Hats off to BMW for the 120 M Sport. While other manufacturers are dumping or have already dumped their hatchback models, BMW carries on in 2025 with a small hatchback. It’s one of the reasons I give credit to companies like Mazda with their Mazda2 and Mazda3 hatchbacks. Surely not everyone “needs” an SUV?
While it is called a small hatchback, the 120 model has certainly grown, and is now wider and longer than the previous generation. The price has grown too, to a starting point of $68,900, and that’s just $7,000 less than the BMW X1 SUV.
What do we think of the 120 M Sport? Is there still a place for it in 2025?
What We Like and Dislike About The 2025 BMW 120 M Sport
| What we like | What we don’t like |
| Design Performance Engine noise Proof hatchbacks are not dead Brakes Steering Handling Grip Fuel economy Good driver assist systems | Sun visors feel so cheap Air vents Dual-clutch automatic slow to engage Price for a small hatchback Interior quality |
What’s In The 2025 BMW 120 Range?
There are essentially two models in the 1 series range, although they are very different cars.
The model we are testing is the front-wheel drive 120 M Sport, that is powered by a 1.5-litre, 3-cylinder turbocharged petrol engine and manages 125kW of power and an excellent 280Nm of torque. There is a change in transmission for the new 120 M Sport, with BMW now using a 7-speed dual-clutch automatic transmission in this car instead of a “straight” 7-speed automatic from the previous generation.
Next up is the all-wheel drive M135i, and you can watch our YouTube review of that model here[LINK]. This model is powered by a 2.0-litre, 4-cylinder turbocharged petrol motor and has outputs of 221 kW of power and 400Nm of torque. Its transmission is the same as the 120 M Sport, and it’s priced from $97,900.
Fuel economy in the 120 M Sport is 6.0L/100km, while the M135i manages 7.8L/100km.
Note that while the ‘base’ model is the 120 M Sport, there are no performance enhancements; “M Sport” models across BMW’s range are changed only in appearance or things added, like M Sport floor mats.
2025 BMW 120 M Sport Colour Range
There are 8 colours in the 120 range, most at no extra cost;
- Skyscraper Grey Metallic
- Thundernight Metallic
- Black Sapphire Metallic
- M Portimao Blue Metallic
- Storm Bay Metallic (+$1,799)
- BMW Individual Frozen Portimao Blue Metallic (+$3,300.50)
- Frozen Pure Grey Metallic (+$3,300.50)
- Alpine White
Our Review Vehicle’s Optional Equipment
Enhancement Package – $6,500
This package includes:
- Panorama glass sunroof
- Steering-wheel heating
- Harmon-Kardon sound system
- Driving Assistant Professional
- Active Front seats
- 19” Y-spoke bicolour alloy wheels
Including the optional equipment, our review car’s retail price is $75,400.
For a full list of specs and options available for the 2025 BMW 120 M Sport, head on over to BMW New Zealand’s website.
How Does The 2025 BMW 120 M Sport Compare To Its Competition?
It might seem weird to include the Honda Civic in this list of euros, but it drives like one, and looks fantastic. It’s not a car to be underestimated, except for its price.
| Make/ Model | Engine | Power/ Torque kW/Nm | Seats | Fuel L/100km | Boot Space litres | Price |
| BMW 120 M Sport | 1.5-litre, 3-cylinder turbo-petrol mild hybrid | 125/280 | 5 | 6.0 | 380 | $68,900 |
| Mercedes-Benz A 200 Hatch | 1.3-litre, 4-cylinder turbocharged-petrol | 120/250 | 5 | 5.2 | 370 | $68,299.65 |
| Honda Civic Hatch | 2.0-litre, 4-cylinder, petrol-hybrid | 149/315 | 5 | 4.8 | 410 | $59,000 |
| Audi A1 35 TFSI S Line | 1.5-litre, 4-cylinder turbo-petrol | 110/250 | 5 | 5.6 | 335 | $55,490 |
| VW Golf R Line | 1.4-litre, 4-cylinder turbocharged-petrol | 110/250 | 5 | 7.0 | 381 | $51,990 |
| Skoda Fabia Monte Carlo | 1.5-litre, 4-cylinder turbo-petrol | 110/250 | 5 | 5.4 | 380 | $39,990 |
Please note that DriveLife does its best to ensure the information above is correct at the time of publication, however, prices, specifications and models can change over time. Please bear that in mind when comparing models in the comparison table.
