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The Advertiser
27-05-2025
- Automotive
- The Advertiser
2025 Ford Transit Custom Trend LWB review
Ford Transit Custom Pros Ford Transit Custom Cons Gee, when did vans get so good? Seriously, I was expecting a circa 18-hour drive in a van to be, if not unpleasant, then still a bit of a chore. However, I was in a Ford Transit Custom, which proved a comfortable way to haul a cargo bay full of my partner's clothes, kitchenware, and even some furniture from Melbourne to Brisbane. I'd love to tell you how the Transit Custom compares with the Hyundai Staria Load or the top-selling Toyota HiAce across a similar distance but, ah, I think I'm good for cross-country road trips for a little while. Let's talk about what the Transit Custom does right, though, and where it needs improvement. You get a choice of two trim levels in the diesel-powered Transit Custom range: Trend and Sport. Both are available in short- and long-wheelbase body styles, however, the long-wheelbase Sport is what Ford calls a Double Cab and it includes a second row of seating. The Trend LWB, therefore, is the one to choose if you want maximum cargo space. If you want it with plug-in hybrid power, you'll need to cough up an extra $10,000, while the electric version commands an additional $10,000 premium on top of that. It's far from the cheapest vehicle in the mid-size commercial van segment. For example, the Toyota HiAce LWB – which has a similar overall cargo bay volume – is several thousand dollars cheaper. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool We did the bulk of our drive in one day, which worked out to around 14 hours in the Transit Custom. Not once did our bodies complain. Kudos to the designers of the Transit Custom's seats, because they proved comfortable and supportive. That's despite the passenger seat actually being more of a bench than a traditional bucket seat. The cloth upholstery is pleasant, and the outboard seats even feature heating. The driver's seat has a fold-down armrest that you can ratchet into your desired position, and the lack of a centre console means you can easily shimmy across the front seats if, for example, someone has parked too close to the driver's door. This is aided by a completely flat cabin floor. The steering wheel has tilt and telescopic adjustment, though we found the pedal placement to be a bit awkward. About that steering wheel: it's wonderful. The switchgear is logically laid out and tactile, while the leather wrapping is wonderfully soft and the size is spot-on. It's a better steering wheel than you'll find in many passenger cars! Overseas, an optional Mobile Office Pack includes a folding version of the steering wheel, allowing you to use it as a work surface or, let's be honest, an easier way to eat your Maccas. Sadly, it's not yet available here. As expected of a van, there's ample storage even up front. Storage shelves span the width of the dashboard, while the doors have a small pocket for items like pens, and then larger pockets at their base. These larger storage cavities incorporate bottle holders large enough for 1.5-litre bottles, while we were able to safely stash items like 3L milk bottles and even a vase in the other part of the lower cavity. Each side of the dashboard has a cupholder that can fit a medium McCafe beverage or a 600ml soft drink bottle, while there's another cupholder that folds out from the centre stack. Everything feels solidly assembled and hard-wearing, and the cabin overall appears modern. Our tester came equipped with a metal bulkhead, helping to insulate the front of the van from any sounds (but not necessarily smells) in the rear and featuring a clever load-through hatch which we didn't end up using. You can still see through the window in the bulkhead and out through the windows in the barn doors, but at night time the reflection of the touchscreen almost completely obscures your view out the back. You can get a digital rear-view mirror in the Transit Custom, but this comes only in an option package that includes a solid bulkhead with no window. Fortunately, the Transit Custom comes standard with blind-spot monitoring, while the exterior mirrors feature two different types of mirror so you've got multiple viewing angles. There's no surround-view camera, though you get a reversing camera with decent resolution plus front and rear parking sensors. The windscreen is huge and the view out the front is expansive, though we were perturbed by a demister that would turn itself off far too quickly. That brings us to perhaps our greatest gripe: the lack of physical climate controls. There are shortcuts anchored to the bottom of the touchscreen, but they can be finicky on the move – particularly temperature adjustment – and would likely prove cumbersome if you're wearing gloves. The centre stack has virtually no switchgear, apart from a handful of shortcut buttons for functions like the driver assistance systems menu plus a volume knob. The touchscreen is an impressive 13-inch unit running the SYNC4 operating system, and features wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto. The latter connects quickly and maintained a stable connection during our road trip, thankfully deciding to wait until we were in Brisbane to occasionally throw up a repetitive "The inserted USB device isn't responding" error message when we had a phone plugged in. This was fixed by unplugging my phone. There is a wireless phone charger so in theory you don't need to ever plug in your phone, but in my experience wireless phone chargers charge too slowly and heat up your phone too much. Cue Alborz chiding me for having an Android. There's a simple 7.0-inch instrument cluster screen that's presentable and logically laid out, and is flanked by a couple of more traditional metres for fuel level and engine temperature. Moving to the rear, there's a single sliding door on the kerbside, though you can option a driver's side sliding door as well. Unlocking the vehicle once doesn't unlock the rear, so you'll need to press that button on the fob again; alternatively, you can separately unlock just the rear of the vehicle, which is handy if you are unloading goods and don't want anybody to nick your van. You'll need to give the sliding door and the barn doors a firm slam to close them, though even still we experienced a handful of phantom 'tailgate open' alerts in the instrument cluster. Inside the cargo bay, you'll find bright LED lighting. There's a helpful switch at the rear to turn on additional lighting, while along the sides of the cargo bay you'll find eight tie-down points as well as padding so your stuff doesn't damage the walls of the van. As standard, there's a single sliding door within an opening 1030mm wide and 1301mm tall, though you can option a second sliding door. The rear door opening is 1400mm wide and 1316mm tall, and the Transit Custom LWB is rated to fit four Euro (1200mm x 800mm) pallets. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool For now, the Transit Custom is a diesel-only affair in Australia, however, plug-in hybrid and electric versions are coming soon. Out of an abundance of caution, we filled up at a quarter of the tank remaining both times we filled up the van. That means we could have easily done Melbourne to Brisbane on two tanks. The Transit Custom quickly settled into a fuel consumption groove, and couldn't be shaken from 7.7 to 7.8 litres per 100km. The final score was 7.8L/100km across over 1800km of driving. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool The first thing you notice about the way the Transit Custom drives is its excellent steering. Not only is the wheel lovely to hold, as mentioned earlier, but the steering is nicely weighted – it's light enough to help you manoeuvre around tight carparks, but confidence-inspiring out on the road, too. Then there's the powertrain. The eight-speed automatic occasionally exhibits a not-so-smooth shift at low speed, but otherwise it's well-matched for the torquey turbo-diesel engine. You change gears using a stalk on the column, which may trip up people for whom the Transit Custom is among a fleet of vehicles they regularly drive. If this will be your primary source of transportation, however, you'll find you quickly get used to the stalk. The Transit Custom feels like it has more grunt than its outputs suggest, while the cabin is quite well insulated from the usual clatter you get from a turbo-diesel. Mind you, the cabin does get a bit boomy at high speeds with tyre roar, but this is a van after all. We drove over some rather rotten rural roads in New South Wales, and the Transit Custom took them in its stride. It has a surprisingly loping ride for a van, and unusually features independent rear suspension. And yet, despite being softly sprung, body control was commendable. When we picked up the car, we found the headlight beam didn't extend far enough, but adjusting the headlight aim with the toggle to the right-hand side of the steering wheel fixed this. What we couldn't fix, however, was the automatic high-beam. It proved erratic and inconsistent, dipping the lights on pitch-black country roads. It got to the point where I just wished the Transit Custom didn't have the feature, as I was constantly having to flick the headlight stalk anyway and this was just giving me another detent to flick through. The low-beam headlights are LEDs, which are lovely and bright. The high-beams may elegantly fade on, but they're disappointingly halogen units. Ford refers to these headlights as "hybrid" headlights, which makes them sound more clever than they are… You fill up the Transit Custom via a flap on the passenger's side, though you'll need to open the passenger-side door in order to open this flap. Fortunately, the filler itself doesn't have a cap. The blind-spot monitoring worked well, as did the lane-keep assist though there's no lane centring. There is adaptive cruise control, which would often allow the van to exceed the speed limit by 2km/h – not ideal, but that shouldn't be enough to get you in trouble with the law. There is an annoying overspeed alert, but you can turn it off or easily drown it out with music. The driver fatigue monitoring feature doesn't scan your eyes like in some cars, though if you swerve over a lane marking or drive for a long time without a break, it will flash up a helpful reminder. The safe exit warning feature is a welcome inclusion, sounding a chime if the van detects you're about to open your door into oncoming traffic. The Transit Custom is under 2m tall, so it should fit in most carparks. Very handy. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool The Trend is the entry-level Transit Custom. 2025 Ford Transit Custom equipment highlights: Metallic paint is a $700 option, though our tester came in standard Frozen White. You can also spend $1400 and get SVO Paint, allowing you to choose from a wider range of colours than the monochromatic trio of $700 finishes. Other options include: To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool While like most vans the Transit Custom hasn't been crash-tested by ANCAP, it does have a 96 per cent rating in assessment of its driver assistance systems. Standard safety equipment includes: To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool Ford backs its vehicles with a five-year, unlimited-kilometre warranty, with 12 months of roadside assistance included at the time of purchase and extended with every service provided they're completed within Ford's network. For other buyers, the first four services are priced at $580, $915, $715, and $915 respectively. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool An 18-hour drive can be a real torture test of a vehicle. If something is bugging you when you set off, it's bound to infuriate you by the end of the trip. I've been in cars with uncomfortable seats, or with annoying lane-keeping aids, that would have had me raging at the end of 18 hours. But any faults the Ford has are minor, and I quickly came to respect this van. Hell, at one point I even thought, "Hey, would I want to own one of these?" (The answer is no: I hate moving my own stuff, so the last thing I'd want as a van owner is to get roped into helping every friend and family member move). With its comfortable interior, spacious load bay, punchy powertrain and slick infotainment, the Transit Custom should be on your shortlist if you're buying a van. Interested in buying a Ford Transit Custom? Get in touch with one of CarExpert's trusted dealers hereMORE: Everything Ford Transit Custom Content originally sourced from: Transit Custom Pros Ford Transit Custom Cons Gee, when did vans get so good? Seriously, I was expecting a circa 18-hour drive in a van to be, if not unpleasant, then still a bit of a chore. However, I was in a Ford Transit Custom, which proved a comfortable way to haul a cargo bay full of my partner's clothes, kitchenware, and even some furniture from Melbourne to Brisbane. I'd love to tell you how the Transit Custom compares with the Hyundai Staria Load or the top-selling Toyota HiAce across a similar distance but, ah, I think I'm good for cross-country road trips for a little while. Let's talk about what the Transit Custom does right, though, and where it needs improvement. You get a choice of two trim levels in the diesel-powered Transit Custom range: Trend and Sport. Both are available in short- and long-wheelbase body styles, however, the long-wheelbase Sport is what Ford calls a Double Cab and it includes a second row of seating. The Trend LWB, therefore, is the one to choose if you want maximum cargo space. If you want it with plug-in hybrid power, you'll need to cough up an extra $10,000, while the electric version commands an additional $10,000 premium on top of that. It's far from the cheapest vehicle in the mid-size commercial van segment. For example, the Toyota HiAce LWB – which has a similar overall cargo bay volume – is several thousand dollars cheaper. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool We did the bulk of our drive in one day, which worked out to around 14 hours in the Transit Custom. Not once did our bodies complain. Kudos to the designers of the Transit Custom's seats, because they proved comfortable and supportive. That's despite the passenger seat actually being more of a bench than a traditional bucket seat. The cloth upholstery is pleasant, and the outboard seats even feature heating. The driver's seat has a fold-down armrest that you can ratchet into your desired position, and the lack of a centre console means you can easily shimmy across the front seats if, for example, someone has parked too close to the driver's door. This is aided by a completely flat cabin floor. The steering wheel has tilt and telescopic adjustment, though we found the pedal placement to be a bit awkward. About that steering wheel: it's wonderful. The switchgear is logically laid out and tactile, while the leather wrapping is wonderfully soft and the size is spot-on. It's a better steering wheel than you'll find in many passenger cars! Overseas, an optional Mobile Office Pack includes a folding version of the steering wheel, allowing you to use it as a work surface or, let's be honest, an easier way to eat your Maccas. Sadly, it's not yet available here. As expected of a van, there's ample storage even up front. Storage shelves span the width of the dashboard, while the doors have a small pocket for items like pens, and then larger pockets at their base. These larger storage cavities incorporate bottle holders large enough for 1.5-litre bottles, while we were able to safely stash items like 3L milk bottles and even a vase in the other part of the lower cavity. Each side of the dashboard has a cupholder that can fit a medium McCafe beverage or a 600ml soft drink bottle, while there's another cupholder that folds out from the centre stack. Everything feels solidly assembled and hard-wearing, and the cabin overall appears modern. Our tester came equipped with a metal bulkhead, helping to insulate the front of the van from any sounds (but not necessarily smells) in the rear and featuring a clever load-through hatch which we didn't end up using. You can still see through the window in the bulkhead and out through the windows in the barn doors, but at night time the reflection of the touchscreen almost completely obscures your view out the back. You can get a digital rear-view mirror in the Transit Custom, but this comes only in an option package that includes a solid bulkhead with no window. Fortunately, the Transit Custom comes standard with blind-spot monitoring, while the exterior mirrors feature two different types of mirror so you've got multiple viewing angles. There's no surround-view camera, though you get a reversing camera with decent resolution plus front and rear parking sensors. The windscreen is huge and the view out the front is expansive, though we were perturbed by a demister that would turn itself off far too quickly. That brings us to perhaps our greatest gripe: the lack of physical climate controls. There are shortcuts anchored to the bottom of the touchscreen, but they can be finicky on the move – particularly temperature adjustment – and would likely prove cumbersome if you're wearing gloves. The centre stack has virtually no switchgear, apart from a handful of shortcut buttons for functions like the driver assistance systems menu plus a volume knob. The touchscreen is an impressive 13-inch unit running the SYNC4 operating system, and features wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto. The latter connects quickly and maintained a stable connection during our road trip, thankfully deciding to wait until we were in Brisbane to occasionally throw up a repetitive "The inserted USB device isn't responding" error message when we had a phone plugged in. This was fixed by unplugging my phone. There is a wireless phone charger so in theory you don't need to ever plug in your phone, but in my experience wireless phone chargers charge too slowly and heat up your phone too much. Cue Alborz chiding me for having an Android. There's a simple 7.0-inch instrument cluster screen that's presentable and logically laid out, and is flanked by a couple of more traditional metres for fuel level and engine temperature. Moving to the rear, there's a single sliding door on the kerbside, though you can option a driver's side sliding door as well. Unlocking the vehicle once doesn't unlock the rear, so you'll need to press that button on the fob again; alternatively, you can separately unlock just the rear of the vehicle, which is handy if you are unloading goods and don't want anybody to nick your van. You'll need to give the sliding door and the barn doors a firm slam to close them, though even still we experienced a handful of phantom 'tailgate open' alerts in the instrument cluster. Inside the cargo bay, you'll find bright LED lighting. There's a helpful switch at the rear to turn on additional lighting, while along the sides of the cargo bay you'll find eight tie-down points as well as padding so your stuff doesn't damage the walls of the van. As standard, there's a single sliding door within an opening 1030mm wide and 1301mm tall, though you can option a second sliding door. The rear door opening is 1400mm wide and 1316mm tall, and the Transit Custom LWB is rated to fit four Euro (1200mm x 800mm) pallets. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool For now, the Transit Custom is a diesel-only affair in Australia, however, plug-in hybrid and electric versions are coming soon. Out of an abundance of caution, we filled up at a quarter of the tank remaining both times we filled up the van. That means we could have easily done Melbourne to Brisbane on two tanks. The Transit Custom quickly settled into a fuel consumption groove, and couldn't be shaken from 7.7 to 7.8 litres per 100km. The final score was 7.8L/100km across over 1800km of driving. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool The first thing you notice about the way the Transit Custom drives is its excellent steering. Not only is the wheel lovely to hold, as mentioned earlier, but the steering is nicely weighted – it's light enough to help you manoeuvre around tight carparks, but confidence-inspiring out on the road, too. Then there's the powertrain. The eight-speed automatic occasionally exhibits a not-so-smooth shift at low speed, but otherwise it's well-matched for the torquey turbo-diesel engine. You change gears using a stalk on the column, which may trip up people for whom the Transit Custom is among a fleet of vehicles they regularly drive. If this will be your primary source of transportation, however, you'll find you quickly get used to the stalk. The Transit Custom feels like it has more grunt than its outputs suggest, while the cabin is quite well insulated from the usual clatter you get from a turbo-diesel. Mind you, the cabin does get a bit boomy at high speeds with tyre roar, but this is a van after all. We drove over some rather rotten rural roads in New South Wales, and the Transit Custom took them in its stride. It has a surprisingly loping ride for a van, and unusually features independent rear suspension. And yet, despite being softly sprung, body control was commendable. When we picked up the car, we found the headlight beam didn't extend far enough, but adjusting the headlight aim with the toggle to the right-hand side of the steering wheel fixed this. What we couldn't fix, however, was the automatic high-beam. It proved erratic and inconsistent, dipping the lights on pitch-black country roads. It got to the point where I just wished the Transit Custom didn't have the feature, as I was constantly having to flick the headlight stalk anyway and this was just giving me another detent to flick through. The low-beam headlights are LEDs, which are lovely and bright. The high-beams may elegantly fade on, but they're disappointingly halogen units. Ford refers to these headlights as "hybrid" headlights, which makes them sound more clever than they are… You fill up the Transit Custom via a flap on the passenger's side, though you'll need to open the passenger-side door in order to open this flap. Fortunately, the filler itself doesn't have a cap. The blind-spot monitoring worked well, as did the lane-keep assist though there's no lane centring. There is adaptive cruise control, which would often allow the van to exceed the speed limit by 2km/h – not ideal, but that shouldn't be enough to get you in trouble with the law. There is an annoying overspeed alert, but you can turn it off or easily drown it out with music. The driver fatigue monitoring feature doesn't scan your eyes like in some cars, though if you swerve over a lane marking or drive for a long time without a break, it will flash up a helpful reminder. The safe exit warning feature is a welcome inclusion, sounding a chime if the van detects you're about to open your door into oncoming traffic. The Transit Custom is under 2m tall, so it should fit in most carparks. Very handy. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool The Trend is the entry-level Transit Custom. 2025 Ford Transit Custom equipment highlights: Metallic paint is a $700 option, though our tester came in standard Frozen White. You can also spend $1400 and get SVO Paint, allowing you to choose from a wider range of colours than the monochromatic trio of $700 finishes. Other options include: To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool While like most vans the Transit Custom hasn't been crash-tested by ANCAP, it does have a 96 per cent rating in assessment of its driver assistance systems. Standard safety equipment includes: To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool Ford backs its vehicles with a five-year, unlimited-kilometre warranty, with 12 months of roadside assistance included at the time of purchase and extended with every service provided they're completed within Ford's network. For other buyers, the first four services are priced at $580, $915, $715, and $915 respectively. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool An 18-hour drive can be a real torture test of a vehicle. If something is bugging you when you set off, it's bound to infuriate you by the end of the trip. I've been in cars with uncomfortable seats, or with annoying lane-keeping aids, that would have had me raging at the end of 18 hours. But any faults the Ford has are minor, and I quickly came to respect this van. Hell, at one point I even thought, "Hey, would I want to own one of these?" (The answer is no: I hate moving my own stuff, so the last thing I'd want as a van owner is to get roped into helping every friend and family member move). With its comfortable interior, spacious load bay, punchy powertrain and slick infotainment, the Transit Custom should be on your shortlist if you're buying a van. Interested in buying a Ford Transit Custom? Get in touch with one of CarExpert's trusted dealers hereMORE: Everything Ford Transit Custom Content originally sourced from: Transit Custom Pros Ford Transit Custom Cons Gee, when did vans get so good? Seriously, I was expecting a circa 18-hour drive in a van to be, if not unpleasant, then still a bit of a chore. However, I was in a Ford Transit Custom, which proved a comfortable way to haul a cargo bay full of my partner's clothes, kitchenware, and even some furniture from Melbourne to Brisbane. I'd love to tell you how the Transit Custom compares with the Hyundai Staria Load or the top-selling Toyota HiAce across a similar distance but, ah, I think I'm good for cross-country road trips for a little while. Let's talk about what the Transit Custom does right, though, and where it needs improvement. You get a choice of two trim levels in the diesel-powered Transit Custom range: Trend and Sport. Both are available in short- and long-wheelbase body styles, however, the long-wheelbase Sport is what Ford calls a Double Cab and it includes a second row of seating. The Trend LWB, therefore, is the one to choose if you want maximum cargo space. If you want it with plug-in hybrid power, you'll need to cough up an extra $10,000, while the electric version commands an additional $10,000 premium on top of that. It's far from the cheapest vehicle in the mid-size commercial van segment. For example, the Toyota HiAce LWB – which has a similar overall cargo bay volume – is several thousand dollars cheaper. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool We did the bulk of our drive in one day, which worked out to around 14 hours in the Transit Custom. Not once did our bodies complain. Kudos to the designers of the Transit Custom's seats, because they proved comfortable and supportive. That's despite the passenger seat actually being more of a bench than a traditional bucket seat. The cloth upholstery is pleasant, and the outboard seats even feature heating. The driver's seat has a fold-down armrest that you can ratchet into your desired position, and the lack of a centre console means you can easily shimmy across the front seats if, for example, someone has parked too close to the driver's door. This is aided by a completely flat cabin floor. The steering wheel has tilt and telescopic adjustment, though we found the pedal placement to be a bit awkward. About that steering wheel: it's wonderful. The switchgear is logically laid out and tactile, while the leather wrapping is wonderfully soft and the size is spot-on. It's a better steering wheel than you'll find in many passenger cars! Overseas, an optional Mobile Office Pack includes a folding version of the steering wheel, allowing you to use it as a work surface or, let's be honest, an easier way to eat your Maccas. Sadly, it's not yet available here. As expected of a van, there's ample storage even up front. Storage shelves span the width of the dashboard, while the doors have a small pocket for items like pens, and then larger pockets at their base. These larger storage cavities incorporate bottle holders large enough for 1.5-litre bottles, while we were able to safely stash items like 3L milk bottles and even a vase in the other part of the lower cavity. Each side of the dashboard has a cupholder that can fit a medium McCafe beverage or a 600ml soft drink bottle, while there's another cupholder that folds out from the centre stack. Everything feels solidly assembled and hard-wearing, and the cabin overall appears modern. Our tester came equipped with a metal bulkhead, helping to insulate the front of the van from any sounds (but not necessarily smells) in the rear and featuring a clever load-through hatch which we didn't end up using. You can still see through the window in the bulkhead and out through the windows in the barn doors, but at night time the reflection of the touchscreen almost completely obscures your view out the back. You can get a digital rear-view mirror in the Transit Custom, but this comes only in an option package that includes a solid bulkhead with no window. Fortunately, the Transit Custom comes standard with blind-spot monitoring, while the exterior mirrors feature two different types of mirror so you've got multiple viewing angles. There's no surround-view camera, though you get a reversing camera with decent resolution plus front and rear parking sensors. The windscreen is huge and the view out the front is expansive, though we were perturbed by a demister that would turn itself off far too quickly. That brings us to perhaps our greatest gripe: the lack of physical climate controls. There are shortcuts anchored to the bottom of the touchscreen, but they can be finicky on the move – particularly temperature adjustment – and would likely prove cumbersome if you're wearing gloves. The centre stack has virtually no switchgear, apart from a handful of shortcut buttons for functions like the driver assistance systems menu plus a volume knob. The touchscreen is an impressive 13-inch unit running the SYNC4 operating system, and features wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto. The latter connects quickly and maintained a stable connection during our road trip, thankfully deciding to wait until we were in Brisbane to occasionally throw up a repetitive "The inserted USB device isn't responding" error message when we had a phone plugged in. This was fixed by unplugging my phone. There is a wireless phone charger so in theory you don't need to ever plug in your phone, but in my experience wireless phone chargers charge too slowly and heat up your phone too much. Cue Alborz chiding me for having an Android. There's a simple 7.0-inch instrument cluster screen that's presentable and logically laid out, and is flanked by a couple of more traditional metres for fuel level and engine temperature. Moving to the rear, there's a single sliding door on the kerbside, though you can option a driver's side sliding door as well. Unlocking the vehicle once doesn't unlock the rear, so you'll need to press that button on the fob again; alternatively, you can separately unlock just the rear of the vehicle, which is handy if you are unloading goods and don't want anybody to nick your van. You'll need to give the sliding door and the barn doors a firm slam to close them, though even still we experienced a handful of phantom 'tailgate open' alerts in the instrument cluster. Inside the cargo bay, you'll find bright LED lighting. There's a helpful switch at the rear to turn on additional lighting, while along the sides of the cargo bay you'll find eight tie-down points as well as padding so your stuff doesn't damage the walls of the van. As standard, there's a single sliding door within an opening 1030mm wide and 1301mm tall, though you can option a second sliding door. The rear door opening is 1400mm wide and 1316mm tall, and the Transit Custom LWB is rated to fit four Euro (1200mm x 800mm) pallets. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool For now, the Transit Custom is a diesel-only affair in Australia, however, plug-in hybrid and electric versions are coming soon. Out of an abundance of caution, we filled up at a quarter of the tank remaining both times we filled up the van. That means we could have easily done Melbourne to Brisbane on two tanks. The Transit Custom quickly settled into a fuel consumption groove, and couldn't be shaken from 7.7 to 7.8 litres per 100km. The final score was 7.8L/100km across over 1800km of driving. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool The first thing you notice about the way the Transit Custom drives is its excellent steering. Not only is the wheel lovely to hold, as mentioned earlier, but the steering is nicely weighted – it's light enough to help you manoeuvre around tight carparks, but confidence-inspiring out on the road, too. Then there's the powertrain. The eight-speed automatic occasionally exhibits a not-so-smooth shift at low speed, but otherwise it's well-matched for the torquey turbo-diesel engine. You change gears using a stalk on the column, which may trip up people for whom the Transit Custom is among a fleet of vehicles they regularly drive. If this will be your primary source of transportation, however, you'll find you quickly get used to the stalk. The Transit Custom feels like it has more grunt than its outputs suggest, while the cabin is quite well insulated from the usual clatter you get from a turbo-diesel. Mind you, the cabin does get a bit boomy at high speeds with tyre roar, but this is a van after all. We drove over some rather rotten rural roads in New South Wales, and the Transit Custom took them in its stride. It has a surprisingly loping ride for a van, and unusually features independent rear suspension. And yet, despite being softly sprung, body control was commendable. When we picked up the car, we found the headlight beam didn't extend far enough, but adjusting the headlight aim with the toggle to the right-hand side of the steering wheel fixed this. What we couldn't fix, however, was the automatic high-beam. It proved erratic and inconsistent, dipping the lights on pitch-black country roads. It got to the point where I just wished the Transit Custom didn't have the feature, as I was constantly having to flick the headlight stalk anyway and this was just giving me another detent to flick through. The low-beam headlights are LEDs, which are lovely and bright. The high-beams may elegantly fade on, but they're disappointingly halogen units. Ford refers to these headlights as "hybrid" headlights, which makes them sound more clever than they are… You fill up the Transit Custom via a flap on the passenger's side, though you'll need to open the passenger-side door in order to open this flap. Fortunately, the filler itself doesn't have a cap. The blind-spot monitoring worked well, as did the lane-keep assist though there's no lane centring. There is adaptive cruise control, which would often allow the van to exceed the speed limit by 2km/h – not ideal, but that shouldn't be enough to get you in trouble with the law. There is an annoying overspeed alert, but you can turn it off or easily drown it out with music. The driver fatigue monitoring feature doesn't scan your eyes like in some cars, though if you swerve over a lane marking or drive for a long time without a break, it will flash up a helpful reminder. The safe exit warning feature is a welcome inclusion, sounding a chime if the van detects you're about to open your door into oncoming traffic. The Transit Custom is under 2m tall, so it should fit in most carparks. Very handy. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool The Trend is the entry-level Transit Custom. 2025 Ford Transit Custom equipment highlights: Metallic paint is a $700 option, though our tester came in standard Frozen White. You can also spend $1400 and get SVO Paint, allowing you to choose from a wider range of colours than the monochromatic trio of $700 finishes. Other options include: To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool While like most vans the Transit Custom hasn't been crash-tested by ANCAP, it does have a 96 per cent rating in assessment of its driver assistance systems. Standard safety equipment includes: To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool Ford backs its vehicles with a five-year, unlimited-kilometre warranty, with 12 months of roadside assistance included at the time of purchase and extended with every service provided they're completed within Ford's network. For other buyers, the first four services are priced at $580, $915, $715, and $915 respectively. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool An 18-hour drive can be a real torture test of a vehicle. If something is bugging you when you set off, it's bound to infuriate you by the end of the trip. I've been in cars with uncomfortable seats, or with annoying lane-keeping aids, that would have had me raging at the end of 18 hours. But any faults the Ford has are minor, and I quickly came to respect this van. Hell, at one point I even thought, "Hey, would I want to own one of these?" (The answer is no: I hate moving my own stuff, so the last thing I'd want as a van owner is to get roped into helping every friend and family member move). With its comfortable interior, spacious load bay, punchy powertrain and slick infotainment, the Transit Custom should be on your shortlist if you're buying a van. Interested in buying a Ford Transit Custom? Get in touch with one of CarExpert's trusted dealers hereMORE: Everything Ford Transit Custom Content originally sourced from: Transit Custom Pros Ford Transit Custom Cons Gee, when did vans get so good? Seriously, I was expecting a circa 18-hour drive in a van to be, if not unpleasant, then still a bit of a chore. However, I was in a Ford Transit Custom, which proved a comfortable way to haul a cargo bay full of my partner's clothes, kitchenware, and even some furniture from Melbourne to Brisbane. I'd love to tell you how the Transit Custom compares with the Hyundai Staria Load or the top-selling Toyota HiAce across a similar distance but, ah, I think I'm good for cross-country road trips for a little while. Let's talk about what the Transit Custom does right, though, and where it needs improvement. You get a choice of two trim levels in the diesel-powered Transit Custom range: Trend and Sport. Both are available in short- and long-wheelbase body styles, however, the long-wheelbase Sport is what Ford calls a Double Cab and it includes a second row of seating. The Trend LWB, therefore, is the one to choose if you want maximum cargo space. If you want it with plug-in hybrid power, you'll need to cough up an extra $10,000, while the electric version commands an additional $10,000 premium on top of that. It's far from the cheapest vehicle in the mid-size commercial van segment. For example, the Toyota HiAce LWB – which has a similar overall cargo bay volume – is several thousand dollars cheaper. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool We did the bulk of our drive in one day, which worked out to around 14 hours in the Transit Custom. Not once did our bodies complain. Kudos to the designers of the Transit Custom's seats, because they proved comfortable and supportive. That's despite the passenger seat actually being more of a bench than a traditional bucket seat. The cloth upholstery is pleasant, and the outboard seats even feature heating. The driver's seat has a fold-down armrest that you can ratchet into your desired position, and the lack of a centre console means you can easily shimmy across the front seats if, for example, someone has parked too close to the driver's door. This is aided by a completely flat cabin floor. The steering wheel has tilt and telescopic adjustment, though we found the pedal placement to be a bit awkward. About that steering wheel: it's wonderful. The switchgear is logically laid out and tactile, while the leather wrapping is wonderfully soft and the size is spot-on. It's a better steering wheel than you'll find in many passenger cars! Overseas, an optional Mobile Office Pack includes a folding version of the steering wheel, allowing you to use it as a work surface or, let's be honest, an easier way to eat your Maccas. Sadly, it's not yet available here. As expected of a van, there's ample storage even up front. Storage shelves span the width of the dashboard, while the doors have a small pocket for items like pens, and then larger pockets at their base. These larger storage cavities incorporate bottle holders large enough for 1.5-litre bottles, while we were able to safely stash items like 3L milk bottles and even a vase in the other part of the lower cavity. Each side of the dashboard has a cupholder that can fit a medium McCafe beverage or a 600ml soft drink bottle, while there's another cupholder that folds out from the centre stack. Everything feels solidly assembled and hard-wearing, and the cabin overall appears modern. Our tester came equipped with a metal bulkhead, helping to insulate the front of the van from any sounds (but not necessarily smells) in the rear and featuring a clever load-through hatch which we didn't end up using. You can still see through the window in the bulkhead and out through the windows in the barn doors, but at night time the reflection of the touchscreen almost completely obscures your view out the back. You can get a digital rear-view mirror in the Transit Custom, but this comes only in an option package that includes a solid bulkhead with no window. Fortunately, the Transit Custom comes standard with blind-spot monitoring, while the exterior mirrors feature two different types of mirror so you've got multiple viewing angles. There's no surround-view camera, though you get a reversing camera with decent resolution plus front and rear parking sensors. The windscreen is huge and the view out the front is expansive, though we were perturbed by a demister that would turn itself off far too quickly. That brings us to perhaps our greatest gripe: the lack of physical climate controls. There are shortcuts anchored to the bottom of the touchscreen, but they can be finicky on the move – particularly temperature adjustment – and would likely prove cumbersome if you're wearing gloves. The centre stack has virtually no switchgear, apart from a handful of shortcut buttons for functions like the driver assistance systems menu plus a volume knob. The touchscreen is an impressive 13-inch unit running the SYNC4 operating system, and features wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto. The latter connects quickly and maintained a stable connection during our road trip, thankfully deciding to wait until we were in Brisbane to occasionally throw up a repetitive "The inserted USB device isn't responding" error message when we had a phone plugged in. This was fixed by unplugging my phone. There is a wireless phone charger so in theory you don't need to ever plug in your phone, but in my experience wireless phone chargers charge too slowly and heat up your phone too much. Cue Alborz chiding me for having an Android. There's a simple 7.0-inch instrument cluster screen that's presentable and logically laid out, and is flanked by a couple of more traditional metres for fuel level and engine temperature. Moving to the rear, there's a single sliding door on the kerbside, though you can option a driver's side sliding door as well. Unlocking the vehicle once doesn't unlock the rear, so you'll need to press that button on the fob again; alternatively, you can separately unlock just the rear of the vehicle, which is handy if you are unloading goods and don't want anybody to nick your van. You'll need to give the sliding door and the barn doors a firm slam to close them, though even still we experienced a handful of phantom 'tailgate open' alerts in the instrument cluster. Inside the cargo bay, you'll find bright LED lighting. There's a helpful switch at the rear to turn on additional lighting, while along the sides of the cargo bay you'll find eight tie-down points as well as padding so your stuff doesn't damage the walls of the van. As standard, there's a single sliding door within an opening 1030mm wide and 1301mm tall, though you can option a second sliding door. The rear door opening is 1400mm wide and 1316mm tall, and the Transit Custom LWB is rated to fit four Euro (1200mm x 800mm) pallets. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool For now, the Transit Custom is a diesel-only affair in Australia, however, plug-in hybrid and electric versions are coming soon. Out of an abundance of caution, we filled up at a quarter of the tank remaining both times we filled up the van. That means we could have easily done Melbourne to Brisbane on two tanks. The Transit Custom quickly settled into a fuel consumption groove, and couldn't be shaken from 7.7 to 7.8 litres per 100km. The final score was 7.8L/100km across over 1800km of driving. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool The first thing you notice about the way the Transit Custom drives is its excellent steering. Not only is the wheel lovely to hold, as mentioned earlier, but the steering is nicely weighted – it's light enough to help you manoeuvre around tight carparks, but confidence-inspiring out on the road, too. Then there's the powertrain. The eight-speed automatic occasionally exhibits a not-so-smooth shift at low speed, but otherwise it's well-matched for the torquey turbo-diesel engine. You change gears using a stalk on the column, which may trip up people for whom the Transit Custom is among a fleet of vehicles they regularly drive. If this will be your primary source of transportation, however, you'll find you quickly get used to the stalk. The Transit Custom feels like it has more grunt than its outputs suggest, while the cabin is quite well insulated from the usual clatter you get from a turbo-diesel. Mind you, the cabin does get a bit boomy at high speeds with tyre roar, but this is a van after all. We drove over some rather rotten rural roads in New South Wales, and the Transit Custom took them in its stride. It has a surprisingly loping ride for a van, and unusually features independent rear suspension. And yet, despite being softly sprung, body control was commendable. When we picked up the car, we found the headlight beam didn't extend far enough, but adjusting the headlight aim with the toggle to the right-hand side of the steering wheel fixed this. What we couldn't fix, however, was the automatic high-beam. It proved erratic and inconsistent, dipping the lights on pitch-black country roads. It got to the point where I just wished the Transit Custom didn't have the feature, as I was constantly having to flick the headlight stalk anyway and this was just giving me another detent to flick through. The low-beam headlights are LEDs, which are lovely and bright. The high-beams may elegantly fade on, but they're disappointingly halogen units. Ford refers to these headlights as "hybrid" headlights, which makes them sound more clever than they are… You fill up the Transit Custom via a flap on the passenger's side, though you'll need to open the passenger-side door in order to open this flap. Fortunately, the filler itself doesn't have a cap. The blind-spot monitoring worked well, as did the lane-keep assist though there's no lane centring. There is adaptive cruise control, which would often allow the van to exceed the speed limit by 2km/h – not ideal, but that shouldn't be enough to get you in trouble with the law. There is an annoying overspeed alert, but you can turn it off or easily drown it out with music. The driver fatigue monitoring feature doesn't scan your eyes like in some cars, though if you swerve over a lane marking or drive for a long time without a break, it will flash up a helpful reminder. The safe exit warning feature is a welcome inclusion, sounding a chime if the van detects you're about to open your door into oncoming traffic. The Transit Custom is under 2m tall, so it should fit in most carparks. Very handy. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool The Trend is the entry-level Transit Custom. 2025 Ford Transit Custom equipment highlights: Metallic paint is a $700 option, though our tester came in standard Frozen White. You can also spend $1400 and get SVO Paint, allowing you to choose from a wider range of colours than the monochromatic trio of $700 finishes. Other options include: To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool While like most vans the Transit Custom hasn't been crash-tested by ANCAP, it does have a 96 per cent rating in assessment of its driver assistance systems. Standard safety equipment includes: To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool Ford backs its vehicles with a five-year, unlimited-kilometre warranty, with 12 months of roadside assistance included at the time of purchase and extended with every service provided they're completed within Ford's network. For other buyers, the first four services are priced at $580, $915, $715, and $915 respectively. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool An 18-hour drive can be a real torture test of a vehicle. If something is bugging you when you set off, it's bound to infuriate you by the end of the trip. I've been in cars with uncomfortable seats, or with annoying lane-keeping aids, that would have had me raging at the end of 18 hours. But any faults the Ford has are minor, and I quickly came to respect this van. Hell, at one point I even thought, "Hey, would I want to own one of these?" (The answer is no: I hate moving my own stuff, so the last thing I'd want as a van owner is to get roped into helping every friend and family member move). With its comfortable interior, spacious load bay, punchy powertrain and slick infotainment, the Transit Custom should be on your shortlist if you're buying a van. Interested in buying a Ford Transit Custom? Get in touch with one of CarExpert's trusted dealers hereMORE: Everything Ford Transit Custom Content originally sourced from:
Perth Now
26-05-2025
- Automotive
- Perth Now
2025 Ford Transit Custom Trend LWB review
