New Fiat 600 Petrol hits nail on the head

100hp and a six-speed manual back in a small Fiat? It's the mid-2000s all over again...

By Matt Bird / Friday, 20 March 2026 / Loading comments

Having been introduced with hybrid and electric power, the Fiat 600 is now available with a combustion engine. It must be the first time that a model line up has had the purely petrol model added last, but such are the strange times we live in (when the response to faltering EV sales has the word 'Petrol' front and centre). This new model is said to represent its maker’s ‘commitment to offering accessible mobility for all, with solutions that adapt to different lifestyles and expectations’. For ‘accessible’ you can obviously read ‘affordable’; a car with just an engine still cheaper to manufacture than one with batteries. A 600 Hybrid starts at £25,750, for example.

We’d expect the new 600 Petrol, with its Turbo 100 engine - the new 1.2 triple with a chain instead of a belt, uprated turbo and new pistons - and six-speed manual to cost less than that. Fiat suggests this new version is for customers ‘who enjoy a simple, direct and engaging driving experience’, with a manual gearbox that ‘delivers a more intuitive and connected driving feel, in line with Fiat’s tradition of honest, human?centred mobility.’ We all certainly have a few stories of driving small, uncomplicated Italian cars a little faster than is wise; if that era is being resurrected with 600 Petrol, then you're welcome for the Friday feeling.

The 100hp engine will launch with the edition you see here, the 600 Street. Just 2,000 will be made, all in this black and white specification, which Fiat says ‘gives the new powertrain a bolt, expressive and unmistakably urban identity.’ As a small hatch, the move to launch the 600 with electrified powertrains appeared to make sense, but clearly it hasn’t chimed with buyers at the volume Fiat was hoping for. Officially the EV does more than 250 miles and costs less than £30k in all its variants. It’s the humble 1.2, however, that’s now tasked with rejuvenating the 600’s fortunes.

While price and availability for the 600 Petrol hasn’t been released just yet, the UK would likely be a key market. Particularly given that BEVs are doing no more in private sales than on the continent, and the 600e is hardly one for fleet customers. Expect the new 1.2 to be on sale later in 2026. And then we can talk about getting this engine into a Panda, for the oft-mooted return of the 100HP...