Citroen Berlingo Review 2024

Extensively revised and with a fresh cabin layout, the latest generation of the popular Citroen Berlingo remains one of the UK’s most popular small vans – but is it the right tool for your job? Read our extensive Citroen Berlingo review to find out.

The Citroen Berlingo has long been a go-to-choice in the small van market, the French manufacturer having had a reputation for making durable, functional and fun-to-drive vans for several decades.

Today, with almost two million Berlingos having been manufactured since 1996, it continues that offensive – the revised 2024 Berlingo yet again being a paragon of excellence in the small van market.

Based on the model introduced in 2018, the latest Citroen Berlingo ushers in a new range of safety equipment and advanced technology, including a new ‘Smartphone Station’ for media integration, digital instrumentation, a new 10-inch HD infotainment display, ‘Flank Guard’ blind spot warnings and optional Dynamic Surround Vision, which uses a screen in the place of a rear-view mirror to transmit camera views from behind the van to the driver’s eyeline. Clever stuff, then, for an already impressive van.

The Berlingo also offers the biggest range in the small van market, with a 1.2-litre PureTech petrol in addition to the diesel and electric variants offered across its sister vans – the Peugeot Partner, Vauxhall Combo and Fiat Doblo.

The Citroen e-Berlingo is subject to a separate review so here we’re focusing on the more traditional petrol and diesel models, the latter of which will make up the bulk of UK sales in the lifecycle of the current Citroen Berlingo.

Despite its modest proportions, the Citroen Berlingo is a practical van with two different body length options. The shortest is called the ‘M’ and the biggest the ‘XL’, which may sound confusing, but ‘S’ and ‘L’ models exist in other markets thanks to the modularity of the platform. There’s also a crew cab variant on the XL, with seats that can be folded away and a clever pop-up second bulkhead to give the best of both worlds.

Two trim levels are offered: Enterprise and Driver, the first of which is more business-focused and the second of which is the plusher, more comfort-oriented model. Both come with Citroen’s unique Advanced Comfort seats, which feature specially engineered lateral supports in high-density memory foam – a feature exclusive to the brand and which may make it the preferred choice for users who spend a long time behind the wheel.

There are two lengths of Citroen Berlingo offered in the UK and both are designed with function very much in mind. In ‘M’ layout it’s 4.4 metres long, with 3.3 metres of usable load bay length and the option of a load-through bulkhead. It’ll swallow a Euro pallet with ease, but is only offered with a single side loading door.

Twin doors are offered on the 4.75-metre-long XL, as well as a crew cab option which will still swallow a pallet.

Both versions have a flat load bay and narrow wheelarch intrusions, making them pretty capacious for small vans, while there’s also the ‘Extenso Cab’ option, which uses a part bulkhead and folding passenger seat to extend one side of the load bay further.  

Maximum payload is one tonne – an impressive claim for a van with such a small footprint.

Upfront, the cabin is neat and well-trimmed with a new digital instrument cluster that’s both fuss-free and easy to use, and a concentric steering wheel that allows better access and egress to the cabin.

Major controls are operated either via the 10-inch touchscreen or (in the case of the climate control) through fiddly buttons mounted beneath it – our only real criticism of the Citroen Berlingo’s ergonomics.

That’s offset by the Advanced Comfort seats which really do live up to their name. They feel disconcertingly soft when you first climb aboard – not what you’d expect in a commercial vehicle – but once settled in they really are astonishingly comfy.

The Citroen Berlingo has always been one of the best vans in its class to drive and that hasn’t changed. It’s perhaps not as sharp-steering as the Ford Transit Connect, but it’s nevertheless extremely car-like to drive, with a smooth ride, precise steering and agile handling both laden and unladen.

The 1.2-litre PureTech petrol is there to serve a purpose where diesel engines won’t suit, and the 110PS unit is perky enough – it’s used in many of Citroen’s cars and acquits itself well overall but is quite harsh at speed and not best-suited to heavy duty work. For urban couriers though, it’s perfectly acceptable.

The other engines on offer are all derivatives of Stellantis Group’s 1.5-litre diesel, which if offered in power outputs of 100 and 136PS.

The less powerful of the two is the volume seller and it punches well above its weight, easily coping with the one-tonne payload and with a smooth-shifting six-speed manual gearbox, our only real criticism being that the rectangular shift lever feels a bit strange and bulky to hold. The 136PS derivative is offered only with the company’s eight-speed automatic gearbox, which is a shame in two respects. First that the engine is so lively that it would be a lot of fun attached to a manual transmission and second that the auto is extremely good and would probably suit the lower-powered engine just as well – irrespective, the perky 136PS auto is our pick of the range, in its element both within and beyond the city limits.

Otherwise, visibility is good all-round and there’s also a decent suite of safety equipment, including lane departure warning, blind spot assist, hill start assist, active safety-assisted braking and hill descent control, plus Citroen’s new Dynamic Surround View system which projects a rearward-view of the van to the rear-view mirror housing. It’s helpful for changing lanes and driving in traffic, but unlike a traditional mirror the camera system makes it quite hard to judge the distance of following vehicles.