Maruti Suzuki is the highest MPV and van manufacturer in India with models like Ertiga, XL6 and Eeco
Maruti Suzuki is currently the largest car manufacturer in India with sales figures trailing way above the competition. For comparison, the immediate next top-selling company Hyundai sells less than half of what Maruti sells as seen in our car sales chart. Maruti Suzuki currently has a 38.24% market share and the company is striving hard to take that back to 50% like it used to be.
Apart from car sales in general, Maruti Suzuki also sells the highest number of MPVs. And this credit goes to Ertiga MPV which has been a crowd favourite ever since its launch. Ertiga is the sixth highest selling product Maruti Suzuki sells in India. When compared to other MPVs in the segment, it is the highest-selling.
But competition like Kia Carens is eating some of Ertiga’s pie and recently, buyers are flocking more towards SUVs. Maruti Suzuki has offered some additional features to Ertiga as standard at an additional cost to keep the product competitive. As competition will heat up with new possible entrants like Hyundai Stargazer.
Maruti Suzuki Ertiga New Feature Additions
The new Ertiga which was launched in April 2022, is built on the company’s HEARTECT platform, sporting a total of 4 airbags, along with hill hold assist, brake assist, rear parking sensors, ISOFIX child seat mounts, speed alert, driver and co-passenger seat belt reminder system, ABS and EBD.
Maruti Suzuki Ertiga gets 7 inch Smart Play Pro infotainment system along with ‘Hi Suzuki’ command. It also gets connected car technology with over 40+ features. The cabin gets a wooden finish and dual-tone fabric upholstery. Second-row seats get a one-touch tumble mechanism for easy third-row access. Ertiga also gets a power socket for each row, roof-mounted AC controls and multiple air vents too.
New feature additions to this package are ESP (Electronic Stability Program) and also, hill hold assist. These features are now offered as standard fitment across all variants. This new update also adds cost to the product. Maruti Suzuki has hiked the price by Rs. 6,000 across the range. Powering the Ertiga is the 1.5L K15C engine with DualJet and Dual VVT technology. It makes 102 bhp of power at 6,000 RPM and 136.8 Nm of torque at 4,400 RPM. This engine gets either a 5-speed or the new 6-speed AT with paddle shifters.
Price & Competition
Maruti Suzuki Ertiga is offered in LXi, VXi, ZXi and ZXi+ trims along with optional automatic variants like VXi AT, ZXi AT and ZXi+ AT. The company also offers a CNG powertrain dubbed as S-CNG on select variants like VXi CNG and ZXi CNG. Ertiga gets six colour options. They are Dignity Brown and Splendid Silver, Metallic Magma Grey, Pearl Arctic White, Pearl Metallic Oxford Blue and Pearl Metallic Auburn Red.
Ertiga is 7-seater exclusively and the company has created a separate model named XL6 based on Ertiga that gets a 6-seater layout only. Ertiga is only sold via Arena dealerships and XL6 is only sold via Nexa dealerships. Currently, Ertiga competes with Kia Carens, Mahindra Marazzo and Maruti’s own XL6. But there’s a new party crasher from Hyundai named Stargazer that might launch in India too.
