Ford Puma (crossover)

The Ford Puma is a subcompact crossover SUV (B-segment) manufactured and marketed by Ford since 2019 as a variant of the seventh-generation Fiesta.

Sales started in Europe in 2019, in Australasia in late 2020, and in South Africa from October 2023. In the European market, the Puma is positioned above the EcoSport and below the Kuga (also called Escape outside Europe).

An electric version of the Puma will launch in 2024.

Overview
Ford first announced the Puma crossover at its event Go Further in Amsterdam, along with the introduction of the third-generation Kuga. The Puma nameplate was last used on the Puma sport compact. The vehicle is based on the seventh-generation Fiesta platform (Ford Global B-car platform).

Production of the Puma started in Craiova, Romania (Ford Romania) in October 2019 along with the EcoSport subcompact crossover and the EcoBoost 1.0 L Fox engine used in both cars. Ford invested two hundred million euros, and employed 1,700 people on the project.

The Puma is offered with a mild hybrid 1.0 litre EcoBoost three cylinder turbo gasoline engine with a belt driven integrated starter, which uses energy from the braking system to charge the forty eight volt lithium-ion battery pack in order to increase torque and lower emissions. Power is rated at 153 bhp, 114 kW, and 240 Nm with an additional 50 Nm from the integrated starter system.

In December 2022, the Puma Vivid Ruby Edition was unveiled as the new flagship trim.

In March 2023, the Puma ST Powershift was officially launched with a 170 hp 1.0L mild-hybrid engine and an automatic transmission.

Safety
Puma was tested by Euro NCAP in 2019. It is rated five-star. Adult and child protection is rated at 94% and 84%. Pedestrian safety is rated 77% by Euro NCAP. The organisation tested the Puma again in 2022, on that occasion giving it a four-star overall rating, with a 75% score in the adult-occupant category, an 84% score in the child-occupant category, a 70% score in the vulnerable-road-users category, and a 69% score in the safety-assist category. The organisation found that the Puma had "marginal" performance in protecting the chest of the driver in a frontal-offset collision, the chest of a rear-seat adult passenger in a full-width rigid barrier collision, and in protecting those seated in the front from whiplash injuries in a rear-end collision, with "poor" performance at preventing occupants bodies from being thrown from side to side in an impact, while generally performing well in other areas for adult occupants. The organisation found protection for child occupants to be "good or adequate" in all of their tests. They also found the protection of struck pedestrians to be "good or adequate" in all areas except for the bottom of the windscreen and the a-pillars surrounding it, which were described as "stiff" and as having "poor" performance for head protection. The organisation rated the autonomous-emergency-braking system's performance as "marginal" due to the characteristics of the front seats and head restraints in low-speed autonomous-emergency-braking tests.

Pre-Collision Assist with Pedestrian Detection, Emergency Brake Assist, Tire Pressure Monitoring System, Electronic Stability Control, semi-autonomous parking assist, and Emergency Steering Assist. The car also has adaptive cruise control. Other available features are autonomous emergency braking, Intelligent Speed Limiter and lane keeping assist.

Reception
In January 2020, What Car? magazine awarded the Puma its Car of the Year title. In January 2021, the Puma 1.0 Ecoboost Hybrid 155 Titanium won What Car? 's Small SUV of the Year title. The same year, the Puma ST 1.5 Ecoboost 200 Performance Pack was named the magazine's Sports SUV of the Year. What Car? awarded the Puma five stars out of five in its review of the car.

In 2020, the Sunday Times found the "infotainment" system to be more difficult to operate than some competing Volkswagen Group products. They noted that the Puma has less rear-passenger space than those models, although they felt the large windows meant children were less likely to become motion sick riding in the back than in a Nissan Juke or Toyota C-HR. While they found the interior to be relatively quiet at speed they found the ride quality to be somewhat inferior to some of its competitors. They noted the 456 L boot as one of the largest in a crossover car sold at the time. The same publication also reviewed the ST model, saying they were "not sure why you'd want this over the 153bhp ST Line Puma" and noted "the uncomfortable seats and twitchy handling that make less sense in an SUV" while saying that the 31 mpgimp they averaged was "decent for a car that can hit 62mph from standstill in 6.7sec". The Daily Telegraph found the physical buttons in the Titanium model they tested to be less distracting than touch-sensitive pads found in some other contemporary cars. Both newspapers praised the Puma's clutch and brakes, and noted the drainable "megabox" underneath the boot as a standout feature. Which? found changing radio stations to be "needlessly complex" and found the Puma to be reliable in surveys, with one-in-fifty Pumas under four years old breaking down in the time frame studied.

Motorsport
A Group Rally1 car, named Ford Puma Rally1, has been competing in the World Rally Championship since 2023.

Sales
In 2021, the Ford Puma became the best-selling Ford model in the UK, surpassing the Ford Fiesta. Its high sales figures also resulted in it being the overall 8th best-selling car in the UK in 2021 having achieved 28,697 new registrations throughout the year. The Puma became the fourth best-selling selling car in the UK in 2022 and the best selling car in the UK in 2023, as well as the eighth-best selling car in Europe for 2023. The plug-in hybrid version of the car was the best-selling plug-in hybrid in Europe for 2023.