Gee, when did vans get so good? 2025 Ford Transit Custom Trend LWB Credit: CarExpert Seriously, I was expecting a circa 18-hour drive in a van to be, if not unpleasant, then still a bit of a chore. However, I was in a Ford Transit Custom, which proved a comfortable way to haul a cargo bay full of my partner's clothes, kitchenware, and even some furniture from Melbourne to Brisbane. I'd love to tell you how the Transit Custom compares with the Hyundai Staria Load or the top-selling Toyota HiAce across a similar distance but, ah, I think I'm good for cross-country road trips for a little while. Let's talk about what the Transit Custom does right, though, and where it needs improvement. You get a choice of two trim levels in the diesel-powered Transit Custom range: Trend and Sport. 2025 Ford Transit Custom Trend LWB Credit: CarExpert Both are available in short- and long-wheelbase body styles, however, the long-wheelbase Sport is what Ford calls a Double Cab and it includes a second row of seating. The Trend LWB, therefore, is the one to choose if you want maximum cargo space. If you want it with plug-in hybrid power, you'll need to cough up an extra $10,000, while the electric version commands an additional $10,000 premium on top of that. It's far from the cheapest vehicle in the mid-size commercial van segment. For example, the Toyota HiAce LWB – which has a similar overall cargo bay volume – is several thousand dollars cheaper. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool We did the bulk of our drive in one day, which worked out to around 14 hours in the Transit Custom. Not once did our bodies complain. 2025 Ford Transit Custom Trend LWB Credit: CarExpert Kudos to the designers of the Transit Custom's seats, because they proved comfortable and supportive. That's despite the passenger seat actually being more of a bench than a traditional bucket seat. The cloth upholstery is pleasant, and the outboard seats even feature heating. The driver's seat has a fold-down armrest that you can ratchet into your desired position, and the lack of a centre console means you can easily shimmy across the front seats if, for example, someone has parked too close to the driver's door. This is aided by a completely flat cabin floor. The steering wheel has tilt and telescopic adjustment, though we found the pedal placement to be a bit awkward. About that steering wheel: it's wonderful. The switchgear is logically laid out and tactile, while the leather wrapping is wonderfully soft and the size is spot-on. It's a better steering wheel than you'll find in many passenger cars! 2025 Ford Transit Custom Trend LWB Credit: CarExpert Overseas, an optional Mobile Office Pack includes a folding version of the steering wheel, allowing you to use it as a work surface or, let's be honest, an easier way to eat your Maccas. Sadly, it's not yet available here. As expected of a van, there's ample storage even up front. Storage shelves span the width of the dashboard, while the doors have a small pocket for items like pens, and then larger pockets at their base. These larger storage cavities incorporate bottle holders large enough for 1.5-litre bottles, while we were able to safely stash items like 3L milk bottles and even a vase in the other part of the lower cavity. Each side of the dashboard has a cupholder that can fit a medium McCafe beverage or a 600ml soft drink bottle, while there's another cupholder that folds out from the centre stack. Everything feels solidly assembled and hard-wearing, and the cabin overall appears modern. 2025 Ford Transit Custom Trend LWB Credit: CarExpert Our tester came equipped with a metal bulkhead, helping to insulate the front of the van from any sounds (but not necessarily smells) in the rear and featuring a clever load-through hatch which we didn't end up using. You can still see through the window in the bulkhead and out through the windows in the barn doors, but at night time the reflection of the touchscreen almost completely obscures your view out the back. You can get a digital rear-view mirror in the Transit Custom, but this comes only in an option package that includes a solid bulkhead with no window. Fortunately, the Transit Custom comes standard with blind-spot monitoring, while the exterior mirrors feature two different types of mirror so you've got multiple viewing angles. There's no surround-view camera, though you get a reversing camera with decent resolution plus front and rear parking sensors. The windscreen is huge and the view out the front is expansive, though we were perturbed by a demister that would turn itself off far too quickly. 2025 Ford Transit Custom Trend LWB Credit: CarExpert That brings us to perhaps our greatest gripe: the lack of physical climate controls. There are shortcuts anchored to the bottom of the touchscreen, but they can be finicky on the move – particularly temperature adjustment – and would likely prove cumbersome if you're wearing gloves. The centre stack has virtually no switchgear, apart from a handful of shortcut buttons for functions like the driver assistance systems menu plus a volume knob. The touchscreen is an impressive 13-inch unit running the SYNC4 operating system, and features wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto. The latter connects quickly and maintained a stable connection during our road trip, thankfully deciding to wait until we were in Brisbane to occasionally throw up a repetitive 'The inserted USB device isn't responding' error message when we had a phone plugged in. This was fixed by unplugging my phone. There is a wireless phone charger so in theory you don't need to ever plug in your phone, but in my experience wireless phone chargers charge too slowly and heat up your phone too much. Cue Alborz chiding me for having an Android. There's a simple 7.0-inch instrument cluster screen that's presentable and logically laid out, and is flanked by a couple of more traditional metres for fuel level and engine temperature. 2025 Ford Transit Custom Trend LWB Credit: CarExpert Moving to the rear, there's a single sliding door on the kerbside, though you can option a driver's side sliding door as well. Unlocking the vehicle once doesn't unlock the rear, so you'll need to press that button on the fob again; alternatively, you can separately unlock just the rear of the vehicle, which is handy if you are unloading goods and don't want anybody to nick your van. You'll need to give the sliding door and the barn doors a firm slam to close them, though even still we experienced a handful of phantom 'tailgate open' alerts in the instrument cluster. Inside the cargo bay, you'll find bright LED lighting. There's a helpful switch at the rear to turn on additional lighting, while along the sides of the cargo bay you'll find eight tie-down points as well as padding so your stuff doesn't damage the walls of the van. As standard, there's a single sliding door within an opening 1030mm wide and 1301mm tall, though you can option a second sliding door. The rear door opening is 1400mm wide and 1316mm tall, and the Transit Custom LWB is rated to fit four Euro (1200mm x 800mm) pallets. 2025 Ford Transit Custom Trend LWB Credit: CarExpert 2025 Ford Transit Custom Trend LWB Credit: CarExpert To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool For now, the Transit Custom is a diesel-only affair in Australia, however, plug-in hybrid and electric versions are coming soon. 2025 Ford Transit Custom Trend LWB Credit: CarExpert Out of an abundance of caution, we filled up at a quarter of the tank remaining both times we filled up the van. That means we could have easily done Melbourne to Brisbane on two tanks. The Transit Custom quickly settled into a fuel consumption groove, and couldn't be shaken from 7.7 to 7.8 litres per 100km. The final score was 7.8L/100km across over 1800km of driving. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool The first thing you notice about the way the Transit Custom drives is its excellent steering. 2025 Ford Transit Custom Trend LWB Credit: CarExpert Not only is the wheel lovely to hold, as mentioned earlier, but the steering is nicely weighted – it's light enough to help you manoeuvre around tight carparks, but confidence-inspiring out on the road, too. Then there's the powertrain. The eight-speed automatic occasionally exhibits a not-so-smooth shift at low speed, but otherwise it's well-matched for the torquey turbo-diesel engine. You change gears using a stalk on the column, which may trip up people for whom the Transit Custom is among a fleet of vehicles they regularly drive. If this will be your primary source of transportation, however, you'll find you quickly get used to the stalk. The Transit Custom feels like it has more grunt than its outputs suggest, while the cabin is quite well insulated from the usual clatter you get from a turbo-diesel. Mind you, the cabin does get a bit boomy at high speeds with tyre roar, but this is a van after all. 2025 Ford Transit Custom Trend LWB Credit: CarExpert We drove over some rather rotten rural roads in New South Wales, and the Transit Custom took them in its stride. It has a surprisingly loping ride for a van, and unusually features independent rear suspension. And yet, despite being softly sprung, body control was commendable. When we picked up the car, we found the headlight beam didn't extend far enough, but adjusting the headlight aim with the toggle to the right-hand side of the steering wheel fixed this. What we couldn't fix, however, was the automatic high-beam. It proved erratic and inconsistent, dipping the lights on pitch-black country roads. It got to the point where I just wished the Transit Custom didn't have the feature, as I was constantly having to flick the headlight stalk anyway and this was just giving me another detent to flick through. The low-beam headlights are LEDs, which are lovely and bright. The high-beams may elegantly fade on, but they're disappointingly halogen units. Ford refers to these headlights as 'hybrid' headlights, which makes them sound more clever than they are… You fill up the Transit Custom via a flap on the passenger's side, though you'll need to open the passenger-side door in order to open this flap. Fortunately, the filler itself doesn't have a cap. 2025 Ford Transit Custom Trend LWB Credit: CarExpert The blind-spot monitoring worked well, as did the lane-keep assist though there's no lane centring. There is adaptive cruise control, which would often allow the van to exceed the speed limit by 2km/h – not ideal, but that shouldn't be enough to get you in trouble with the law. There is an annoying overspeed alert, but you can turn it off or easily drown it out with music. The driver fatigue monitoring feature doesn't scan your eyes like in some cars, though if you swerve over a lane marking or drive for a long time without a break, it will flash up a helpful reminder. The safe exit warning feature is a welcome inclusion, sounding a chime if the van detects you're about to open your door into oncoming traffic. The Transit Custom is under 2m tall, so it should fit in most carparks. Very handy. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool The Trend is the entry-level Transit Custom. 2025 Ford Transit Custom Trend LWB Credit: CarExpert 2025 Ford Transit Custom Trend LWB Credit: CarExpert 2025 Ford Transit Custom Trend LWB Credit: CarExpert 2025 Ford Transit Custom Trend LWB Credit: CarExpert 2025 Ford Transit Custom equipment highlights: 7.0-inch instrument cluster screen 13.0-inch touchscreen infotainment system Wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto DAB+ digital radio Satellite navigation 5G embedded modem Wireless phone charger FordPass app connectivity 4-speaker sound system 8-way manual driver's seat with single armrest Heated front seats Leatherette-wrapped steering wheel Drive mode selection: Normal, Eco, Slippery and Tow/Haul Load Area Protection Kit Side and rear door protection Moulded load floor liner LED load bay lighting Metal bulkhead Kerbside sliding door Integrated roof racks Halogen and LED 'hybrid' headlights Rain-sensing wipers Quickclear heated windscreen Push-button start Metallic paint is a $700 option, though our tester came in standard Frozen White. You can also spend $1400 and get SVO Paint, allowing you to choose from a wider range of colours than the monochromatic trio of $700 finishes. Other options include: A two-seat configuration: $150; deletes the load-through hatch Rear liftgate: $700; replaces the barn doors Secure Visibility Pack: $1500; includes steel rear doors with no windows, a metal bulkhead with no window; and a digital rear-view mirror with an integrated dash cam To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool While like most vans the Transit Custom hasn't been crash-tested by ANCAP, it does have a 96 per cent rating in assessment of its driver assistance systems. 2025 Ford Transit Custom Trend LWB Credit: CarExpert Standard safety equipment includes: Autonomous emergency braking Adaptive cruise control Blind-spot assist Evasive steering assist Lane keep assist Rear cross-traffic alert Safe exit warning Traffic sign recognition Reversing camera with 180-degree view Front, rear parking sensors Front, front-side, and curtain airbags To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool Ford backs its vehicles with a five-year, unlimited-kilometre warranty, with 12 months of roadside assistance included at the time of purchase and extended with every service provided they're completed within Ford's network. 2025 Ford Transit Custom Trend LWB Credit: CarExpert For other buyers, the first four services are priced at $580, $915, $715, and $915 respectively. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool An 18-hour drive can be a real torture test of a vehicle. If something is bugging you when you set off, it's bound to infuriate you by the end of the trip. 2025 Ford Transit Custom Trend LWB Credit: CarExpert I've been in cars with uncomfortable seats, or with annoying lane-keeping aids, that would have had me raging at the end of 18 hours. But any faults the Ford has are minor, and I quickly came to respect this van. Hell, at one point I even thought, 'Hey, would I want to own one of these?' (The answer is no: I hate moving my own stuff, so the last thing I'd want as a van owner is to get roped into helping every friend and family member move). With its comfortable interior, spacious load bay, punchy powertrain and slick infotainment, the Transit Custom should be on your shortlist if you're buying a van. 2025 Ford Transit Custom Trend LWB Credit: CarExpert Interested in buying a Ford Transit Custom? Get in touch with one of CarExpert's trusted dealers here MORE: Everything Ford Transit Custom Spacious and practical Solid dynamics Good technology No physical climate controls More expensive than rivals Annoying automatic high-beam Power: 125kW Fuel Type: Diesel Economy: 7.6L/100km CO2 Emissions: 197g/km ANCAP Safety Rating: Untested
