A study in competency—which is mainly why people want to get a vehicle

By Gary S. Vasilash

One of the things that is probably going to happen in the market given the high prices of vehicles—high prices that people are having a difficult time affording (sure, they might be able to get a low(ish) monthly car payment, except that by the time they pay off the loan, were they to have given birth to a child the day they bought the car, the kid would be old enough to get a driver’s license by the time it was paid off).

While it once was that ±$20,000 was the point people considered to be where “economy” resided for vehicles, it is now ± $30,000.

As is the case with age, 30 is the new 20.

Which brings me to the 2025 Taos SE Black, which has a base MSRP of $30,145.

About Black

It should be noted that the “Black” is a trim level for the vehicle that includes, well, features like two-tone paint that includes. . .black on the roof as well as black 18-inch wheels (for the FWD version or 19 for the AWD) and black mirror caps and a black illuminated grille. One feature that it brings that isn’t black is the panoramic sunroof, but it provides more illumination of the extensive use of piano black plastic on the instrument panel.

However, the 2025 Taos in S trim starts at $24,995, so while it is closer to that $20K of days gone by, that’s still about a 25% bump, which is a non-trivial thing.

This is a subcompact SUV, which might lead some people to hear alarm bells, in that they think “compact” is “small” so “sub” must be “mirco.”

Sizeable

It is not particularly small.

It has a wheelbase of 105.5 inches, length of 175.9, width of 72.5 and height of 64 inches. It offers 99.5 cubic feet of passenger space and there is bona-fide utility, as there is  27.9 cubic feet of cargo space with the seats in place and 65.9 cu ft with the second row folded down (again, for the FWD version; packing for that 4Motion system takes away a bit of that capacity: 24.9 cubic feet behind the second row and 60.2 cubic feet with it down, so if stuff handling is a bigger concern than, say, driving in the snow, that decrease in capacity is something to keep in mind).

Inside

Circling back to the black theme, the interior, in addition to the aforementioned piano black, is mainly gray-on-gray, with differences in hues, but still gray so far as the seats, door cards and other surfaces on the vehicle driven. There is nice white stitching on the seats which adds a perceptible bump in visual aspects. The upholstery material in the SE Black are a combination of cloth and what VW calls “CloudTex,” which has a suede leather-like appearance, although it is not made from animals. The material is used on the IP and door panels for trim, too. On the surfaces that people are not likely to touch (e.g., top of the IP) there is a hard(ish) plastic that is grained so it looks appropriate but doesn’t include padding that is otherwise not going to bring anything to the party beyond price.

The 8-inch infotainment screen is centrally located (it is described as being “semi-floating,” which simply means that it is ahead of the main IP surface) and easy-to-use. The higher trim level (SEL) includes navigation, but in the case of the SE Black I used Waze through Apple CarPlay; wirelessly pairing the phone with the vehicle was simply simple. And in addition to two USB-C points with 45-w fast charging below the screen in a bin, there is a wireless charging pad in that space.

Power

The Taos is powered by a 1.5-liter four-cylinder engine that produces 174 hp and 184 lb-ft of torque. It is mated to an eight-speed automatic.

The fuel economy numbers are 28 city, 36 highway and 31 mpg combined, and I got 31 mpg during my city and highway driving. Imagine.

The thing that strikes me about the Taos is that things like the Atlas SUV notwithstanding, VW has a depth of knowledge when it comes to the execution of smaller vehicles.  The Taos does what it is supposed to do, and that matters a lot.