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Video: 2024 Ford Bronco Sport Free Wheeling Review: An Acquired Taste

10:04 min
By Cars.com Editors
August 30, 2024

About the video

Ford lightly updated the 2024 Ford Bronco Sport with an appearance package called the Free Wheeling. But the bigger question is, do we still like the Bronco Sport as much as we did when it debuted? Watch our video to find out!

Transcript

Now in its fourth model year, the Ford Bronco Sport enters 2024 largely unchanged, except for two appearance packages including this, the Free Wheeling. We'll get to it.
But our bigger question is, do we like the Bronco Sport as much as we did when it first debuted as a 2021 model? Let's find out. Normally we tend to not talk too much about appearance packages, but we pretty much have to with the way this looks. The Free Wheeling is not a cheap option. It's $2,600. It adds onto the Big Bend, which is the base model. Adds no actual equipment. It's all appearance. You get this two-toned grill with the silver insert. And the white and red badging. Stripes along the hood, including a reflective Bronco decal. Coming along the side, you get these gradient stripes going all the way down the body, reflective Bronco badging there. You also get unique 17-inch wheels that are black with these race red inserts. You get a two-toned roof that is black on the Free Wheeling. And then along the back, you again get the unique badging with the silver insert and then the white with red outline. It's meant to look like classic 70s models that Ford sold that were called usually Free Wheeling, sometimes Free Wheelin'. But for me, not really my thing. When I was driving this, chose in-store pickup over curbside, just so I wouldn't be seen in it. But if you like it, please have at it. The rest of the Bronco Sports exterior styling remains delightfully old school and it's a big reason I'm a big fan of it. You get this big upright hood, nice and long, looks rugged. Upright cabin design that gives you great visibility and with the safari-style roof, a lot of headroom. And then the old school lift glass at the rear. It's a really rugged take on a compact SUV, when most compact SUVs these days are just glorified, slightly taller hatchbacks. I really like it. I'm a big fan. I would just skip the appearance stuff. Inside the Bronco Sport Free Wheeling, I would say the changes are slightly more subtle, although still very evident. You get a gradient pattern on the seat backs, multicolored stitching on the seats and the doors. Race red trim on the center console and the doors as well. Not as bright and in your face as the stripes necessarily, but very obvious that you're in the Free Wheeling package. As for the rest of the interior, very basic Bronco Sport. These seats are fairly comfortable for shorter drives. They're not my favorite for longer trips. They're not incredibly uncomfortable either, but just could be a little bit better cushioned for me. Other than that, materials quality is not great. This is essentially the base model of the Bronco Sport, the Big Bend. There's a little bit of padding on the doors, but most of these surfaces are hard plastic. It is using Ford's kind of winning technique of making the cheap materials at least visually interesting. So this is textured. The stuff on the doors is textured. This race red trim at least looks interesting, even though it's plastic, so it feels a little bit more upscale, at least from the eye test. Although once you start tapping things, not that great. You also only get an eight-inch touchscreen display. It's running Sync Three. We are two systems past that in most Fords. But here, you only get Sync Three, which means, among other things, wired Apple CarPlay and Android Auto only, and no home button. To get you out of CarPlay, you have to hit the Ford app tile to get out of it back to the native system. You do get this fun little storage tray down here as well. With the convenience package, you get wireless device charging, but again, you're gonna need a connection to get CarPlay or Android Auto. Down here in the center console, you have a rotary gear selector. Not my favorite design, it doesn't really save any space, although you do get some vertical openness because there isn't large gear selector in the way. And then down below that, you have your Go Over Any Type of Terrain, or G.O.A.T. modes selector. It's very basic. You have Normal, Eco, Sport, and then Slippery and Sand. Not a whole lot happens on the instrument panel when you change those things. Visibility from the driver's seat is excellent, front and rear. There is a large B pillar that can get in the way, but looking out, you have great visibility. You can see the corners of the Bronco Sport, even with this long and high hood. And out the back, the view is good as well. But we should check out the back now, 'cause that's where I have a few more quibbles with the interior design. So let's check it out. In back, I have two main complaints in the Bronco Sport. First, I don't have a lot of leg room, especially behind my own seating position. The Bronco Sport does have a shorter wheel base than its Escape