7NEWS
26-05-2025
- Automotive
- 7NEWS
2025 Ford Transit Custom Trend LWB review
Gee, when did vans get so good? Seriously, I was expecting a circa 18-hour drive in a van to be, if not unpleasant, then still a bit of a chore. However, I was in a Ford Transit Custom, which proved a comfortable way to haul a cargo bay full of my partner's clothes, kitchenware, and even some furniture from Melbourne to Brisbane. I'd love to tell you how the Transit Custom compares with the Hyundai Staria Load or the top-selling Toyota HiAce across a similar distance but, ah, I think I'm good for cross-country road trips for a little while. Let's talk about what the Transit Custom does right, though, and where it needs improvement. How much does the Ford Transit Custom cost? You get a choice of two trim levels in the diesel-powered Transit Custom range: Trend and Sport. Both are available in short- and long-wheelbase body styles, however, the long-wheelbase Sport is what Ford calls a Double Cab and it includes a second row of seating. The Trend LWB, therefore, is the one to choose if you want maximum cargo space. If you want it with plug-in hybrid power, you'll need to cough up an extra $10,000, while the electric version commands an additional $10,000 premium on top of that. It's far from the cheapest vehicle in the mid-size commercial van segment. For example, the Toyota HiAce LWB – which has a similar overall cargo bay volume – is several thousand dollars cheaper. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool What is the Ford Transit Custom like on the inside? We did the bulk of our drive in one day, which worked out to around 14 hours in the Transit Custom. Not once did our bodies complain. Kudos to the designers of the Transit Custom's seats, because they proved comfortable and supportive. That's despite the passenger seat actually being more of a bench than a traditional bucket seat. The cloth upholstery is pleasant, and the outboard seats even feature heating. The driver's seat has a fold-down armrest that you can ratchet into your desired position, and the lack of a centre console means you can easily shimmy across the front seats if, for example, someone has parked too close to the driver's door. This is aided by a completely flat cabin floor. The steering wheel has tilt and telescopic adjustment, though we found the pedal placement to be a bit awkward. About that steering wheel: it's wonderful. The switchgear is logically laid out and tactile, while the leather wrapping is wonderfully soft and the size is spot-on. It's a better steering wheel than you'll find in many passenger cars! Overseas, an optional Mobile Office Pack includes a folding version of the steering wheel, allowing you to use it as a work surface or, let's be honest, an easier way to eat your Maccas. Sadly, it's not yet available here. As expected of a van, there's ample storage even up front. Storage shelves span the width of the dashboard, while the doors have a small pocket for items like pens, and then larger pockets at their base. These larger storage cavities incorporate bottle holders large enough for 1.5-litre bottles, while we were able to safely stash items like 3L milk bottles and even a vase in the other part of the lower cavity. Each side of the dashboard has a cupholder that can fit a medium McCafe beverage or a 600ml soft drink bottle, while there's another cupholder that folds out from the centre stack. Everything feels solidly assembled and hard-wearing, and the cabin overall appears modern. Our tester came equipped with a metal bulkhead, helping to insulate the front of the van from any sounds (but not necessarily smells) in the rear and featuring a clever load-through hatch which we didn't end up using. You can still see through the window in the bulkhead and out through the windows in the barn doors, but at night time the reflection of the touchscreen almost completely obscures your view out the back. You can get a digital rear-view mirror in the Transit Custom, but this comes only in an option package that includes a solid bulkhead with no window. Fortunately, the Transit Custom comes standard with blind-spot monitoring, while the exterior mirrors feature two different types of mirror so you've got multiple viewing angles. There's no surround-view camera, though you get a reversing camera with decent resolution plus front and rear parking sensors. The windscreen is huge and the view out the front is expansive, though we were perturbed by a demister that would turn itself off far too quickly. That brings us to perhaps our greatest gripe: the lack of physical climate controls. There are shortcuts anchored to the bottom of the touchscreen, but they can be finicky on the move – particularly temperature adjustment – and would likely prove cumbersome if you're wearing gloves. The centre stack has virtually no switchgear, apart from a handful of shortcut buttons for functions like the driver assistance systems menu plus a volume knob. The touchscreen is an impressive 13-inch unit running the SYNC4 operating system, and features wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto. The latter connects quickly and maintained a stable connection during our road trip, thankfully deciding to wait until we were in Brisbane to occasionally throw up a repetitive 'The inserted USB device isn't responding' error message when we had a phone plugged in. This was fixed by unplugging my phone. There is a wireless phone charger so in theory you don't need to ever plug in your phone, but in my experience wireless phone chargers charge too slowly and heat up your phone too much. Cue Alborz chiding me for having an Android. There's a simple 7.0-inch instrument cluster screen that's presentable and logically laid out, and is flanked by a couple of more traditional metres for fuel level and engine temperature. Moving to the rear, there's a single sliding door on the kerbside, though you can option a driver's side sliding door as well. Unlocking the vehicle once doesn't unlock the rear, so you'll need to press that button on the fob again; alternatively, you can separately unlock just the rear of the vehicle, which is handy if you are unloading goods and don't want anybody to nick your van. You'll need to give the sliding door and the barn doors a firm slam to close them, though even still we experienced a handful of phantom 'tailgate open' alerts in the instrument cluster. Inside the cargo bay, you'll find bright LED lighting. There's a helpful switch at the rear to turn on additional lighting, while along the sides of the cargo bay you'll find eight tie-down points as well as padding so your stuff doesn't damage the walls of the van. As standard, there's a single sliding door within an opening 1030mm wide and 1301mm tall, though you can option a second sliding door. The rear door opening is 1400mm wide and 1316mm tall, and the Transit Custom LWB is rated to fit four Euro (1200mm x 800mm) pallets. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool What's under the bonnet? For now, the Transit Custom is a diesel-only affair in Australia, however, plug-in hybrid and electric versions are coming soon. Out of an abundance of caution, we filled up at a quarter of the tank remaining both times we filled up the van. That means we could have easily done Melbourne to Brisbane on two tanks. The Transit Custom quickly settled into a fuel consumption groove, and couldn't be shaken from 7.7 to 7.8 litres per 100km. The final score was 7.8L/100km across over 1800km of driving. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool How does the Ford Transit Custom drive? The first thing you notice about the way the Transit Custom drives is its excellent steering. Not only is the wheel lovely to hold, as mentioned earlier, but the steering is nicely weighted – it's light enough to help you manoeuvre around tight carparks, but confidence-inspiring out on the road, too. Then there's the powertrain. The eight-speed automatic occasionally exhibits a not-so-smooth shift at low speed, but otherwise it's well-matched for the torquey turbo-diesel engine. You change gears using a stalk on the column, which may trip up people for whom the Transit Custom is among a fleet of vehicles they regularly drive. If this will be your primary source of transportation, however, you'll find you quickly get used to the stalk. The Transit Custom feels like it has more grunt than its outputs suggest, while the cabin is quite well insulated from the usual clatter you get from a turbo-diesel. Mind you, the cabin does get a bit boomy at high speeds with tyre roar, but this is a van after all. We drove over some rather rotten rural roads in New South Wales, and the Transit Custom took them in its stride. It has a surprisingly loping ride for a van, and unusually features independent rear suspension. And yet, despite being softly sprung, body control was commendable. When we picked up the car, we found the headlight beam didn't extend far enough, but adjusting the headlight aim with the toggle to the right-hand side of the steering wheel fixed this. What we couldn't fix, however, was the automatic high-beam. It proved erratic and inconsistent, dipping the lights on pitch-black country roads. It got to the point where I just wished the Transit Custom didn't have the feature, as I was constantly having to flick the headlight stalk anyway and this was just giving me another detent to flick through. The low-beam headlights are LEDs, which are lovely and bright. The high-beams may elegantly fade on, but they're disappointingly halogen units. Ford refers to these headlights as 'hybrid' headlights, which makes them sound more clever than they are… You fill up the Transit Custom via a flap on the passenger's side, though you'll need to open the passenger-side door in order to open this flap. Fortunately, the filler itself doesn't have a cap. The blind-spot monitoring worked well, as did the lane-keep assist though there's no lane centring. There is adaptive cruise control, which would often allow the van to exceed the speed limit by 2km/h – not ideal, but that shouldn't be enough to get you in trouble with the law. There is an annoying overspeed alert, but you can turn it off or easily drown it out with music. The driver fatigue monitoring feature doesn't scan your eyes like in some cars, though if you swerve over a lane marking or drive for a long time without a break, it will flash up a helpful reminder. The safe exit warning feature is a welcome inclusion, sounding a chime if the van detects you're about to open your door into oncoming traffic. The Transit Custom is under 2m tall, so it should fit in most carparks. Very handy. What do you get? The Trend is the entry-level Transit Custom. 