The Bronco Sport has been a big hit for Ford but the time has come for the compact SUV to receive a pretty substantial refresh. Although the handsome design looks like it will change only mildly, a big update is coming inside, and it will also probably gain a new off-road trim. Spy photographers recently caught a handful of Bronco Sports testing and managed to take a peek inside the updated SUV. Although much of the interior remains covered, we were able to see Ford testing a massive new infotainment screen.
Compared to the old one, the new
touchscreen display appears to be a lot bigger and looks a lot like the
optional 13.2-inch unit from the Escape. This likely means that the software
will finally upgrade to Ford’s SYNC4 infotainment system, and bring a lot of
useful updates with it. That extra real estate means that Ford has had to do
reorganize the dash, and it appears to have moved the vertical vents elsewhere.
In a move that may frustrate some buyers, the Bronco Sport may also lose some
physical buttons for the HVAC controls, that appear to have been replaced by
touch controls on the display’s lower section.
On the outside, camouflage still covers
the front and rear of the facelifted Bronco Sport, meaning that it still isn’t
clear how much these will change with the refresh. Overall, the design looks
more or less unchanged, as you’d expect from a mid-cycle refresh. However, as
we’ve seen previously, Ford looks to be testing an even more rugged version of
the Bronco Sport. The test cars have been spotted wearing a set of rugged
six-spoke wheels with a Mustang Mach-E Rally-like band around their perimeter
and wrapped in chunky Goodyear R/T tires.
The wheel package is then combined with
wider rocker panels, and redesigned black cladding around the wheel arches,
making this new version of the Bronco Sport look even more aggressive than the
current Badlands model. Whether it receives any other mechanical updates for
better off-road capabilities has not yet been confirmed.
