BMW M135 xDrive 2025 review

A return to form? That’s what the BMW M135 is aiming for, yet a quick perusal on paper suggests it’s taken a minor step back, at least in some areas. One gear ratio fewer, less torque… even the i at the end of its name has been sliced off to avoid confusion with the Bavarian firm’s EVs.

Yet perhaps a bit of simplification is what the car was crying out for. Its predecessor had that in spades, mating a chunky six-cylinder engine to rear-wheel drive in a compact version of a tried-and-trusted recipe that’s seen BMWs fly out of showrooms for years. 

The third-gen 1 Series’ switch to a natively front-driven chassis put paid to that, though, and while the performance version that spun from it added an on-demand driven rear axle, driving thrills were no longer its forte. BMW’s little ripper had grown up.

An initial update a few years into its life had a good dig around in the chassis to boost involvement and this latest iteration, actually dubbed an all-new model by BMW, aims to carry the job over the line. (It arrives in Australia very soon, along with the entry-level 118.)

Its gearbox is a crucial element. An eight-speed torque-converter auto has been swapped for a seven-speed dual-clutch ‘box, its ratios stacked tightly together and operated via elongated paddle-shifters. 

It’s accompanied by a tweak of the 2.0-litre four-cylinder turbo engine, its peaks now 233kW and 400Nm (versus 225 and 450 in the outgoing M135i) though performance is largely undimmed, the M135 claiming a 4.9sec sprint to 100km/h and a classically German 250km/h top speed.

The chassis hasn’t been transformed, rather subject to ongoing tweaks that increase its focus and rigidity, but things are tangibly a bit more fun as you grab the M135 by the scruff its neck, something you’ll be encouraged to do more often by its smart new twin-clutcher. 

Second gear tops out at 80km/h, third is all done a mite over 110 and the various drive modes even allow you to butt right into the limiter with no auto upchange to save your blushes. The rev bar in the head-up display, which illuminates from yellow to red as the revs really pile on, helps keep you involved. 

Which means, yes, you can wring out every last rpm while punching up and down the ‘box repeatedly on a good stretch of the road, your commitment rising with the easily won confidence the xDrive system below encourages. 

More gimmicky is the ‘boost’ mode of the left-hand paddle – seemingly present across most BMWs now – which effectively saves you the effort of using kickdown or repeated downchanges for 10 easily accessed seconds of hardened acceleration. Keener drivers will relish doing the work themselves.

While never as expressive as a VW Golf R, the little 1 works all four tyres evenly and adroitly and you know it’s a step above front-driven rivals. 

It just never feels like the rear axle wants to do more than the job it was hired for, and you’ll need an old-fashioned lift-off technique to tease more agility out of it, though fun is definitely there if you go digging for it. 

The ride is fairly resilient and doesn’t offer the breadth of the Golf with its DCC adaptive damping, but you learn to cope and it does bring a bit of vital hot-hatch vigour to a car that’s otherwise in danger of coming across as rather serious. 

Same goes for its augmented ‘Iconic Sounds’. A fad ushered in by the BMW i4 and its Hans Zimmer-orchestrated electric soundtrack, the implementation is a bit less cinematic here. 

Namely a bit more bass for the engine (handy, given it’s hardly brimming with character) and a bit of overly scripted gunfire on the overrun. The choice is yours: it’s a bit gauche when it’s turned on, but the fairly workaday engine doesn’t exactly perform an enthralling solo without it. 

Oh, and you’d never know this was a less torquey car than before – it’s still almightily quick, whatever the weather, and much like its Wolfsburg rival, there’ll be little to hang on its coattails on a grimy back road, however much power it possesses.

There’s a bunch of drive modes still, but they’re no longer a simple flick between Eco, Comfort or Sport, instead taking on multiple ‘expressions’ and deploying digital art across the curved screen of a supremely posh feeling interior. 

Brands like BMW always tell us the tech drips down from their halo models to the mainstream stuff, and the front quarters of the 1 Series now feel much closer to the big 7 than a Mercedes-Benz A-Class does to an S. 

All but the most prosaic of materials feel upgraded and the plethora of ambient light and tricolour stitching elements look a tad chintzy but do genuinely lift the atmosphere. 

BMW is calling this a fourth-gen 1 Series rather than a facelifted mk3, giving it a new model code (now F70 rather than F40). For the most part that feels like marketing spin, but the huge strides taken in interior ambience give the claim a bit more clout.

It feels like it’ll be fabulous to live with, in fact. There’s decent legroom for rear passengers, even if headroom is a touch limited for taller adults, while the boot has decent capacity at 380 litres seats up and up to 1200 with them folded down (they split 40:20:40). It further boosts BMW’s cause in switching this car from pure RWD half a decade ago.

Equipment looks strong, Aussie cars justifying their $82,500 price – a $5900 rise on before – with luxuries such as a heated wheel, massaging front seats, a pano roof and Harman Kardon audio. It’s a premium little thing with undeniably punchy performance.

The lingering question is whether it’s thrilling enough. It certainly encourages commitment and the more you give, the more you get from this car. 

It sucks you in more than a Merc-AMG A35, at least, and I think there’s depth to this chassis you’d uncover with time, albeit with a whole heap of commitment, too; the kind that’s possibly best kept to racetracks. 

On which note the F70 M135 also offers a new M Dynamic Package, which brings lighter 19in wheels, grippier tyres, additional bracing, tweaked dampers and ballsy brake pads from the M3 and M4. Surely overkill on a chunky 1625kg hatchback, but we’re glad they’ve made the effort and can’t wait to give it a go. An improved M135 might get better yet.