First Impressions Of The 2025 BMW 120 M Sport
It must be said, the new 120 M Sport is a great-looking car, especially when finished in Black Sapphire Metallic of our test car.
The new model is definitely a bigger-looking car, and that’s confirmed by its measurements that make it wider and higher than the previous model, although the front bumper is a lot lower, giving it a pretty mean stance. Adaptive LED headlights are standard, meaning some amazing-looking headlights – the blue that BMW adds to the headlights just gives them that little something extra.
New to the range is a number ‘1’ on the C pillar and actually, it looks pretty cool.
Overall, it’s an even better-looking car now – top marks to the designers for not giving it a humungous front grille. Let’s hope this concept flows down to other BMW models.
What’s The Interior Like In The 2025 BMW 120 M Sport?
With black paint, a black interior and small side windows, the 120 M Sport can feel a little closed in. There is an electric, panoramic tilt/slide sunroof with an electric cloth blind, so it helps to keep that blind open to let some light in. The black interior also means it can be baking hot inside the 120 on a sunny day, but at least it’s European, and that means you can hold the unlock button down on the remote as you walk towards the car, and all the windows will open, as well as the sunroof. It helps to let some of that hot air out before you get to the car.
Speaking of hot, BMW has changed the air vents to something that look great, but work not great. There are separate controls for air flow and direction, with the direction changer as a small toggle that’s painful to use. I spent far too long trying to adjust the air vents, and even then, the amount of air flow out of them is simply not enough – even with the fan turned up high. The fiddly adjusting controls feel like a change for the sake of change. It feels like now that we’re getting rid of haptic steering wheel controls, they are focussing on something else to annoy buyers? Who knows.
There are M Sport touches inside, like the three coloured stripes running across the dash. They could come across as a bit try-hard, but they actually look pretty cool, and all my passengers commented on them (and felt inclined to run their fingers along the stitching). There are also some illuminated accents on the dash ends, more a gimmick than anything, but I guess they are a point of difference.
There is standard Qi wireless phone charging fitted, in the front of the centre console. Just above that charger is another handy shelf to put your junk on. Also up front are two USB-C ports, as well as a 12-volt socket for your radar detector or dashcam. A rare find in this car is a driver’s ceiling grab handle. I can’t remember the last time I saw a car with one of these fitted, but for the cost that they likely are, I hope we see more cars fitted with this.
For the size of the 120 M Sport, the glovebox is very good, and there are a reasonable amount of other storage options. One disappointment are the sun visors; they feel cheap and pretty nasty. Thin, and plasticky – weirdly, just as cheap-looking and feeling as the ones we recently found in the $148,000 Mercedes-Benz E300. The rest of the interior is okay, but the interior quality was not to the level I expected. I felt the interior of the new Honda Civic is just as good, if not better and yes, I never thought I’d say that either.
Any change to the air conditioning is via the main screen but thankfully, BMW have put a shortcut at the bottom of the centre screen for quick access. As standard, the car has 3-stage heated front seats, and these are turned on via a shortcut at the base of the centre display, as well.
The 120 M Sport is fitted with an electric tailgate, and the boot is small but a usable shape – with a nicely low load height. There is no spare tyre, just a tyre repair kit and tyre pump.
What’s The 2025 BMW 120 M Sport Like To Drive?
You’re immediately faced with a small, fat and chunky steering wheel – leather wrapped, of course. It feels fantastic and suits the car perfectly.
