Everything you need to know about the new 2020 Honda Jazz

Honda’s Jazz remains a hatchback imbued with practicality and safety, and the new model is the first in its class to be equipped with 10 airbags as standard fitment.

This includes a new centre airbag designed to cushion the front passengers from crashing into each other in a side collision. The safety suite also includes an airbag for the driver’s knees and a compact rear seat (i-side) airbag system designed to fit snugly inside the rear seat pad to protect rear occupants from impacts against the door and C-pillars.

"Occupant safety is of the utmost importance for our designers when we develop a new car," said Takeki Tanaka, a project leader with Honda.

"We completely redesigned the latest-generation Jazz from the ground up, which meant we were able to incorporate new advanced structural technologies and the latest passive safety features to provide exceptional protection from all kinds of accidents."

Passive safety is also enhanced through a new wider-angle, higher-definition camera and the company’s city-brake active system. These features are part of a detailed list of safety technologies bunched up as Honda Sensing.

The features include a collision mitigation braking system with improved night-time operation and better pedestrian detection in poor light conditions. The system applies automatic braking if the Jazz senses it has drifted across or into the path of oncoming traffic.

The car also has adaptive cruise control and other driver aids such as "lane keeping assist" and "traffic sign recognition". It has a multi-information display with "intelligent speed limiter" that adjusts the speed according to the sign recognition function. Additional features include auto high beam and blind-spot information.

Prospective owners can also expect to receive wireless telephony and smartphone mirroring as part of enhanced infotainment.

The new Jazz will introduce the efficiency benefits and performance of hybrid power to the mass market, with models to feature electrified, twin-motor powertrains by 2022.

The range will include a new crossover variant called Crosstar. It uses the same mechanicals and comes with the same flexible, flat-folding seat as the Jazz hatch, but with a higher road stance.

Honda SA has not yet indicated when it will launch the new Jazz in SA.