sibling, so this is to be expected, but this isn't necessarily the place you wanna put taller adults for long stretches. Also, the materials quality tends to dip a little bit. The tops of the doors are no longer padded here. This feels a little bit cheaper as well. Not terrible though. I do have a lot of shoulder room, a lot of head room. I can see out great. I don't feel very enclosed. And for cargo sake, in addition to seat back pockets on both front seats, you actually get two sets of these cool straps in case that's how you wanna store a whole bunch of gear that you can store that way. For cargo purposes, you actually have two different ways you can access the cargo area. The Bronco Sport is one of the few SUVs left on the market that has a lift up glass panel, so you can access the back without opening up the entire lift gate. That way things won't necessarily spill out. But if you do want to access the entire cargo area, you have that option as well. This one is not powered. And then inside the cargo area, here we have a rubberized mat and rubberized backs of the seats that'll protect your interior from messy gear or pets. You also have cargo hooks on both sides that have fun little lasso details. You have control for an exterior light. And then, for fun, and for tailgating purposes, you still have the little bottle opener right here. Unfortunately, this time, I don't have a bottle to show that off. Driving the 2024 Ford Bronco Sport is a pretty uneventful experience. This is the 1.5 liter turbocharged, three-cylinder engine. There's also a turbocharged two liter, four-cylinder available. This one only makes 181 horsepower. That's more than enough for getting you around town. The four-cylinder makes 250 horsepower. It's sort of a hot rod, if I'm being honest. But the problem with that is mediocre fuel economy. The three-cylinder is rated at 26 miles per gallon combined. I'm showing 22.9 on the trip computer right now. So a little bit below its fuel economy average. 23 miles per gallon is what the four-cylinder is rated at, combined. The Bronco Sport feels nice and nimble on the road. This is my first time driving a Bronco Sport with sort of street-oriented tires, or more street-oriented tires, as compared to the Badlands trim, which has all terrain tires. So there's a little bit less road and tire noise coming through, but it is a very noisy experience. Lots of wind noise, lots of impact noise as you go over bumps. And you can hear actually the turbo sounds. It's not ideal, I would say, as far as turbo sounds go. To me it sounds sort of like someone's operating a string trimmer right outside my window. But you can hear them. That's kind of fun. The whole feel is sort of rough and agricultural, almost. It's what Ford is going for. If you're looking for that buttoned up experience, you're really gonna wanna look elsewhere. The Escape would be a good choice, or Toyota RAV 4 and Honda CR-V are sort of the standards in the class in terms of popularity. We also really like the Nissan Rogue. That has consistently won our compact SUV challenges. But this is fun in its own sort of old school, truckier way. So while the 1.5 liter is peppy enough around town, on highways, you're gonna find you sort of run out of passing power. At higher speeds, you have to plan your maneuvers a little bit more carefully. You can't just step on it and go, there's some lag. And not a whole lot extra once you get up to highway speeds. Handling is good overall. I would say it's not quite up to snuff of some of the more car-like SUVs, but it is fairly nimble. Steering is okay, a little bit over boosted. You do sort of feel like it has a higher center of gravity than other compact SUVs. It feels a little bit tippier in corners. Again, more old school, more truck-like feel. It's not a body on frame SUV, but it tries to convey that. And I think it does a decent job, and I'm kind of a sucker for that sort of thing. I grew up learning how to drive and getting my driving experience in a 1997 4Runner. So anything that sort of brings me back to that is fun. Overall, the driving experience is pretty good. It's not as refined as you're gonna find in other compact SUVs. But that's part of the appeal of the Bronco Sport. It's a bit more capable off-road. So there is that trade-off. It feels like it when you're driving, but you're not gonna be put out if you get this and don't ever take it off-road. You're not gonna be wishing that you'd ended up with something else, simply because of its on-road manners. It doesn't have the best on-road manners, but it doesn't have the worst in my opinion either. The 2024 Ford Bronco Sport remains a solid compact SUV choice that is rugged, and delightfully rough around the edges. We're still big fans of it. If you're looking for something a little bit smoother, a little bit more of that hatchback sort of feel, you should look elsewhere. But if this is kind of the image you want to project, the rugged, active lifestyle, this is a compact SUV you should definitely take a look at. You can find my full review of the 2024 Ford Bronco Sport on cars.com/news.

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