What Van? Britain's biggest and best van buyers' guide

The What Van? Road Test: Fiat Professional Ducato (2021)

Date: Friday, May 13, 2022

Driving

For a big van, the LH2 Ducato is remarkably manoeuvrable at low speeds, and the rear-view camera delivers an exemplary daylight image on the aforementioned touchscreen when you need to back up. The screen also gives you the ability to switch the camera on to see what is behind you without having to engage reverse.

The image deteriorates markedly at night however, especially in wet weather. Such deterioration is not something unique to the Ducato, but is nevertheless something to bear in mind if you are making out-of-hours deliveries.

While the light power steering may be a boon around town, it fails to tighten up sufficiently at speed, despite Fiat Professional’s assurances to the contrary. As a consequence there were some occasions when we thought the handling lacked precision, with the van feeling a little nervous and uncertain as we started to swing into bends.

Nor was the ride always all that smooth. It tends to be choppy when the Ducato is lightly laden, although it undoubtedly starts to improve when you put some weight in the back; a characteristic the van shares with most light commercials of its size.

In-cab noise levels could stand to be better suppressed, and the quality of the manual gear change is acceptable rather than outstanding. 

With 140hp on tap there is no shortage of performance. Although we might be tempted to step up to 160hp or even 180hp if we were tackling a lot of intercity runs heavy laden. Pressing the ECO button should improve your fuel economy, and does not affect your vehicle’s performance unduly unless you happen to have a lot of weight on board, or have decided to pull a heavy trailer.

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