Renault Scenic - Design, interior & technology

The exterior of the Renault Scenic taps into the themes of the Scenic Vision concept of 2022, designed by Gillas Vidal. The light units front and rear adopt an aggressive and bold design, and unlike the black-painted concept, the lighter colours available on the Scenic show up the car’s sharp surfacing very well. The selection of alloy wheel designs is interesting. If you don’t like the Iconic’s 20-inch wheels, you can take the covers off them to reveal a different style underneath. Be warned, however, doing this will lose you 12 miles of range due to losses in aerodynamic efficiency. 

What is the Renault Scenic like inside?

While you’ll find a lot of controls in the Scenic are located on the central touchscreen, the climate and heated seat controls are still physical switches. The overall layout of the Scenic cabin is neat, rather than eye-catching in the way that a Hyundai Ioniq 5 is.

Something that helps the Renault Scenic stand out is its ‘Solarbay’ panoramic sunroof (offered as standard on the range-topping Iconic) which has segments that can be adjusted from opaque to transparent using liquid crystals. The level of shading can be varied between rear and front occupants, all controlled via the overhead button or using the Google voice assistant. This works well, although you'll find yourself looking up to double-check that the sequence has started. 

Range-topping Iconic trim cars feature a digital rear-view mirror with a feed from a camera placed on the rear of the roof. The image quality on the screen is good, with only a little graining in the resolution. It won’t be for everyone and you can switch it back to a normal mirror instantly - our car had a shaky rear-view mirror, which turned out to merely be a loose fitting. We kept it in digital mode where there was no shakiness apparent.

What is the interior quality like? 

The materials feel like they’re of a good quality with frequently-used parts like the steering wheel and door cards covered in bio-sourced materials - there’s no option for leather with the Scenic, backing up the firm’s commitment to sustainability. There were no creaks and rattles during our time with the Scenic as well.

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Sat-nav, stereo and infotainment

Sitting on the dash are a 12-inch central touchscreen and a 12.3-inch driver’s display utilising Renault’s OpenR digital cockpit layout, which is based on the Android Automotive system. As standard, you get Google sat-nav and account integration with the Scenic. This enables the use of Google Maps for EV route planning, plus a preconditioning feature for the battery so that when you start charging, the battery should be at an optimal temperature to provide a faster recharge speed. 

The infotainment system layout is simple enough to navigate with the submenus readily available - we also didn’t find any noticeable lag in its readouts, although to make the whole system quicker we’d like the ‘home’ button to be fixed in place.  

Renault requested the help of musician Jean-Michel Jarre to develop some sounds for the Scenic. The first is a ‘VSP’ (vehicle sound for pedestrians) that warns people when the car is approaching at speeds under 18mph, and the second is a welcome sound sequence when you turn the car on. Sadly for 1980s electronica fans, Jarre was not involved in developing the nine-speaker Harman Kardon sound system which is found as standard on the highest-specification Iconic trim.