Honda South Africa is yet to confirm whether the facelift will offered locally.
Exterior has been subtly revised to mirror those of certain Honda models sold in the United States. Picture: Honda India
Its global reveal having taken place three years ago, Honda has removed the wraps from the facelift Elevate in India.
Said to be of a substantial manner, the updates haven’t, however, been carried over to the Elevate’s drivetrain, which continues to comprise a single petrol engine paired with a choice of two transmission options.
New outside
Visually, the easy-to-spot updates include darkened headlight clusters, a new bumper and fog light surrounds, restyled L-shaped daytime running LEDs and a new alloy wheel up to 17-inches.
For its biggest change, the grille now resembles that of certain US-market Hondas and additionally involves the full-length LED bar, making way for a three-slit design underneath the new chrome upper section of the grille.
A new bonnet, complete with the Honda logo that moves from the grille, completes the Elevate’s frontal changes.
At the rear, the tweaks are more subtle and consist of a new bumper and a full-width LED light bar that connects the main clusters.
Inside
Inside, the changes are even subtler, as apart from the Indian versions losing the faux wood trim on the dashboard in favour of imitation leather, the Elevate retains both the 10.25-inch infotainment system and the seven-inch TFT instrument cluster display.
In fact, the key revisions are to the specification where, depending on the trim level, buyers now have ventilated front seats, ambient lighting, ventilated rear seats and a sunroof.
New on the safety and driver assistance side is a 360-degree camera system, front parking sensors, Adaptive Cruise Control and six airbags across all variants.
Same power
Up front, the Elevate prevails with the normally aspirated 1.5-litre petrol engine outputting 89kW/145Nm.
Drive is again routed to the front wheels through either a six-speed manual gearbox or an optional CVT.
Approval awaited
Available in six trim levels, SV, V, VX, ZX, ZX+ and Black, based on the latter, pricing for the Elevate ranges from Rs 1 180 900 for the SV manual to Rs 1 840 900 for the CVT-equipped Black.
When directly converted and without taxes included, these amount to between R202 721 and R316 021.
First introduced two years ago, Honda South Africa is yet to confirm availability of the facelift Elevate, which spans two models, Comfort and Elegance, priced at R373 800 and R434 000, respectively.
In both instances, power and torque are identical to the Indian variant, but the former utilises the manual gearbox, and the latter is only equipped with the CVT.
