2025 Jaecoo J7 Track review

There’s no shortage of new Chinese car brands coming to Australia, and among the latest to hit our roads is Jaecoo.

A spin-off of Chery, Jaecoo sees itself as the more luxurious and ‘adventurous’ of the two marques, in exchange for prices slightly higher – but still much lower than mass-market brand rivals from Japan, South Korea and Germany.

Its debut model is the J7, a small to mid-size SUV that bears more than a passing resemblance to a Range Rover Evoque, and shares its DNA with Chery’s Tiggo 7 Pro. Does it do enough to stand out in an increasingly crowded market?

Four variants of the Jaecoo J7 are available – the front-wheel-drive petrol-only Core and Track, all-wheel-drive petrol-only Ridge, and front-wheel-drive plug-in hybrid SHS Summit.

On test in this review is the Track priced from $37,990 drive-away nationwide – $3000 more than the Core, and $5000 less than the Ridge.

Its most direct rival is its sibling in the Chery Tiggo 7 Pro SE+ ($33,990 drive-away), because the J7 splits the size difference between ‘small’ and ‘mid-size’ models from rival brands.

There’s the small GWM Haval Jolion Ultra petrol ($33,990) and mid-size GWM Haval H6 Ultra ($39,990), and the small MG ZS Essence Turbo ($31,990) and mid-size MG HS Excite ($36,990), all drive-away.

It is the same price as the cheapest Mazda CX-5 ($37,990 drive-away nationwide on special offer), but the Jaecoo is considerably better equipped.

The same goes for the base Kia Sportage S automatic ($39,210 drive-away in NSW) and Toyota RAV4 Hybrid ($46,700 drive-away in NSW) – or even the smaller Toyota Corolla Cross ($40,600 drive-away in NSW) – all not as well equipped as the J7.

Over the base model, the J7 Track adds dual-zone climate control, a wireless phone charger, heated front seats, a power tailgate, 360-degree camera, front parking sensors, rain-sensing wipers, a driver’s knee airbag, and more.

Equipment shared with the base model includes LED headlights, 18-inch alloy wheels, a 13.2-inch touchscreen with wireless Apple CarPlay/Android Auto and satellite navigation, 10.25-inch instrument display, rear parking sensors, leather-look upholstery, power-adjustable front seats, keyless entry and start, and a suite of crash-avoidance technologies.

Exclusive to more expensive J7 grades are larger 19-inch wheels, a head-up display, sunroof, ventilated front seats, a heated steering wheel, and a full-size spare wheel (rather than a space-saver).

There’s a classy feel to the Jaecoo J7’s cabin that belies the $37,990 price. It feels well assembled (in this near-new test car), the armrests are soft, and design elements like the cross-hatched leather-look dashboard trim break up what may otherwise be a sea of black plastic.

The firmly bolstered front seats are reasonably comfortable on longer drives, and the driver sits high for a true SUV feel, but the lack of underthigh support – without any way of adjusting it, either – may frustrate taller drivers.

Front-seat heating is standard in the J7 Track variant, plus synthetic upholstery that looks like leather but, as with similar materials in other cars, doesn’t quite feel like it. Driver’s seat lumbar control is also on offer.

The steering wheel is trimmed in a similar leather-like material, but it’s quite big for a relatively compact SUV, and could do with more reach adjustment to better accommodate longer-legged drivers. The buttons on the wheel are physical, not touch-sensitive, but they could be better backlit at night.

Elsewhere, there are little to no physical controls in the car. Yet the controls present are confusing in their choice – there’s no volume dial for the passenger, but the drive mode selector controller is surprisingly huge. More on the screen interface in the next section.

Storage space is well catered for, with door pockets that are slim but leave plenty of space for tall bottles, a decently sized centre console box, and more storage under the central ‘flying bridge’. The glovebox is modestly sized, but it has one of the slowest damping mechanisms we’ve ever seen, and it doesn’t like to be rushed with a firm pull down.

There is space for two phones ahead of the shifter – though only one is a wireless charging pad, albeit one with ventilation to prevent overheating – and the USB ports (one USB-A, one USB-C) are down near the front passenger’s right knee, so they’re a little hard to access.

Other amenities include a 12-volt socket (near the driver’s left knee), ambient cabin lighting, keyless entry and start, and illuminated vanity mirrors.

