Contain Your Excitement: The Honda Civic Has Been Facelifted

We bring you enormous news from Japan: the Honda Civic Hybrid has received a light facelift. We know, we can hardly contain our excitement either.

Yep, the current Civic isn’t a car we think about a lot outside of the soon-to-die-in-Europe Type R, but just in case you needed reminding it exists, here’s a mid-life nip-and-tuck for the eminently sensible hybrid hatch.

It gets a new, slightly angrier face with a more aggressive front bumper, and Honda’s ditched the front fog lights from all versions, which it says are no longer necessary in the face of improved LED headlight tech. A new design of 18-inch, ten-spoke diamond cut alloys arrives too, finished in black for the mid-range Sport model and grey for the top Advance trim.

Rounding out the exterior tweaks is the new shade of Seabed Blue, replacing the pre-facelift car’s Premium Crystal Blue. Various accents can now be picked out in either Berlina Black, Nordic Silver or Patina Bronze.

The tweaks are even more marginal on the inside. All trims now get black headlining and matt chrome detailing around the air vents, while the top Advance version now gets ambient interior lighting. The mid-range Sport, meanwhile, receives a heated steering wheel and 10.2-inch driver display, and wireless phone charging is standard across all versions.

Under the skin, it’s exactly the same as before, with no tweaks to the chassis or powertrain. That means the Civic retains the same solitary hybrid option, a 2.0-litre naturally aspirated four-cylinder working in tandem to send a peak of 181bhp to the front wheels through a CVT gearbox. 0-62mph takes a quoted 7.8 seconds, and top speed is 112mph.

We know what you’re going to ask, and no, unless something dramatically changes, the Civic you actually care about – the sensational Type R – won’t be party to this facelift. Not in Europe anyway, where it’s going off sale this year thanks to those pesky emissions rules. Perhaps things will be different in Japan and North America, where the Type R shows no signs of dying.

As for the Hybrid we’re now limited to in Europe, pricing kicks off at £33,795 for the entry-level Elegance trim. That rises to £35,395 for the mid-tier Sport, and £38,695 for the range-topping Advance. UK orders are open now.