In what comes as a major fillip for Tata Motors, the Nexon compact SUV has secured a four-star adult occupant rating and a three-star child occupant rating in the Global NCAP crash tests.

Global NCAP's report states the Nexon "can offer four-star adult occupant protection with good protection for the head and neck of driver and passenger, and adequate protection for their chests". It also rates the Nexon's body shell integrity as ‘stable’ in the 64kph offset deformable barrier crash test.

Additionally, the Nexon's three-star child occupant rating is attributed to "the rearward facing Isofix Child Restraint Systems (CRS) made available by Tata and installed with Isofix anchorages", which provided "good protection" to the 18-month-old child test dummy. The installed forward-facing Isofix CRS offered "good protection for head and limited protection to the chest."

What is worth noting is that all variants of the Nexon – from the base XE to the top-spec XZ+ – get ABS and two airbags as standard. The Isofix child seat anchorage is offered only on the XZ+ and XZA+ trims. In the past, another Tata that had secured a four-star Global NCAP rating was the Zest, which got it way back in 2016.

Speaking about the Nexon's performance in the crash tests, David Ward, secretary general of Global NCAP, said, “The four stars awarded to the Tata Nexon represent a very strong result from a major Indian car manufacturer. This impressive safety performance is comfortably above the new crash test standards applied in India to new models since October 2017. It is very encouraging to see Tata aiming high for safety and a great example for others to follow. The race is clearly on for India’s first five-star car.”

Also talking about the Nexon's rating, Rohit Baluja, president of the Institute of Road Traffic Education (IRTE) said, "I wish to congratulate Tata on this very good result. It shows that ‘Made in India’ and high levels of safety go together well. With excellent efforts like this from Tata and the new crash test standards now applied by the Indian Government we are going to see a steady improvement in the safety of new cars across the country and this will help to make our roads safer."

The Tata Nexon is available with petrol and diesel engine options, and a choice of manual and AMT gearboxes. Its prices start at Rs 6.15 lakh for the base petrol-manual and go all the way up to Rs 10.59 lakh for the diesel-AMT variant (both prices, ex-showroom, Delhi).

Interestingly, Maruti Suzuki’s compact SUV, the Vitara Brezza, also meets the latest Indian crash test norms, making it one of the nine models from the carmaker's current range to do so.

Also see:

2018 Tata Nexon AMT video review 

2017 Tata Nexon vs Maruti Vitara Brezza comparison

2017 Tata Nexon review, road test

2018 Tata Nexon long term review, first report