roomy back seat, reasonably attractive styling, long warranty, frugal on the highway

Room for improvement
Unimpressive at low speed due to rough dual-clutch automatic take-up, urban thirst and stiff-legged ride in town; only driver’s seat is cooled, misses some modern safety aids, blind spot cam obscures display

Overview

 

GUANGZHOU Automobile Group Company (GAC) is a large, state-owned Chinese automotive manufacturer with several decades of carmaking experience in its home market; it is also the prestigious holder of joint venture production contracts with Toyota and Honda.

 

Internationally, GAC has expanded to around 70 markets, with its strategy outside China centred on introducing very affordable models backed by comparatively long warranties and high levels of standard equipment.

That formula—which could be summarised as “get more for less”—is tried and tested in Australia. Over the decades, Japanese, then Korean, and now a parade of Chinese manufacturers have attempted to muscle cozy established brands out by demonstrating stronger value for money.

 

GAC commenced Australian operations earlier this month with three products: a midsize electric SUV called the Aion V that will compete with the BYD Atto 3; the M8 plug-in hybrid minivan; and perhaps most relevantly, the petrol-fuelled Emzoom small SUV on test.

 

The Emzoom is GAC’s cheapest and smallest car for Australia, and it is a rebadged, export version of the second-generation Trumpchi GS3 that has been on sale in China since February 2023.

 

Priced in a single relatively well-equipped ‘Luxury’ trim at $25,590 plus on-road costs, the Emzoom enters affordable, sub-$30K small SUV territory that has seen a withdrawal by legacy manufacturers in recent years with the void filled by new entrants like MG, Haval and Chery.

 

GAC enters this space without an existing reputation in Australia and without a large sales and servicing network (though a rapid national expansion is planned). It aims to establish credibility through spec’, pricing that rivals other Chinese brands, and a seven-year warranty.

 

The Emzoom adopts an overtly angular exterior design that differentiates it from conservatively styled rivals like the Toyota Corolla Cross. Key elements include a ‘Mecha Wing’ grille, ‘Light Dart’ geometric LED tail-lights and pronounced creases on the bonnet and flanks.

 

With a length of 4410mm, width of 1850mm and height of 1600mm, the Emzoom sits squarely within the small SUV class, though its 2650mm wheelbase is on the longer side for this segment, contributing to comparatively generous rear-seat dimensions, though boot space is only fair at 341L.

 

Standard equipment is relatively generous. Exterior features include auto LED headlights and wipers, an opening sunroof with sunshade, power tailgate, 18-inch alloy wheels and auto-folding mirrors.

 

Inside, the Emzoom is fitted with vinyl upholstery, a six-way powered and cooled driver’s seat, leather steering wheel, large 14.6-inch touchscreen, 7.0-inch cluster, wireless Apple CarPlay/Android Auto, a 50-watt wireless charger, climate control with rear air vents, and three USB ports.

 

Ivory White pearl paint is standard, with six premium hues (including a hero Lilac Metallic) each attracting a $600 upcharge. GAC is offering introductory incentives including a waiver of dealer delivery charges to help kick off the Emzoom’s sales campaign.

 

While those offers are in place, that makes the Emzoom’s driveaway price of around $27,000 lineball with entry-level versions of the MG ZS and GWM Haval Jolion (both $26,990 d/a).

 

Power is supplied by a 1.5-litre turbocharged ‘4A15J2’ petrol four-cylinder engine that produces 125kW of power at 5500rpm and 250Nm of torque between 1400-4500rpm. A wet-type dual-clutch automatic is standard as is front-wheel drive with no AWD variant planned.

 

Claimed fuel consumption is 6.1L/100km, and the Emzoom—which just scraped in before the deadline would have barred its Euro 5-rated engine—produces 156g/km, which is well over the 2026 NVES headline limit for cars and SUVs of 117g/km. The GAC takes regular unleaded.

 

GAC has not yet published service pricing for its trio of new models in Australia. Combustion-fuelled GAC models are covered by a seven year/unlimited kilometre warranty while battery electric GACs enjoy an additional warranted year.

 

Driving impressions

 

Dynamically, the Emzoom will suit some buyers more than others—and perhaps surprisingly, it is regional, rural and outer suburban customers that will prefer this car rather than inner-city dwellers.