2025 Ford Transit Custom equipment highlights: 7.0-inch instrument cluster screen 13.0-inch touchscreen infotainment system Wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto DAB+ digital radio Satellite navigation 5G embedded modem Wireless phone charger FordPass app connectivity 4-speaker sound system 8-way manual driver's seat with single armrest Heated front seats Leatherette-wrapped steering wheel Drive mode selection: Normal, Eco, Slippery and Tow/Haul Load Area Protection Kit Side and rear door protection Moulded load floor liner LED load bay lighting Metal bulkhead Kerbside sliding door Integrated roof racks Halogen and LED 'hybrid' headlights Rain-sensing wipers Quickclear heated windscreen Push-button start Metallic paint is a $700 option, though our tester came in standard Frozen White. You can also spend $1400 and get SVO Paint, allowing you to choose from a wider range of colours than the monochromatic trio of $700 finishes. Other options include: To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool Is the Ford Transit Custom safe? While like most vans the Transit Custom hasn't been crash-tested by ANCAP, it does have a 96 per cent rating in assessment of its driver assistance systems. Standard safety equipment includes: Autonomous emergency braking Adaptive cruise control Blind-spot assist Evasive steering assist Lane keep assist Rear cross-traffic alert Safe exit warning Traffic sign recognition Reversing camera with 180-degree view Front, rear parking sensors Front, front-side, and curtain airbags To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool How much does the Ford Transit Custom cost to run? Ford backs its vehicles with a five-year, unlimited-kilometre warranty, with 12 months of roadside assistance included at the time of purchase and extended with every service provided they're completed within Ford's network. For other buyers, the first four services are priced at $580, $915, $715, and $915 respectively. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool CarExpert's Take on the Ford Transit Custom An 18-hour drive can be a real torture test of a vehicle. If something is bugging you when you set off, it's bound to infuriate you by the end of the trip. I've been in cars with uncomfortable seats, or with annoying lane-keeping aids, that would have had me raging at the end of 18 hours. But any faults the Ford has are minor, and I quickly came to respect this van. Hell, at one point I even thought, 'Hey, would I want to own one of these?' (The answer is no: I hate moving my own stuff, so the last thing I'd want as a van owner is to get roped into helping every friend and family member move). With its comfortable interior, spacious load bay, punchy powertrain and slick infotainment, the Transit Custom should be on your shortlist if you're buying a van. Interested in buying a Ford Transit Custom? Get in touch with one of CarExpert's trusted dealers here MORE: Everything Ford Transit Custom Pros Spacious and practical Solid dynamics Good technology Cons No physical climate controls More expensive than rivals Annoying automatic high-beam Top Line Specs
West Australian
26-05-2025
- Automotive
- West Australian
2025 Ford Transit Custom Trend LWB review
Gee, when did vans get so good? Seriously, I was expecting a circa 18-hour drive in a van to be, if not unpleasant, then still a bit of a chore. However, I was in a Ford Transit Custom , which proved a comfortable way to haul a cargo bay full of my partner's clothes, kitchenware, and even some furniture from Melbourne to Brisbane. I'd love to tell you how the Transit Custom compares with the Hyundai Staria Load or the top-selling Toyota HiAce across a similar distance but, ah, I think I'm good for cross-country road trips for a little while. Let's talk about what the Transit Custom does right, though, and where it needs improvement. You get a choice of two trim levels in the diesel-powered Transit Custom range: Trend and Sport. Both are available in short- and long-wheelbase body styles, however, the long-wheelbase Sport is what Ford calls a Double Cab and it includes a second row of seating. The Trend LWB, therefore, is the one to choose if you want maximum cargo space. If you want it with plug-in hybrid power, you'll need to cough up an extra $10,000, while the electric version commands an additional $10,000 premium on top of that. It's far from the cheapest vehicle in the mid-size commercial van segment. For example, the Toyota HiAce LWB – which has a similar overall cargo bay volume – is several thousand dollars cheaper. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool We did the bulk of our drive in one day, which worked out to around 14 hours in the Transit Custom. Not once did our bodies complain. Kudos to the designers of the Transit Custom's seats, because they proved comfortable and supportive. That's despite the passenger seat actually being more of a bench than a traditional bucket seat. The cloth upholstery is pleasant, and the outboard seats even feature heating. The driver's seat has a fold-down armrest that you can ratchet into your desired position, and the lack of a centre console means you can easily shimmy across the front seats if, for example, someone has parked too close to the driver's door. This is aided by a completely flat cabin floor. The steering wheel has tilt and telescopic adjustment, though we found the pedal placement to be a bit awkward. About that steering wheel: it's wonderful. The switchgear is logically laid out and tactile, while the leather wrapping is wonderfully soft and the size is spot-on. It's a better steering wheel than you'll find in many passenger cars! Overseas, an optional Mobile Office Pack includes a folding version of the steering wheel, allowing you to use it as a work surface or, let's be honest, an easier way to eat your Maccas. Sadly, it's not yet available here. As expected of a van, there's ample storage even up front. Storage shelves span the width of the dashboard, while the doors have a small pocket for items like pens, and then larger pockets at their base. These larger storage cavities incorporate bottle holders large enough for 1.5-litre bottles, while we were able to safely stash items like 3L milk bottles and even a vase in the other part of the lower cavity. Each side of the dashboard has a cupholder that can fit a medium McCafe beverage or a 600ml soft drink bottle, while there's another cupholder that folds out from the centre stack. Everything feels solidly assembled and hard-wearing, and the cabin overall appears modern. Our tester came equipped with a metal bulkhead, helping to insulate the front of the van from any sounds (but not necessarily smells) in the rear and featuring a clever load-through hatch which we didn't end up using. You can still see through the window in the bulkhead and out through the windows in the barn doors, but at night time the reflection of the touchscreen almost completely obscures your view out the back. You can get a digital rear-view mirror in the Transit Custom, but this comes only in an option package that includes a solid bulkhead with no window. Fortunately, the Transit Custom comes standard with blind-spot monitoring, while the exterior mirrors feature two different types of mirror so you've got multiple viewing angles. There's no surround-view camera, though you get a reversing camera with decent resolution plus front and rear parking sensors. The windscreen is huge and the view out the front is expansive, though we were perturbed by a demister that would turn itself off far too quickly. That brings us to perhaps our greatest gripe: the lack of physical climate controls. There are shortcuts anchored to the bottom of the touchscreen, but they can be finicky on the move – particularly temperature adjustment – and would likely prove cumbersome if you're wearing gloves. The centre stack has virtually no switchgear, apart from a handful of shortcut buttons for functions like the driver assistance systems menu plus a volume knob. The touchscreen is an impressive 13-inch unit running the SYNC4 operating system, and features wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto. The latter connects quickly and maintained a stable connection during our road trip, thankfully deciding to wait until we were in Brisbane to occasionally throw up a repetitive 'The inserted USB device isn't responding' error message when we had a phone plugged in. This was fixed by unplugging my phone. There is a wireless phone charger so in theory you don't need to ever plug in your phone, but in my experience wireless phone chargers charge too slowly and heat up your phone too much. Cue Alborz chiding me for having an Android. There's a simple 7.0-inch instrument cluster screen that's presentable and logically laid out, and is flanked by a couple of more traditional metres for fuel level and engine temperature. Moving to the rear, there's a single sliding door on the kerbside, though you can option a driver's side sliding door as well. Unlocking the vehicle once doesn't unlock the rear, so you'll need to press that button on the fob again; alternatively, you can separately unlock just the rear of the vehicle, which is handy if you are unloading goods and don't want anybody to nick your van. You'll need to give the sliding door and the barn doors a firm slam to close them, though even still we experienced a handful of phantom 'tailgate open' alerts in the instrument cluster. Inside the cargo bay, you'll find bright LED lighting. There's a helpful switch at the rear to turn on additional lighting, while along the sides of the cargo bay you'll find eight tie-down points as well as padding so your stuff doesn't damage the walls of the van. As standard, there's a single sliding door within an opening 1030mm wide and 1301mm tall, though you can option a second sliding door. The rear door opening is 1400mm wide and 1316mm tall, and the Transit Custom LWB is rated to fit four Euro (1200mm x 800mm) pallets. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool For now, the Transit Custom is a diesel-only affair in Australia, however, plug-in hybrid and electric versions are coming soon. Out of an abundance of caution, we filled up at a quarter of the tank remaining both times we filled up the van. That means we could have easily done Melbourne to Brisbane on two tanks. The Transit Custom quickly settled into a fuel consumption groove, and couldn't be shaken from 7.7 to 7.8 litres per 100km. The final score was 7.8L/100km across over 1800km of driving. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool The first thing you notice about the way the Transit Custom drives is its excellent steering. Not only is the wheel lovely to hold, as mentioned earlier, but the steering is nicely weighted – it's light enough to help you manoeuvre around tight carparks, but confidence-inspiring out on the road, too. Then there's the powertrain. The eight-speed automatic occasionally exhibits a not-so-smooth shift at low speed, but otherwise it's well-matched for the torquey turbo-diesel engine. You change gears using a stalk on the column, which may trip up people for whom the Transit Custom is among a fleet of vehicles they regularly drive. If this will be your primary source of transportation, however, you'll find you quickly get used to the stalk. The Transit Custom feels like it has more grunt than its outputs suggest, while the cabin is quite well insulated from the usual clatter you get from a turbo-diesel. Mind you, the cabin does get a bit boomy at high speeds with tyre roar, but this is a van after all. We drove over some rather rotten rural roads in New South Wales, and the Transit Custom took them in its stride. It has a surprisingly loping ride for a van, and unusually features independent rear suspension. And yet, despite being softly sprung, body control was commendable. When we picked up the car, we found the headlight beam didn't extend far enough, but adjusting the headlight aim with the toggle to the right-hand side of the steering wheel fixed this. What we couldn't fix, however, was the automatic high-beam. It proved erratic and inconsistent, dipping the lights on pitch-black country roads. It got to the point where I just wished the Transit Custom didn't have the feature, as I was constantly having to flick the headlight stalk anyway and this was just giving me another detent to flick through. The low-beam headlights are LEDs, which are lovely and bright. The high-beams may elegantly fade on, but they're disappointingly halogen units. Ford refers to these headlights as 'hybrid' headlights, which makes them sound more clever than they are… You fill up the Transit Custom via a flap on the passenger's side, though you'll need to open the passenger-side door in order to open this flap. Fortunately, the filler itself doesn't have a cap. The blind-spot monitoring worked well, as did the lane-keep assist though there's no lane centring. There is adaptive cruise control, which would often allow the van to exceed the speed limit by 2km/h – not ideal, but that shouldn't be enough to get you in trouble with the law. There is an annoying overspeed alert, but you can turn it off or easily drown it out with music. The driver fatigue monitoring feature doesn't scan your eyes like in some cars, though if you swerve over a lane marking or drive for a long time without a break, it will flash up a helpful reminder. The safe exit warning feature is a welcome inclusion, sounding a chime if the van detects you're about to open your door into oncoming traffic. The Transit Custom is under 2m tall, so it should fit in most carparks. Very handy. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool The Trend is the entry-level Transit Custom. 2025 Ford Transit Custom equipment highlights: Metallic paint is a $700 option, though our tester came in standard Frozen White. You can also spend $1400 and get SVO Paint, allowing you to choose from a wider range of colours than the monochromatic trio of $700 finishes. Other options include: To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool While like most vans the Transit Custom hasn't been crash-tested by ANCAP, it does have a 96 per cent rating in assessment of its driver assistance systems. Standard safety equipment includes: To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool Ford backs its vehicles with a five-year, unlimited-kilometre warranty, with 12 months of roadside assistance included at the time of purchase and extended with every service provided they're completed within Ford's network. For other buyers, the first four services are priced at $580, $915, $715, and $915 respectively. To see how the Ford Transit Custom stacks up against its rivals, use our comparison tool An 18-hour drive can be a real torture test of a vehicle. If something is bugging you when you set off, it's bound to infuriate you by the end of the trip. I've been in cars with uncomfortable seats, or with annoying lane-keeping aids, that would have had me raging at the end of 18 hours. But any faults the Ford has are minor, and I quickly came to respect this van. Hell, at one point I even thought, 'Hey, would I want to own one of these?' (The answer is no: I hate moving my own stuff, so the last thing I'd want as a van owner is to get roped into helping every friend and family member move). With its comfortable interior, spacious load bay, punchy powertrain and slick infotainment, the Transit Custom should be on your shortlist if you're buying a van. Interested in buying a Ford Transit Custom? Get in touch with one of CarExpert's trusted dealers here MORE: Everything Ford Transit Custom
The Citizen
30-04-2025
- Automotive
- The Citizen
Sport-overall clad Ford Transit Custom shows work can be fun
The Blue Oval's sportiest van returns to spice up a segment not accustomed to loutish conduct. Long known as the United Kingdom's best-selling new vehicle, with sales still into four figures right up until production ended two years ago, the Ford Puma officially replaced the Fiesta as the island's nation top-seller with sales last year of 48 340 units. The figures speak As with South Africa, the figures by the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders Limited (SMMT) – the equivalent of the National Association of Automobile Manufacturers of South Africa (Naamsa) – separates passenger vehicle sales from commercial vehicles. Taking the latter into consideration sees the Puma drop a notch to second behind the Ford Transit range, whose offset throughout 2024 amounted to 78 289 units. Of these, 46 967 were examples of the Transit Custom and the remaining 31 322 of the full-size, one-ton Transit. ALSO READ: Ford Transit Custom Sport a pimped out panel van with attitude Outranking the Mercedes-Benz Sprinter and Vauxhall (Opel) Vivaro by respective totals of 50 075 and 59 708, the Turkish-made Transit's reputation in the UK needs little explaining the country's well-known liking for vans above bakkies. Unsurprisingly, the opposite applies to South Africa where 25 533 Rangers departed dealership floors last year compared to 257 Transit Customs and 288 full-size Transits. Transit 'ST' While both have since undergone changes in the form of a line-up shuffle for the latter and a new generation for the former, the arrival of the Transit Custom Sport last year arguably reignited interest not seen the arrival of the Ranger Raptor. The closest Dearborn will most likely come to offer a ST-type model locally, the Sport completes the cargo hauling Transit Custom range following the premiere of the unbadged long wheelbase variant five months before. Modelled on the short wheelbase Custom, the second generation Sport is, however, a radical departure from its workhorse sibling as, apart from its loutish exterior, Ford has reworked its specification sheet and extracted more grunt from the single turbo 2.0-litre Panther diesel engine. Sportier exterior touches inside dual racing stripes, restyled bumpers and door sills, and the 17-inch alloy wheels. Likely to be seen as more of a leisure than work van, the weeklong stay with the Sport proved not only a surprise, but as with the regular Transit Custom, another reason why vans can be viewed as alternatives to bakkie equivalents. On first glance, it doesn't take long to fathom way the Sport shuns its sibling's work gear for a ST-inspired look that had observers calling it a 'Transit ST'. Decked-out in a model specific blue metallic hue – one of seven colours available – the Sport's racier looks come via matte black multi-spoke 17-inch alloy wheels, sportier bumpers and door sills, a roof spoiler, colour coded bumpers and door handles, and standard LED headlights – the latter trio not offered on the long wheelbase. Barn-style rear doors can open up to 180-degrees. Still with the dual barn-style doors capable of opening up to 180-degrees, the Sport also gets dual black racing stripes with a blue outer surround regardless of the body colour, a matte black grille with a honeycomb pattern that extends to the lower air intake, and black-and-blue decals at the base of the front doors and on the outer edges of the front bumper. For its final encore, the Sport comes standard with a pair of electrically sliding side doors operated from the key fob, or by pulling the inner or outer door handles. Aesthetic additions that can be seen as over-the-top and defeating the purpose of what a van should be, the Sport's appeal remains and given the popularity of 'appearance packages', could prove the deal breaker over less sporty looking rivals from Opel, Hyundai, Volkswagen, Toyota and Mercedes-Benz. Inside The same applies to the interior where Ford has added blue striping to the cloth seats, and finished the centre console in an un-van-like shade of less than adequate piano-key black. Interior is anything but van-like with premium finishes and a neat layout. A finish that extends down from the 13-inch infotainment system, the choice is not ideal for a van and, as with the finicky touch-sensitive buttons for the climate control integrated into the base of the display, unnecessarily complicated for a vehicle still designed to work. Working, casually In this regard, the short wheelbase bodystyle comes with a 400 mm reduction in overall length from the long wheelbase's 5 050 mm to 4 650 mm, and a payload drop of 246 kg to 1 023 kg. Accordingly, the loading area still has an overall volume of 5.8 m3, no less than six tie-down hooks integrated into the floor, a series of overhead LED lights and the ability to accommodate three Euro palettes behind the steel bulkhead. Transit Custom Sport comes standard with a pair of electric side doors. As with the long wheelbase, the Transit Custom Sport has a rated towing capacity of 2 500 kg for a braked trailer. Climbing aboard, which can prove tricky given the positioning of the grab handle, the interior appears unsurprisingly spacious, with fit-and-finish being upmarket despite the aforementioned black inserts. Sport's loading volume is rated 5.8 m3, its payload at 1 023 kg and its loading capacity equal to three Euro palettes. That being said, the electrically adjustable seatback for the driver's chair will still be too upright when reclined against the steel partition. Fortunately, the steering column adjusts for rake and reach, thus offsetting a driving position, unsurprisingly, somewhat reminiscent of a forward control truck. Let's talk space A still impressive place to be, the cabin lacks for little storage-wise with the inclusion of a pair of gloveboxes – the dash unit with a deep recess capable of housing a laptop – a three-tier door card compartment arrangement, a pair of clipboard-style dash slots and a covered pair of cupholders on the centre console. Door cards offer have a three-tier storage layout. If still not enough, two further cupholders feature on the outer edges of the dash, with the final storage solution being a deep slot at the base of the centre console that doubles up as the wireless smartphone charging pad. Packaging As explained with the Tourneo tested last year, the move from base to Sport has seen the Transit Custom take leave of the slick and precise six-speed manual gearbox for a model specific eight-speed automatic selected by the lever on the steering column. While understandable given the focus on space utilisation, the lack of paddle shifters will result in an awkward shifting process requiring the M button to be pushed and the stalk twisted instead of moving the lever itself. Admittedly, this won't hamper most buyers unlike the biggest irritation attributed to the infotainment system. Top mounted glovebox has a deep recess capable of storing a laptop. Similar in appearance to the setup used in the Ranger and Everest, the SYNC 4A-enabled design with voice activation, Apple CarPlay and Android Auto requires some familiarisation, as will the switch for the electronic handbrake that sits between the air vents. Although tedious, it didn't irritate as much as the projection off of the window integrated into partition, especially at night. What's more, the start/stop system requires going into the infotainment system and being switched off manually each time the ignition is turned on. Infotainment system takes a bit getting used to, but becomes easy with constant use. The application of the piano key black finish isn't as welcoming, especially on vehicle still designed to work. Less of a pain are the buttons on the steering wheel, the configurable 12-inch digital instrument cluster that actually measures eight-inches, and the retention of physical dials for the decently sounding sound system. As for specification, the Sport's features, aside from those mentioned, include heated front seats, dual-zone climate control, front and rear parking sensors, a 180-degree reverse camera, Adaptive Cruise Control, a tyre pressure monitor, Blind Spot Monitoring, Autonomous Emergency Braking, Lane Keep Assist, Traffic Sign Recognition, Driver Attention Alert and Pre-Collision Assist. On the move Equipped with a drive mode selector housing five modes: Slippery, Eco, Normal, Tow/Haul and Sport, the Transit Custom Sport's focal piece is the extraction of an additional 25kW/30Nm from the mentioned turbodiesel engine. Outputting 125kW/390Nm, progress initially falls flat as a result of the low down lag, but becomes smooth and with substantially more go than in the, admittedly, less powerful long wheelbase variant. Hooked to the automatic 'box, the Sport feels effortless and although largely slick, the 'box lacks engagement as experienced on the lesser panel van grade, and tended to become flustered when shifting down – reason again for the inclusion of paddle shifters. Cloth seats feature fetching blue embroidery work. While both are heated, only the driver's chair has electric adjustability. On the move, and despite its lower profile rubber than of its sibling, the Sport keeps intact its car-like ride, though noticeably firmer on less well maintained surfaces and a tad bouncier with no load present. While a decent cargo haul will rectify the bouncy ride, the offset will be increased fuel consumption. During the weeklong stay and eventual 341 km, the Transit Custom Sport registered a more than commendable 8.8 L/100 km versus the 9.5 L/100 km recorded by the Tourneo. Worth noting though is the latter's power and torque deficit plus its eight seats that offsets its mass being only seven kilograms up on the Sport. Conclusion As much as 'sporty' and 'van' are seldom if ever used in the same write-up, Ford's execution with the Transit Sport has largely been a success and worth serious consideration should a comparative Ranger prove inadequate. Transit last year sold nearly 80 000 units in its traditional market stronghold, the United Kingdom. At R938 000, the Sport is on the pricey side and for many buyers, unlikely to be worth the R177 000 premium over the less powerful and less well stocked, but slightly more practical long wheelbase. Given, however, its segment uniqueness and popularity of the previous generation Sport, the added expenditure comes with a lot of substance worth every penny. NOW READ: Work and racy return as Ford prices new Transit Custom Sport
