NEWS: VW Up Tops What Car?/JD Power Survey As Germans Dominate

German manufacturers have once again dominated one of the market's largest vehicle ownership studies, the 2014 What Car?/JD Power survey – revealing that seven out of the top 10 vehicles are made by German-owned car manufacturers, and, incredibly... the top three are all made by the Volkswagen Group (which is why two of our Road Magazine project cars are German!).
The car with the highest overall rating and the winner of the city car category is the fabulous little Volkswagen Up, What Car?’s Car of the Year 2012. Its key attributes were listed as reliability, its easiness to drive and fuel-efficiency. Drivers also loved the interior space, layout and colour, and the fact it was easy to see out of. It also looks great we reckon.
The second-placed model is the Volkswagen Golf Plus, closely followed by the Skoda Yeti.
Jaguar and Lexus are joint top manufacturers this year. Jaguar has held the top position for the past two years, and Lexus held the top position for 11 years before that.
What Car? editor Jim Holder said: “The Volkswagen Group deserves special congratulations for having six cars in the top 10. It is clearly building cars that have showroom appeal and, even more importantly, deliver in real life. Cars that perform in customer satisfaction surveys are a great recommendation for car buyers and act as a great barometer to a car’s quality.”

Top 10 models 2014:
1 Volkswagen Up
2 Volkswagen Golf Plus
3 Skoda Yeti
4 Mercedes-Benz C-Class
5 Volkswagen Scirocco
6 Volkswagen Tiguan
7 Lexus CT200h
7 Skoda Octavia
7 Volvo V70/XC70
10 Jaguar XF

Bottom 10 models 2014:
109 Chevrolet Spark
108 Alfa Romeo Mito
106 Citroën C3
106 BMW X1
105 Ford Ka
104 Fiat Grande Punto / Punto Evo
103 Citroën C4
102 Smart Fortwo
101 Ford Fusion
100 Citroën C1

The full report is published in What Car? magazine, on sale today. In addition car owners and prospective new car buyers can also investigate all of the latest What Car?/JD Power survey results online, using a new, fully interactive tool that allows visitors to uncover where each car in the survey was praised or criticised. Find out more at: www.whatcar.com/jdpower