I came from a 12 year old Altea Sport to an Altea Xcellence TDI 2.0 DSG 4Drive with all bells and whistles you could buy as extras but didn't specify the tow bar, didn't need it. It's been a good car.
The Altea XL has more space than the standard Altea. The SUV design of the
Ateca rather than the people carrier design of the Altea lends itself to making space more rigid. The Altea had many cubby storage slots to put things in. The
Ateca is like one of those German plan hotel rooms, with little closed storage and the partner has to watch you shower through a glass panel... what I always said about it at the time. You have to stop carrying the kitchen sink and need to buy some of those boot tidies.
If you aren't down sizing you might want to consider a secondhand
Tarraco. It's the same car as the
Ateca but stretched. It's the Allsport / Kodiak version of the range. Seat SUVs came in three flavours the Arona (pretend SUV),
Ateca and the
Tarraco.
Ateca equivalent the Tiguan / Karoq (that one is a carbon copy of the
Ateca but with thoughtfull storage slots).
Tarraco the Allspace / Kodiak stretched model of the one below. Longer vehicle, will stick out in parking bays. Did look at it.
We say secondhand since VAG chose not to refresh the
Tarraco for that you have to look at Skoda. Skoda are ugly beasts as we know in all models compared with Seat.
If you are happy with slight downsizing from the Altea XL and the conversion from a people carry to an SUV then Altea will do it. Seat fit a range of seats in there different model line up in the
Ateca or did. In 2016 only the Xcellence had decent seating. Pass on what is fitted now. The Altea Sport seats were slightly better than the Xcellence seats. Live-able thou. Important criteria if you suffer from back pain and choose a people carrier / larger SUV for upright seating. The
Ateca I find totally fine in this respect, the pseudo Arona SUV we also own isn't. That's only a run around.
Afraid you get keyless entry but apart from flat battery when least expecting it (always carry a spare tucked away on your person, wallet etc) I haven't had an issue with it. The 2.0 TDI is glued to the road and is plenty powerful. DSG form it's a dream like the Altea. It isn't a soggy ride, not on 19" wheels. Has the standard sport ride.
On manual / DSG I gave up driving manuals in 2004 when I bought the Altea, Never looked back. If you do buy a DSG with paddles which I have on my
Ateca you can always drive it as a racing car. I don't bother. The DSG on automatic is good enough with a 2 litre engine to fiddle with otherwise... but some people do.
Petrol v Diesel it was noted at the time back in 2016 as winter came, those use to the weight of diesel cars swapping to trendy petrol before net zero raised it's head had problems with traction in snow on 2WD drive. Lighter vehicles. They had been taken in by the marketing, thinking they were buying a 4Drive, but ended up with a light 2WD on summer tyres. I swapped to all weather ones. 4Drive is nothing to be frightened off if you see it in the secondhand market. It's there when you need it. Used it a couple of times. Global warming, less snow now but black ice. Can't win them all. At launch the diesel 2.0 was only available in Xcellence form with 4Drive but was not an issue to me since I was moving to rural Wales. Frightening black ice round here in the winter. That Celtic mist as we call it lays a coating on the road, freezes and you get an ice rink. Impossible to walk on let alone drive on. Needless to say in rural Wales they don't treat the rural roads
.
On snow... rings a bell on the Altea you would put traction control off to give wheel spin for grip, 4Drive
Ateca you twiddle the knob for the off road setting. You can do that going along. But as said in normal mode 4Drive will kick in if it needs the grip or you just twiddle the knob to offroad when you hit the snow and back off when out of it. I don't bother with sport mode. Plenty of power with a DSG diesel to need to put it in Sport or play with the paddles.
Ownership of the
Ateca you can get hit by the high cost Vag parts like the Altea. Not been hit by the very high price ones yet, just a diesel pollution sensor that gave up the ghost and two ABS sensors.
