10 Days, Two Kids and Three Road Trips: What I Learnt Living With the Chery TIGGO 8 Super Hybrid as a Mum

When Chery offered me the keys to the TIGGO 8 Super Hybrid for ten days, I knew I didn’t want to write another traditional car review. There are already plenty of motoring journalists who can tell you about engine outputs, torque figures and suspension systems. If that’s what you’re looking for, I’d encourage you to head to Chery’s website because they can explain it far better than I ever could.

That’s simply not how I choose a family car. This Chery Tiggo 8 Super Hybrid review comes from ten days of real family life, not a spec sheet.

As a mum of two, I’m far more interested in the everyday questions. Will it survive the school run? Is there enough room for dance bags, groceries and the collection of rogue drink bottles that seem to multiply overnight? Can it handle a road trip without everyone asking, “Are we there yet?” every twenty minutes? Most importantly, will it make life feel just a little bit easier?

Those were the questions I was carrying with me as I picked up the keys. The answer, as it turns out, wasn’t going to come from a spec sheet. It was going to come from real life.

Over the next ten days, the Chery became part of our family’s routine. It tackled school holiday adventures, dance drop-offs, supermarket runs, a four-hour drive to Orange and our first family camping trip to the Central Coast. Somewhere between packing enough snacks to feed a small army and working out where everyone was going to sit, I stopped thinking about the fact I was driving a review car and simply started treating it like our own.

For context, the Chery Tiggo 8 Super Hybrid is Chery’s seven-seat plug-in hybrid SUV, priced from $45,990 driveaway. It promises the flexibility of a petrol vehicle with the efficiency benefits of hybrid driving, but I wasn’t interested in whether it sounded good on paper.

I wanted to know whether it worked for families like mine.

The Nerves Started Before I Even Left the Car Park

I don’t know whether anyone else feels this way, but driving someone else’s brand-new car is surprisingly nerve-racking. The moment I climbed into the driver’s seat, one thought kept running through my mind: please don’t let me scratch it before I even get home.

Before I’d even left the warehouse, though, I’d already done what I do in every car. I connected my phone, found somewhere for my coffee, worked out where my sunglasses were going to live and adjusted everything I could reach. The first few minutes in any new car aren’t spent admiring the dashboard. They’re spent figuring out where all the little pieces of your everyday life are going to go. Thankfully, the 360-degree camera quickly became my friend. When you’re driving an unfamiliar car, especially one that’s a little bigger than you’re used to, having that extra visibility makes parking feel far less intimidating. It gave me the confidence to relax much sooner than I probably would have otherwise.

Adding to those nerves was the fact that I’d never driven a hybrid before. While many people have already made the switch, this was completely new territory for me. Every button, every alert and every feature felt unfamiliar, so I drove home far more cautiously than I normally would. I’m fairly certain anyone driving behind me would have assumed I was a learner.

By the following morning, though, that feeling had completely disappeared. Once I understood how the vehicle worked, everything became incredibly intuitive. Within 24 hours I wasn’t thinking about the technology anymore. I was simply driving. Somewhere between the school run and the supermarket, it stopped feeling like a review car and simply became our car for the week. That gave me confidence that even someone with no previous hybrid experience could adapt very quickly.

The Feature I Initially Thought Was Strange Became One of My Favourites

One of the biggest adjustments had nothing to do with actually driving the car. It happened every time I parked.

Like most people, I’m used to putting the car into park, turning the engine off and hearing everything go quiet. The first time I parked the Chery Tiggo 8 Super Hybrid, that didn’t happen. The music kept playing, the climate control continued running and the dashboard remained illuminated. I remember opening the driver’s door and immediately thinking I’d forgotten to switch the car off.

It turns out I hadn’t forgotten anything.

The vehicle is designed to recognise when the driver is still inside. Once it’s in park, everything remains ready while you’re in the cabin. As soon as you walk away with the key, however, the car automatically detects that you’ve left, locks itself and powers down. When you return, the flush door handles rise automatically, making it easy to open the door before neatly disappearing back into the bodywork once you’re driving again.

It sounds like a small detail, but it quickly became one of those features I appreciated every single day. I stopped wondering whether I’d remembered to lock the car or whether I’d accidentally left something running because the vehicle quietly took care of those little tasks for me.

As someone navigating the wonderful world of perimenopause, where my brain already feels like it’s juggling a hundred tabs at once, I hadn’t realised how much mental energy I was spending on those little “Did I lock the car?” moments until they simply disappeared. It might seem like an insignificant feature, but when you’re already carrying the mental load of family life, one less thing to remember is genuinely appreciated.

