The impressive new Nissan Pulsar – click for hi-res image
The new Nissan Pulsar marks the firm’s return back into the highly competitive family hatchback sector to take on the likes of the VW Golf, Ford Focus and the Vauxhall Astra.
Nissan hasn’t had a car in this segment since 2006 when it finished production of the Almera, and the new vehicle will slip into its line-up below the new Qashqai.
However, the design style of the new Nissan Pulsar has more than a passing resemblance to its stablemates, particularly the Qashqai.
New Nissan Pulsar has technology and safety
The new vehicle is packed with technology and has more space than many of its rivals and there will be four trim levels to match the budgets and expectations of customers.
The Nissan Pulsar Visia will be the entry level model and will have the level of standard equipment that is normally found on higher spec versions including Bluetooth connectivity, air con, steering wheel mounted controls and a 5 inch colour screen.
Other models also come with automatic wipers and lights, forward emergency braking and the firm’s clever i-Key system. Some models also come with privacy glass, colour reversing camera and an impressive entertainment system.
Performance and power in the new Nissan Pulsar
Top of the range is the Nissan Pulsar Tekna comes with more safety features including lane departure warning, blindspot warning and moving object detection.
All of the models are going to be very safe cars and will have more equipment and safety features than many of their rivals.
Nissan is also using two engines which include an impressive 1.5 litre dCi diesel unit and a 1.2 litre DIG-T petrol variants.
Get this car on personal contract hire
Nissan says there’s more legroom in its new car, but there’s no figures to prove it, though the car is longer than the bestselling VW Golf.
Potential buyers who think they may have heard of the name Nissan Pulsar before would be right to think so; it was previously used around the world to describe what we knew as the Nissan Sunny but the name has never been previously used in this country.
The new Nissan Pulsar will go on sale in the UK later this year with prices starting at £15,995 OTR.