Space in the rear is, to be expected for an SUV, on the smaller end of the ‘mid-size’ category. Head room is generous for my 186cm (6ft 1in) frame, but toe room is limited with the front seats set low, and knee room behind my driving position isn’t as generous as a RAV4 and larger rivals.

The floor is close to flat – with only a small hump – but underthigh support is limited in all three seats, especially the middle position that has a shorter and flatter seat base.

There is a single adjustable rear air vent, plus one USB-A and one USB-C port, map and smartphone pockets on each front seatback, small door pockets for bottles, and a fold-down centre armrest with cupholders.

There are even controls to move the front passenger seat from the rear, which is great in theory, but will no doubt become the domain of mischievous kids. Two ISOFIX and three top-tether anchors are present for securing child seats in the back.

Boot space is quoted as 424 litres to the cargo cover, which is modest but not class-leading for an SUV of this size.

It is a decently sized space in reality, but items need to be hoisted over a load lip, and the floor height isn’t adjustable, so taller owners will find themselves reaching down into the boot more than other SUVs.

The height of the power tailgate can be set through the touchscreen, but even in its highest setting (1.80m), six-footers will find it too low. There are plenty of amenities in the cargo area, though, with a 12-volt socket, a light, bag hooks, and a few tie-down points.

There’s a space-saver spare wheel under the floor, while the rear seats fold 60:40, but not completely flat – long items need to bridge a height difference to the folded seats.

Standard in the J7 Core and Track is a 13.2-inch portrait-oriented touchscreen that dominates the cabin design, running quick-to-respond software that looks smart, though there are plenty of menus to learn and get your head around.

Wired and wireless versions of Apple CarPlay and Android Auto are on offer, plus embedded satellite navigation, Bluetooth, AM, FM and digital radio, and a voice assistant activated by saying ‘Hello Jaecoo’.

We spent most of our time in wireless Apple CarPlay, which worked reasonably well… aside from freezing and disconnecting for no reason on one occasion. It was easy to reconnect, so it wasn’t too much of an annoyance.

While the screen is reasonably easy to navigate, the near lack of physical controls inside the car ranges from annoying to simply distracting.

It includes the air-conditioning controls. Occupants can swipe up on the touchscreen to access a menu bar, where there are buttons for temperature – but adjusting fan speed requires multiple further taps into the screen, when a simple hard key or dial under the screen would be easier and less distracting.

The voice control system is helpful here, but the only way to carry out simple tasks in a car without taking your eyes off the road should not require interrupting your conversation or what’s playing through the speakers, in our view.

You can at least swipe down from the top of the display to open a ‘control centre’ menu, with shortcuts for safety features and other systems, but it’s not a perfect solution.

The 10.25-inch instrument display looks crisp, but some of the fonts are a touch small, and translations like ‘After the Reset’ for the trip computer could do with a tweak.

The eight-speaker Sony sound system delivers decent but not standout audio quality, even after fiddling with the EQ settings. Among them is a nondescript ‘Loudness’ toggle, which seems to just boost the bass, rather than activating any sort of fancy surround-sound mode.

There’s no smartphone app support in the J7, but there is a way to start the car remotely, which will automatically activate the air conditioning in its most recent setting.

The non-hybrid Jaecoo J7 is yet to be crash-tested by ANCAP in Australia, but the plug-in hybrid version has received a five-star score.

That said, it only just managed to earn five stars. Its 81 per cent adult occupant protection score cleared the five-star bar by 1 per cent. Any less than 80 per cent in these categories, and the Jaecoo would’ve been limited to a four-star rating. Similarly, the 80 per cent score in vulnerable road user protection cuts close to the bone.

It was awarded an 84 per cent score in the safety assist technology category and 85 per cent score in the child occupant protection category.

Keep in mind, these scores reflect the hybrid-enabled Jaecoo J7 SHS variant.

The Jaecoo J7 offers a full list of crash-avoidance safety features its maker hopes will help it earn top marks in ANCAP testing, once a local score is awarded.

The tuning of driver-assistance systems has historically been a Chery weak spot, and while improvements have been made for the J7, there is still some work to be done.