On pick-up, our test car was showing a range of 889km from its 49 litre fuel tank, and I aimed to get as close as I could to that figure. We’ll see in a week how well the 120 M Sport does on this front.
Commuting in the 120 M Sport is a breeze. There’s a surprisingly large back window for watching that motorway traffic, although the C pillar is huge. A bonus is the inclusion of a rear window wiper, an object we are seeing less of. The standard heads-up display (HUD) is the usual excellent BMW unit, giving information to the driver, right there on the windscreen. It includes your current speed, the current speed limit, cruise control info, audio, phone, and SatNav directions.
One surprising change that I haven’t noticed in a BMW before is when using SatNav and an off-ramp approaches. Now, we are told to take the ‘slip road’. A very English term that one, and I’m unsure why it’s changed. The 120 M Sport is fitted with BMW’s Augmented Reality system, and that means that when using SatNav, the centre display will have flashing arrows on the screen that will move around as needed to highlight (for example) what road you need to be turning in to. It’s a nice feature, and certainly helps when navigating unfamiliar roads.
Other niceties are things like Bluetooth. Once your phone is paired, then before you’ve even started the car, your phone is connected and will start paying your music. It’s such a nice and simple thing and saves those frustrations from (mainly) Chinese cars that struggle with Bluetooth connections. There’s more that other brands could learn from BMW, for example the steering wheel volume controls work when you have stopped the engine. I’ve lost count of the cars that don’t do this and yet if you are used to using the steering wheel volume controls, then this is where your brain sends your fingers.
Let’s quickly run through some other BMW-awesome features that make it a great commuter. All the driver assist systems simply work. No dramas, no extra annoying beeps, just systems that work in harmony with the driver – exactly how it should be.
BMW has (thankfully) stayed away from haptic steering wheel controls, and the steering wheel buttons on the 120 M Sport are placed correctly and work as they should.
More? Sure. The car’s speed limiter works downhill. This is far less common than you think, and I believe I’ve only ever tested say 6 cars that did this. It can save your license, for those times when you don’t want to use cruise control. If you do want to use the car’s adaptive cruise control, it’s almost perfect – it’s a one touch cruise control, it’s smooth and intelligent. Again, just how it should be. You can select from three options from the steering wheel; speed limiter, adaptive cruise control, and Driver Assist. The last one enables an automatic steering function and that too works well. It tracks the car to the centre of your lane, and you are not trying to fight it all the time (as I did recently in the Nissan Ariya).
Other day-to-day features include the dashboard popping up with an offer to back you out of your parking spot, every time you select reverse. I can see some drivers taking advantage of this, and it saves having to push buttons or work through infotainment menus to find this option. There is automatic parking fitted as standard, and it works very well, although it got so close to the kerb it had me freaking out. But all was well in the end – and it will not only do the steering but the brakes, accelerator and gears as well. Just sit back and relax while the car parks itself.
So, it’s a good commuter apparently – but what about being BMW’s constant claim, that they are a driver’s car? The 120 M Sport pretty much ticks all the boxes on this front; the steering feel is very good, with decent feedback given to the driver when needed. The ride is pretty firm in this car; not too jiggly, but definitely on the harsher side of things. Generally, if the ride is a bit firm then the handling should be good, and yes, it is. The car sits relatively flat through the bends, with almost neutral handling. It’s no M135i, but it can hold its own when needed, but watch bumpier corners, where the car can get a little upset.
This car loves a slow-in, fast-out approach, and revels in being pushed along, although it will turn to understeer if you push too hard. As per other BMWs, there are 3 drive modes; Efficiency, Personal, and Sport. You might call them Eco, Normal, and Sport. They work as expected, with Efficiency mode more efficient, Sport mode makes the car perk up and holds the gears, while Normal is the mode where you’ll spend most of your time.
