► Introducing the 340i
► Plug-in 330e on the way
► First time for 3-cyl engine
Mid-life update time for the car that makes up a quarter of all BMW sales worldwide. No pressure then. At first glance, they’ve trodden so carefully you might wonder if they’ve touched anything at all. Spangly new LEDs aside, there’s been minimal exterior meddling, and in the cabin changes are subtler still (the annoying cupholder lid you previously had to stow in the glovebox is now a proper sliding cover, and sat-nav’s standard across the range).
Under the surface though, almost the entire engine range is replaced with new faces from BMW’s latest modular family. For the first time there’s a 3-cyl 3-series, the 318i, a plug-in 330e’s on the way, and the 320d (which everyone will buy) now ducks the magic 100g/km CO2 threshold. BMW didn’t bring any of them to the launch, so we drove the irrelevant but rather wonderful 340i range-topper – a firecracker straight-six that replaces the 335i, and sounds and goes like a sports car. The 5% of buyers who choose it will have fun. The 3’s chassis, so often worshipped as the class benchmark, is the one bit you’d think they’d have left alone, but the suspension top mounts and dampers have been changed, the ride height dropped by 10mm and the power steering retuned. The stiffer front assembly means there’s a tendency for the front wheels to follow cambers, but the 3-series is still nice to look at and nice to drive. As you were.
BMW 340i: the specs
Price: £38,125
Engine: 2998cc 24v 6-cyl turbocharged, 322bhp @ 5500-6500rpm, 332lb ft @ 1380-5000rpm
Transmission: Eight-speed auto, rear-wheel drive
Performance: 5.1sec 0-62mph, 155mph (limited), 41.5mpg, 159g/km CO2
Weight: 1615kg
On sale: Now
Rating: ****
Verdict: Still a class act. But so is the XE