 

Australian buyers who rarely leave the city will find the GAC to be tedious. The non-hybrid, turbo engine is thirsty in start-stop traffic, the low-speed ride is stiff, and the dual-clutch automatic transmission is rough and clunky when it tries to select first gear. In the city, this gets annoying.

 

But if you spend much of your driving time at 60km/h or above, the Emzoom reveals a very different nature. The ride settles at this pace, with a quiet maturity when cruising. Find some corners and the GAC is surprisingly planted and the decent chassis shows there is even some fun to be had.

 

Plus, when you’re up to speed and the torquey engine is barely ticking over on the highway, fuel use falls dramatically to become quite impressive. We recorded 5.9L/100km on the open road (compared to 8.5L/100km in the ‘burbs).

 

The Emzoom is built on a very conventional compact SUV architecture that features passive dampers with a MacPherson strut-type front suspension and cheaper torsion beam rear axle. Kerb weight is 1415kg which is reasonably light for the class.

 

Suspension tuning favours stability and control on country roads over outright compliance at low speeds. To be fair, the best cars in this class, like the Corolla Cross, the Skoda Kamiq and the MG S5 EV, can do both, but we appreciate that the GAC doesn’t become sloppy when pushed.

 

We found the electric power steering to be overboosted and quick in the hand, providing adequate off-centre response but without meaningful feedback or feel. Body control through corners is quite respectable and the Emzoom resists excessive roll.

 

While the Chinese-brand Landsail Sentury Qin 990 tyres (all four measuring 225/55 R18) were unfamiliar to us, we found them to be sufficient on technical roads in the New South Wales Southern Highlands, though our testing was only conducted in dry weather.

 

A strength of the Emzoom is its turbo ‘four, which provides confident acceleration for merging and overtaking, assisted by its very broad peak torque band—and while the DCT automatic struggles on take-off, it is not intrusive while shifting through the gears on the move.

 

Engaging the selectable ‘sport’ drive mode significantly improves shift responsiveness at low speed but it causes revs to flare, resulting in higher fuel consumption and more noise from the uncultured exhaust note.

 

As a result, the Emzoom performs best in either sporty driving (probably not where you’ll find most small SUVs) or steady-state commuting (more likely). In these conditions, where low-speed work is rarer, the GAC feels composed, relaxed and acceptably refined.

 

One of the reasons the Emzoom is more relaxing than some rivals is the fact that it lacks any audible speed monitoring or driver attention monitoring. However, it also goes without strong lane centring—it bobs between markings with lane departure warning.

 

Other standard safety technology includes forwards AEB, adaptive cruise control, tyre pressure monitoring, six airbags, and (impressively at this price) a 360-degree parking camera.

 

Inside, black PVC upholstery, which covers the seats, is durable and easy to clean, but it lacks breathability in hot weather. For the driver at least, this is mitigated via seat ventilation—bizarrely, the front passenger misses out on this feature. There is also no seat heating.

 

We found seat comfort middling. While the driver has six-way adjustment, there is no in/out lumbar (leaving us squirming for back support after a few hours), and seat base tilt angle is fixed and fails to support longer legs, making the Emzoom less comfortable over distances.

 

Likewise, cabin tech is adequate but not more. The 14-inch touchscreen is impressively large, but its menus are extremely basic in presentation; most will pair their phone for wireless mirroring which worked well.

 

The only issue: activating the indicator stalk brings up a blind spot camera (which is in isolation a good feature) but it totally obscures all content being displayed on the touchscreen, leaving you frustrated if you really need a Google Maps direction like, right now!

 

Rear accommodation is generous for back seat passengers with good legroom and headroom, as it appears GAC has prioritised back seat room above outright boot space (341L, expanding to 1271L when folded). However, a single omnidirectional rear air vent feels a tad ungenerous.

 

At the time of writing, the GAC Emzoom has not received an ANCAP crash and safety rating.

 

So, does the GAC do enough to stand out against a base MG or Haval in this class? At this stage, not really. Like it or not, those rival brands do have some brand equity built up with runs on the board in Australia.

 

While the Emzoom has a marginally longer specification list than an entry-level ZS or Jolion, its situation-dependent driving dynamics mean it fails to land a slam dunk in the affordable part of the small SUV market.

 

However, we see the potential here, as the engine, packaging and handling are solid. Resolving the dual-clutch automatic issues and stiff low-speed ride would go a long way to making the Emzoom a remarkably likeable crossove