Honda’s Jazz is moving to an even more economical beat days, with the arrival of petrol/electric Hybrid that promises to make an already economical hatch even thriftier.

Blend the fuel miserly ways of a Hybrid, with the class leading space and versatility of the Jazz five-door hatch and its appeal moves to a new level. While the current model has been around for nearly six years and all new replacement expected some time in 2014, this current version remains surprisingly competitive against most of it newer mini hatch rivals.

Using the same hybrid technology from the larger Insight hatch it does everything possible to get those behind the wheel to drive for economy. There is what Honda calls its Driver coaching system. It doesn’t use the colourful language of some coaches, but it does employ a bit of colour therapy. The speedo background turns red, when the cars computer deems you are using a leaden foot on the throttle. Green indicates you have achieved fuel miser status. There are instant and trip fuel readouts, to keep the driver focused on squeezing every last kilometre out of each litre of fuel.

An ECON button helps ensure the driver get into the right fuel saving head space as soon as they slide behind the wheel, by giving them the option of selecting whether they want to drive for economy or performance. It applies some clever electronic manipulating of the engine Auto Stop, accelerator responsiveness, plus the output of the petrol and electric motors to deliver the driving mode you select. The Jazz Hybrid has a claimed a fuel economy of 4.5l/100kms – a 30% improvement over the standard 1.5 litre Auto’s running costs. The best I managed was well over a litre more than this figure.

For the $31,500 asking price you get a 3-year unlimited km warranty with the Hybrid battery warrantied for 8 years or 160,000kms whichever comes first. Its closest rival in the affordable Hybrid stakes is Toyota’s Prius C although at this price point the Honda is more generously equipped. The Jazz is the newest addition to the Honda Hybrid family that includes the Insight, CRZ and Civic. Honda must feel they were justified in taking the Hybrid plunge, having sold over a million Hybrids in the last decade, with about 2,000 of those finding owners in New Zealand.

Power comes from a 1.3 litre iVTEC engine and an electric motor that have a combined power output of 72kw – around 3kw less that the standard 1.3 litre Jazz petrol. While on paper little if anything appears to separate the Hybrid and the conventional 1.3 litre engine in terms of power, the hybrid has more performance bite in the low to mid rev range. This delivers a more relaxing drive, especially over undulating terrain where the Hybrid system displays plenty of strength and stamina. This together with its eager throttle response, making it a more invigorating and engaging drive than its larger, but slightly under whelming Hybrid sibling the Insight that I test drove 18 months ago.

I was expecting a similar showing from this car that had the same Hybrid technology. In the smaller and lighter Jazz, it fronted with a more convincing performance, especially in town driving where it impressed with nippy off-the-line acceleration. Helping out in that department to some extent is a drive-by-wire electronic throttle control. Out in the cut and thrust of the open road the test car felt more subdued and loses some of the sparkle that was so evident in town driving. Noise levels are adequately suppressed, although on long steep up hill slogs they rise rather sharply. Unlike some Hybrids the test car appeared to lack the battery capacity to run in full electric mode at around town speeds, with the system acting more as a power booster for the petrol engine when it’s required.

While a five-speed auto does the gear changing business in petrol only Jazz variants the Hybrid use a CVT (Constant Variable Transmission) that seems to work more effectively with petrol/electric powered cars. While I’m not exactly a CVT transmission fan, it was hard to fault the way this one seamlessly stepped through the gears without any stumbles.

Standard features on the Jazz Hybrid include 15-inch alloys, power windows and mirrors, central locking, an MP3, WMA & CD compatible audio system, plus USB connectivity for full ipod or MP3 player integration. The Jazz still sets the mini hatch benchmark for passenger and load space, with an excellent interior packaging job, that liberates an almost ridiculous amount room given the cars modest exterior dimensions. Load carrying flexibility must make it the envy of its rivals and is achieved by offering a variety of different configurations to accommodate even the trickiest loads. Converting the rear seats to a form completely flat load floor simply involves pulling a lever that sees the rear seats sink flat into the floor. In its place you have cargo carrying capacity to burn.

The ride is firm for a car designed primarily for city life and at times I got a sharp and often unexpected reminder of this, as the suspension crunched, rather than glided across corrugated or pot holed surfaces. Grip and road holding is adequate and not convincing enough to put the Jazz Hybrid into the sporty hatch category. Body roll that influences proceedings a bit too soon when negotiating tighter curves plus steering that is short on road feel, see to that.

What’s the verdict?  Despite this model being into its twilight years and an all-new replacement just around the corner, it still delivers Class leading space and practicality, although not a lot else.