Australia is getting a second bite of the Chery - but this time, it's quite delicious

If Chery’s new SUV was a person, it would wear one of those gauche Ralph Lauren shirts where the logo takes up the whole front. There’s hardly a blank space on the boot without some form of logo or lettering.

Put together – and at risk of blowing this article’s word limit two pars in – this is the ‘Chery Tiggo 8 Pro Max 390T TGDI AWD’ – and actually that’s missing the fact the one I’ve borrowed is the top-spec ‘Ultimate’ model.

Also, leaving to the side how Chery managed to sneak “Pro Max” past Apple without a lawsuit, the ‘390’ bit isn’t even correct.

That’s the torque figure, in Newton metres, for the slightly more powerful version on offer in South Africa. The two-litre turbocharged four-cylinder petrol we get here in Australia makes 375 Nm.

At least ‘T’ stands for turbocharger, I guess.

You’ll have heard of Chery before. The Chinese brand dipped a toe in our waters in 2011, but two-star safety ratings and asbestos in the engine gaskets sent them packing a mere four years later.

But as of March 2023, they’re back, now with three Omoda crossover models (including most recently an electric version), and three Tiggo SUVs – the 4 Pro, the 7 Pro, and the 8 Pro Max.

In case you’re wondering, all of them have five-star safety ratings from ANCAP. And no asbestos.

And it’s going well for them. Between March 2023 and June this year, Chery has racked up more than 10,000 Australian sales – 1000 of them in June 2024 alone.

Time to see what all the fuss is about.

The Tiggo 8 looks good and rugged, and almost a bit Audi-like, but the best is reserved for the inside.

There are a lot of shapes and patterns going on but it really is luxurious and, in Ultimate spec, scores two-tone leather and a soaring panoramic glass roof overhead. It’s also solid, except of course in the case of the seats and headrests, which hold you like your grandmother’s lap.

Man-spreading is off the cards up the front, however, on account of the massive centre console.

What I was sure would shatter the serenity were the safety systems, because in the case of every Chinese car I’ve driven up to this point, the lane-keeping assistance screams at you the moment you get within bowling distance of a white line.

But no. The Tiggo is almost too quiet, to the point I was always checking the dash to see if the indicator was still blinking because the ticking noise it emits would make a bat cock its neck.

The only hint of something that may have been developed without too much fluent English influence was the driver monitoring system which – when I looked away from the road ahead for too long – flashed a message on the dash that read: “You have been distracted”.

And, shortly afterwards: “You have been distracted for a long time”.

A lot of this tech can be adjusted, or turned up or down, in the touchscreen, but the touchscreen is typically the place I go when I’m annoyed at something and want to turn it off. And I wasn’t.

Apparently, there’s wireless Apple CarPlay available but I could only get my phone to connect via cable. We’ll chalk this up as user-error maybe.

The Tiggo starts in default ‘Eco’ mode, but I found this choked the accelerator too much, so as soon as I got in, I’d change it to ‘Normal’ using the slightly cheap-feeling dial. Like a Subaru, there are also modes for snow and mud, but don’t go getting too cocky – it’s not a 4WD.

We might get slightly less torque than the South Africans, but I can’t imagine you’d miss it. I hardly ever used ‘Sport’ mode, for instance – it was perfectly sprightly enough as it was.

The only issue is what I suspect is the seven-speed dual-clutch automatic gearbox, which is sharp and smooth at speed, but you have to try hard for it not to take off without a jerk and grumble.

As a big car, the Tiggo 8 feels a bit unsteady in the corners but then, at other times, it seems to shrink, like when you’re in the McDonald’s drive-through, when you’re especially thankful for the tiny turning circle and handy birds-eye animation of the car on the screen.

The rear-view mirror, with its weird fish-eye lens, is also very useful for seeing what your kids are up to in the back seats, but decidedly less so for actually looking out the back window.

But it’s not like they could have made the back window any bigger – because then they’d only be able to fit six badges on the back.

2024 Chery Tiggo 8 Pro Max Ultimate

• $47,990 (plus driveaway costs)
• 2-litre turbocharged four-cylinder petrol, 180 kW / 375 Nm
• 7-speed dual-clutch automatic, all-wheel drive (AWD)
• 8.7 litres per 100 km claimed fuel usage, 95 RON
• 1731 kg

Thanks to Chery Australia for providing this car for testing. Region has no commercial arrangement with Chery Australia.