The feature that has made the greatest advance is the lane-centring assist. In a Chery Tiggo 7 Pro we tested 18 months ago, the lane-centring tech would bounce between the lane markings, and constantly disengage and re-engage without warning for little reason, whether it’s in a straight line or on approach to a corner when a driver isn’t expecting it.

That latter behaviour seems to have been tamed in the J7, and we were impressed by how well it holds the centre of the lane through corners, without running wide or giving up entirely. It’s not perfect – it does wander in the lane a bit – but it’s a solid improvement.

In need of more refinement is the lane-keep assist. It’s not hypersensitive or pushy, but that’s because most of the time – even on straight roads with clearly painted white lines – it refuses to detect the lane markings, and is effectively in an inactive state (the icon on the dashboard is white, not green, as it would be when active).

Chery tells us it's an intentional design choice, to 'suppress' the lane-keep assist system when the car can't confidently detect the lines, or on tight roads where it may intrude.

Drivers might appreciate this – that it’s not constantly tugging at the wheel – but there’s no point having lane-keep assist if it can’t recognise the lane to keep you in.

The least refined safety system the J7 offers is its adaptive cruise control. Rather than holding the set speed smoothly, it frequently pulses the accelerator, followed by tapping the brakes – and as a result can drift between 2km/h under and over the desired speed.

As with others of its type, the speed sign recognition system has a tendency to misread signs – reading one 60km/h sign we encountered as 110km/h, for example – but it is generally acceptable in its performance.

There is an overspeed warning that sounds when the car exceeds the speed limit it has detected – even when it has misread the sign.

In many other cars, it can be infuriating, but not here, for a few reasons: it only beeps once when the car first realises it’s exceeding the speed limit it has detected, it’s a quiet sound, and once you turn the chime off in the settings (from ‘Sound + Icon’ to ‘Icon’, so you see the visual speed alert only), it stays off, even when the car is restarted.

There is also a driver attention monitoring camera, which chimes the driver when it detects they are distracted or tired.

It’s better tuned than in earlier Chery vehicles we’ve driven, though on a few occasions it beeped at us for being “distracted for a long time” when we were looking at the road with sunglasses on, and will chime if you look at the touchscreen for too long.

There is room for improvement in the operation of this system, but it is far from the worst we’ve tested in other new – particularly Chinese – cars.

It will turn back on every time the car is restarted, but there is at least the ability to turn it – as well as the entire speed-sign recognition system, and the ‘lane-departure prevention’ system, though not the lane-departure warning – off through a swipe-down shortcut menu accessible from the infotainment home screen.

Eight airbags – including front-centre, and driver’s knee coverage – are offered in the Track variant, plus tyre pressure monitors, blind-spot monitoring, and rear cross-traffic alert.

The Jaecoo J7 is covered by an eight-year/unlimited-kilometre warranty, the longest time coverage on the market without an accompanying distance cap.

MG offers 10 years, but 250,000km, while similar “10-year” guarantees by Mitsubishi (200,000km) and Nissan (300,000km) require owners to service their vehicle within each brand’s dealer network for the full decade to maintain the last five years of coverage.

There’s also eight years of roadside assistance available, included for the first year but activated for each successive 12-month period at each service at a Jaecoo dealer.

Service intervals are set every 12 months or 15,000km, whichever comes first, and capped for eight years/120,000km.

The five-year/75,000km price amounts to $1725, more expensive than a Chery Tiggo 7 Pro ($1445) and Toyota RAV4 Hybrid ($1300), but on par with a Mitsubishi Outlander MY24 petrol ($1700).

Jaecoo claims fuel consumption of 7.0 litres per 100 kilometres for the front-wheel-drive J7 in mixed conditions, split across 6.0L/100km in freeway and extra-urban driving, and 8.9L/100km in urban areas.

Over a mix of driving scenarios – primarily suburban cruising and some exploration of its handling capabilities on a winding road, with some limited highway driving thrown in – we saw an indicated 8.2L/100km on the trip computer, which is respectably close to the claim.

In motorway driving, we saw indicated consumption closer to the 6.0L/100km extra-urban claim, while in traffic it crept closer to 9.0L/100km.

The J7 requires 95- or 98-octane premium unleaded petrol, which will add to running costs.

The Jaecoo J7 will drive in an acceptable manner for many buyers, but it is behind the wheel where the sense ‘you get what you pay for’ compared to a similarly sized Toyota, Mazda or Kia is most evident.

