VW Golf GTI Vs Honda Civic Type R: Is Subtlety Better Than Lunacy?

Let’s be clear before we go any further: the customer crossover between the VW Golf GTI and the Honda Civic Type R is going to be minimal. Yes, they’re both hot hatches costing around £30,000 (£29,990.00 for the Golf, £30,995 for the Civic), but they’re aimed at completely different buyers. So, why bother to get them together at all? The answer is ‘curiosity’.

What we have here are essentially the two bookends of the hot hatch market. In one corner there’s one of the classiest and most restrained cars, while in the other we have a car that’s a visual exercise in giving absolutely no f**ks whatsoever. There’s a big gap in power, too: the GTI makes do with 228bhp, whereas the Type R is nearly 100bhp up with its 316bhp.

Some tartan seats, a red line splashed across the grille and a dinky little boot spoiler are the only racy details on the GTI. The Type R on the other hand is - for better and worse - a feast for the eyes. There are the bulging arches that the 245/30/20 wheels somehow look lost in, the festooning of vents, the chunky front splitter and - of course - that rear wing. All of this is dumped on the stock Civic, which already looks ungainly from some angles with its many creases and vast, fake grilles. There really is a lot going on here.

So what’s it like jumping from the chalk to the cheese of the hot hatch world? Let’s start with the most extreme of the two. Good lord does it take off after 3000rpm. Below that it barely moves, but once you hit the boost threshold, it launches forward at an alarming rate. Thanks to the limitations of front-wheel drive it can ‘only’ manage a 5.7sec 0-62mph sprint, but once you’re moving, its boosty nature makes it feel far faster than any 300 or so horsepower car should do. It feels up there with megahatches like the Mercedes-AMG A45 and Audi RS3, even if the stats suggest otherwise.

Partly down to wider front tyres, the front end on this thing is even grippier than the last Type R. You find yourself burying your foot on the throttle, sure that understeer is about to follow, only for those 245-section front boots to cling on and for your face to be smushed to one side under the G-forces. Just imagine what it’d be like on the semi-slick Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2s it set the front-wheel drive Nurburgring record on…

The Torsen mechanical limited-slip differential up front feels ever so slightly grabbier than it used to, but that’s a perfectly forgivable detail, particularly when the rest of the package has grown up so much. Now it’s rocking a fully independent suspension setup and has three driving modes to play with, there’s so much more finesse to the chassis.

Before, you had a choice of either hard in normal mode or stupidly hard in +R, but now, +R can actually be used on a road that’s over five years old without making the car crashy and nervous. Granted, it’s still bordering on unacceptable, but that’s just fine, as away from the track there’s now the nicely balanced Sport mode to fall back on.

The engine is still a bit of a blunt instrument, but thanks to a much lighter flywheel and various other changes, it’s far more responsive than before. It doesn’t rev hang like it used to, and it’s much more pleasant to ring out to its 7000rpm redline than previously.

But here’s the thing: on a tight and twisty road, the Golf does not feel far behind, despite the conspicuous power deficit. The fact that we’ve had several months to learn how to extract as much as possible from this particular GTI (it’s been our long-term test car since May) helps, as does the presence of a six-speed DSG automatic gearbox, but this hot hatch offers up a lesson in how mega power outputs aren’t always necessary to get the job done.

The 2.0-litre ‘EA888’ inline four is a more eager, flexible engine than the Honda’s own 2.0-litre lump, and is capable of actually providing noticeable forward momentum under 3000rpm. It sounds better, too. Sure, it’s aided by VAG’s ‘Soundaktor’ resonator puck thing in the front bulkhead, but it’s hard to argue with the results. The Honda just drones throughout its range, save for something vaguely akin to a pleasant din in the last few hundred RPM before the red line.

The light, fast steering gives some points away to the heavier, more feelsome setup in the Honda, but I’m fond of it. The variable ratio rack - which sees the steering ratio quicken the more you turn the wheel - is welcome in the tighter corners, too. There’s not a huge amount of body roll, and the chassis feels a little more delicate than the Civic’s, not to mention more palatable when it comes to ride comfort.

"Thanks to a much lighter flywheel and various other changes, the Type R's engine is far more responsive than before"

When you push the boundaries a little though, the Golf starts to frustrate - the frontmost Pirelli P Zeros give up the game far too easily. The GTI needn’t be this prone to understeer - a reasonable £1000 premium bags you the GTI Performance, with its beefier brakes, boost in equipment levels and - crucially - VW Group’s VAQ front differential that can send up to 100 per cent of torque to a single wheel.

Once you calm down, the Golf claws it back. While the new Civic is far less irritating than the old one when it comes to switchgear layouts, trip computers and infotainment systems, it’s still far from perfect. Get back in the Golf, and even with its less-than-convincing Active Info Display instrument binnacle and pointless gesture control system, it immediately shows itself to be leaps about bounds ahead of the Honda.

Everything is exactly where you expect it to be. It has a familiar, friendly feel to it, like that old hoodie you might have retrieved from the bottom of the cupboard, revealing itself to be just as comfy and snug as it ever was. I don’t think anyone has nailed this quite like VW.

So if it was my choice, would I go with team understatement, or team unhinged? If we were looking at a GTI Performance or - better yet - the recently discontinued Clubsport, I might be tempted toward something with a VW badge. But in this present company? There’s no doubt in my mind that life with the Golf would be easier and almost entirely without aggravation, but there’s a strong case for putting up with the Civic’s foibles and one-track mind in order to fill your life with its excitable, bonkers attitude.

What would you choose?