As far as handling goes, BMW says the steering precision and cornering dynamics benefit from the increased rigidity of the body structure and the chassis connection. “Advanced chassis technology includes optimised kinematics, highly preloaded anti-roll bar mounts and new shock absorber technology. The caster of the front wheels has been increased by 20 per cent, ensuring particularly stable directional stability and optimised steering feedback.”
Grip from the Goodyear tyres is excellent, and while they are generally reasonably quiet, they will sing a bit on coarse-chip seal. An absolute highlight of this care are the brakes; the pedal feel is absolutely excellent, the braking power superb even after repeated hard stops, and you can modulate the brakes beautifully for either handling or simply coming to a smooth stop.
Backing up the handling is BMW’s all-too familiar 1.5-litre, turbocharged 3-cylinder that’s used in many BMW models and multiple MINI models too. It’s not that powerful with 125kW of power, but torque is where this engine is at. It pulls and pulls, giving the driver the impression of instant acceleration at any time. All that torque helps in the handling department too, you can punch it out of a corner in a higher gear if you want to, and the torque of the engine will deliver.
Not only is it torquey, it sounds fantastic too. It’s quiet under no or little load on the motorway, but bury your foot, and you get that awesome thrumming sound that only a 3-cylinder engine can give you. It’s a fantastic power unit, and makes you wonder why you might need BMW’s 2.0-litre turbo. Acceleration is 7.8 seconds to 100km/h, so it’s not really a hot hatch, but it’s more than enough performance for most people. In the wet, full throttle in Normal drive mode will see a reasonable amount of wheelspin before systems kick in, but in the dry, even in Sport mode, full throttle acceleration sees almost no wheelspin, you simply get instant forward movement.
If you feel like being a bit of a hero at the lights, you can pull the left-hand paddle and hold it, and this will engage Boost mode, meaning full engine power for ten seconds.
Does all the above maintain BMW’s claims of a Driver’s Car? For me, yes. It’s engaging and capable, and that’s a test pass from my point of view.
The gearbox is now a 7-speed dual-cutch unit, instead of BMW’s usual straight-automatic gearbox. While the move to a dual-clutch automatic (DCT) might seem like a good idea, it’s fairly slow to engage, which can feel a little embarrassing when doing a 3-point turn and people are waiting. Pulling the gear selector down will engage manual mode for the automatic transmission, so you can then use the paddles to change gears.
BMW says the 120 M Sport should use around 6.0L/100km of petrol and over 780km of driving, we managed 6.2L/100km. That’s pretty close to their figure and something that’s about right for this car. Did we get 889km from one 49-litre tank? Not quite – we got 717km, and that’s still a great result.
READ ON TO CHECK OUT OUR SUMMARY OF THE YEAR MAKE MODEL VARIANT.
2025 BMW 120 M Sport – Specifications
| Vehicle Type | 5-door small hatchback |
| Starting Price | $68,900 |
| Price as Tested | $75,400 |
| Engine | 1.5-litre, 3-cylinder, turbocharged petrol/mild hybrid |
| Power, Torque kW/Nm | 125/280 |
| Transmission | 7-speed dual-clutch (DCT) |
| Spare Wheel | Tyre repair kit & 12-volt pump |
| Kerb Weight, Kg | 1,500 |
| Length x Width x Height mm | 4361x1800x1459 |
| Boot Space / Cargo Capacity, Litres (seats up/seats down) | 380/1,135 |
| Fuel tank capacity, litres | 49 |
| Fuel Economy, L/100km | Advertised Spec – Combined – 6.0 Real-World Test – Combined – 6.2 Low Usage: 0-6 / Medium Usage 6-12 / High Usage 12+ |
| Towing Capacity Kg, unbraked/braked | 750/1,300 |
| Turning circle metres | 10.9 Small: 6-10m / Medium 10-12m / Large 12m+ |
| Warranty | 5 years, unlimited km warranty 5 years Roadside Assistance 3 years free scheduled servicing |
| Safety information | ANCAP Rating – 5 stars – Link Rightcar.govt.nz – 5 Stars – QWZ913 |
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