The 1.6-litre turbo-petrol engine (137kW/275Nm) delivers respectable performance for a car of this size. It’s not quite as strong low in the rev range as some other brands’ turbo engines, but at higher RPM, it’s spritely enough for daily duties.

But the Achilles heel of the entire drive experience is the seven-speed dual-clutch automatic transmission, which is smooth enough on the move not to annoy, but struggles off the mark.

Press the accelerator pedal from a standstill, and there is a literal second or two of sluggishness as the transmission’s clutches engage and the car creeps forward, followed by a surge of acceleration – and flare of engine RPM – as the car finally starts to gain velocity at a meaningful rate.

No amount of input on the accelerator pedal can speed up that initial second of hesitation, so if you miss the traffic lights going green, the car will accentuate your moment of inattention. It's especially frustrating, and hard to be smooth with in slow-speed traffic.

It can be jerky at parking speeds too, especially when parallel parking on a hill, and there is a tendency for the car to roll back on certain inclines, even just at the traffic lights.

The gearbox seems slightly smoother than in a Chery Tiggo 7 Pro we tested about 18 months ago, and hesitation off the line is a common trait of dual-clutch transmissions, but there is a lot more work to be done in the J7.

There’s also room for improvement in the suspension. At suburban speeds, the ride is generally comfortable, but it has a firm edge, with a tendency to crash over particularly sharp bumps, and jitter over rough roads with lots of small lumps.

It’s quite supple over speed bumps and other big impacts, though, and at higher speeds the suspension settles down, doing a better job of ironing out bumps and undulations of all shapes and sizes.

Find a corner and it’s more sure-footed than other Chery cars, with body roll that is noticeable but not excessive, and acceptable grip in dry weather from the Cooper tyres – but the minority of buyers looking for a ‘fun’ family SUV should look elsewhere.

The steering is light and easy at city speeds, though the large wheel and a relatively slow steering rack means drivers will find themselves doing more arm-twirling than in rival SUVs, as well as more mid-corner corrections on country roads, because the steering doesn’t tell you much about what the front wheels are doing.

City drivers will appreciate the soft and approachable brake pedal feel, but it can require quite a long push if you need to pull the car up in a hurry.

Wind noise is well suppressed, but there’s quite a bit of tyre roar on coarse-chip freeways and country roads, as well as suspension noise on bumpy streets.

General visibility is adequate, but the high and flat bonnet can make the car feel bigger around town than it actually is, and taller drivers will find the right-side mirror doesn’t adjust far enough outwards.

Overall, the Jaecoo J7 will be fine to drive for many customers, but it is not as refined as rivals from Japan, South Korea and Europe.

The Jaecoo J7 is rated to tow 1350kg braked or 750kg unbraked, which is modest but to be expected for a car-derived, light-duty SUV of this type.

However, as with other Chery group vehicles, the Jaecoo J7 is limited by its payload, the maximum mass of people, cargo and accessories the car can carry.

Its payload is 375kg – not enough for five average-mass adults (87kg each), and four 87kg adults will only leave space for a half-full carry-on suitcase in the boot, before the car becomes too heavy to be legally driven on the road.

On one hand, the Jaecoo J7 is a commendable first effort from a new marque, with a classy cabin, no shortage of technology, a long warranty, ample performance, and plenty of equipment for a very sharp price.

On the other hand, it’s not that ‘new’ of a brand, and many of the rough edges on other Chery cars remain here – particularly in the driving experience, with a hesitant transmission, and ride and handling qualities that are merely average.

It is a step forward over the likes of the Chery Tiggo 7 Pro, particularly in the tuning of the safety features, and there’s a lot to like for buyers on a budget.

We would strongly advise asking the dealer for an overnight test drive – and taking the J7 on roads you're familiar with – before signing on the dotted line.

Alex Misoyannis has been writing about cars since 2017, when he started his own website, Redline. He contributed for Drive in 2018, before joining CarAdvice in 2019, becoming a regular contributing journalist within the news team in 2020. Cars have played a central role throughout Alex’s life, from flicking through car magazines at a young age, to growing up around performance vehicles in a car-loving family. Highly Commended - Young Writer of the Year 2024 (Under 30) Rising Star Journalist, 2024 Winner Scoop of The Year - 2024 Winner

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