The latest version of the Nissan Sunny, one of the Middle East's favourite zippy little rides, has just arrived on UAE shores in a brand new suit and with a little bit of extra oomph under the bonnet. The new design features lower, wider and longer exterior dimensions than its predecessor, allowing for a little extra room in the cabin. It is recognisable as a Sunny though as it still has what Nissan calls the V-motion grille, as well as boomerang-shaped head and tail lights. The inner stylings mirror those used on its more upmarket siblings, the Maxima and Altima, featuring a gliding wing instrument panel, with optional features including a 7-inch infotainment screen and all the bells and whistles that generally come with these things. When it comes to what’s under the bonnet, Nissan’s men and women with the engineering hats on have upped the power in the 1.6-litre powertrain by 12 per cent, so it now has 118 horse power. This car is competing in what our friends in motoring sales call the B-sedan segment market, and, if figures released by the manufacturer are accurate, it’s a dominating force in that sector. Apparently, 80 per cent of those polled in a survey across the UAE said they would consider buying one. Obviously, “consider buying” and “will be buying” are two different things, but you’d be hard pushed to find many vehicles that eight out of 10 people would ponder the purchase of. Demand, therefore, is likely to be high. If cold, hard statistics rather than surveys are your bag, the Sunny has sold more than 474,500 units in Gulf countries alone since it first arrived in 1994. This latest model comes in three trim-levels, models: S (MT or Xtronic), SV (Xtronic) and the sporty version, which is the SL (Xtronic). The trio are available at Nissan dealers in the region at a starting price of Dh57,900. Be warned though – if you’re the kind of person who likes waving to other drivers if they have the same vehicle as you, your hand is going to be very tired after even the shortest journey.
