Alfa Romeo 4C (2014-2019) review - MPG, CO2 and Running Costs
In spite of its fierce performance, the Alfa 4C should be relatively cheap to own
With a price tag of £51,500 the 4C coupe is around £2,000 more than a Cayman S, while the 4C Spider carries an £8,000 premium over the coupe. That's a pretty big step when you consider the Porsche 718 Boxster S is only about £1,000 more than a Cayman S. It also means the Alfa 4C is pricier than a lot of accomplished rivals, such as the Lotus Elise, the aforementioned Porsches and models such as the Jaguar F-Type V6 and the entire Caterham Seven range.
Emissions of 157g/km are superb for a 160mph sports car, and make the Alfa a cost-effective choice for company-car drivers. It’s the result of low overall weight and a small four-cylinder engine, and it means that a higher-band earner will pay just £4,119 a year in company car tax – £644 less than for a manual Porsche Cayman.
Road tax will be a very reasonable £175. Alfa hasn’t confirmed servicing costs, but while only eleven specialist retailers will be able to sell you a 4C, all 46 UK dealers are able to service it.
Accident repairs could be a different story, as the carbon tub and aluminium space frames will be potentially very expensive to fix after a major incident.
As far as day-to-day running costs are concerned, the official claim for the 4C’s combined cycle fuel efficiency is 41.5mpg, with economy of up to 56.5mpg on a run out of town. You’d be hard-pressed to drive the red-blooded Alfa with a light foot though, so matching those figures in the real world seems highly unlikely.
Still, ignoring test-track driving, we averaged a fairly decent 30.8mpg fuel economy, so your petrol bills shouldn’t be too high. With a reasonable 40 litre tank it also means you’ll be able to cover 250 miles between fill-ups quite comfortably.
Insurance groups
Thanks to its relatively exotic construction, high purchase price and sporting performance, the Alfa 4C falls into the top Group 50 insurance bracket, which is well ahead of the Porsche Cayman in Group 41.
Depreciation
Given the entire 2014 UK allocation of 200 4Cs sold out very quickly, demand for the 4C should outstrip supply, so residual values should be decently strong.
• Alfa Romeo 4C sports car rethink in the pipeline
Our experts predict a used price after three years/30,000 miles of just under 50 per cent. A Porsche Cayman is likely to be stronger still though, retaining a little more than half its value over the same period and mileage.