That was probably my biggest takeaway after living with the Chery Tiggo 8 Super Hybrid. The things I valued most weren’t necessarily the headline features you’d read about in a brochure. They were the thoughtful little details that quietly reduced the mental load and made everyday family life just that little bit easier.

I Thought the Driver’s Seat Was Uncomfortable. It Turned Out the Car Was Smarter Than Me.

One of my first comments to my husband after the drive home was, “I don’t think I like the seat.” After about an hour behind the wheel, my back was starting to ache and I couldn’t quite get comfortable. I kept shifting my position, convinced the seat just wasn’t right for me. As it turns out, the problem wasn’t the seat at all.

My husband wandered down to the driveway, climbed into the driver’s seat and started pressing buttons I hadn’t even noticed. Within a few minutes the height had been adjusted, the seat base moved, the backrest repositioned and the lumbar support fine-tuned. The difference was incredible. Instead of feeling like I was sitting on the seat, it suddenly felt like the seat was supporting me. On the longer drives that followed, particularly our four-hour trip to Orange, I was genuinely comfortable. It was a good reminder that the Chery Tiggo 8 Super Hybrid offers far more seat adjustment than many of us ever take advantage of.

Meanwhile, my husband quickly discovered that the front passenger seat came with a massage function. While I was concentrating on the road, he was happily working his way through the different massage settings. Safe to say, he was very comfortable. The massage function is available for the front passenger in the model we drove, and after watching him enjoy it for the trip to Orange, I could certainly see the appeal.

Every Mum Needs This Snack Box

There was one feature I didn’t expect to become one of my favourites, and it had nothing to do with technology. It was storage. More specifically, the enormous centre console in the Chery Tiggo 8 Super Hybrid, tucked between the two front seats.

I’m sure Chery’s designers had a much more sophisticated purpose in mind, but in our family it very quickly became known as “the snack box.” School holidays had just begun, which meant we were spending far more time in the car than usual. Muesli bars, chips, crackers, fruit pouches, water bottles and all the little snacks that somehow disappear within minutes suddenly had their own dedicated home. It didn’t stop there, though.

Before long, it was also home to sunglasses, charging cables, tissues, lip balm, hand sanitiser and the random collection of little treasures that seem to follow every family around. If you’ve ever wondered where all those odds and ends end up, apparently they all migrate to the centre console. Instead of digging through my handbag or searching underneath seats every time someone announced they were starving, I knew exactly where everything was. That might not sound revolutionary, but any parent knows how much smoother a long drive becomes when you can hand over a snack in five seconds rather than five minutes.

It’s one of those features that would barely register during a quick test drive, yet after ten days it became something I appreciated almost every time we got in the car. It wasn’t flashy or particularly exciting. It simply worked the way family life works.

The Real Test Started on the Road to Orange

Cars don’t reveal much about themselves in a showroom. They reveal themselves somewhere between Sydney and Orange, when you’ve been on the road for a couple of hours, the snack wrappers are starting to pile up, someone’s asking how much longer there is to go and you’re trying to remember which playlist everyone agreed on.

Our trip to Orange wasn’t just a weekend away. It was a busy trip filled with activities and plenty of driving between destinations. For a few days, the Chery Tiggo 8 Super Hybrid became far more than a way to get from A to B. It became our office, snack cupboard, wardrobe and family room all rolled into one. A four-hour drive is where you really discover whether the Chery Tiggo 8 Super Hybrid works as a family car. It’s where uncomfortable seats become really uncomfortable, children start running out of patience and every little annoyance becomes impossible to ignore.

Thankfully, none of that happened. One minute we were chatting about what we were looking forward to in Orange and the next, the girls had settled in with their snacks and music while the kilometres quietly disappeared beneath us. They had plenty of room to spread out without constantly invading each other’s space, and for once I didn’t hear complaints about being squashed or needing more leg room. Even after several hours on the road, everyone climbed out in good spirits, which any parent knows is an achievement in itself.

What surprised me most, though, was how I felt. Normally, after four hours behind the wheel, I’m ready to stretch my legs and have a decent break before doing anything else. This time, I climbed out feeling remarkably fresh. The drive felt smooth, quiet and relaxed, and by the time we reached Orange, it honestly felt like the journey had passed much quicker than I’d expected.

The Seven-Kid Test

If you’re a parent, you’ll understand that sometimes your car isn’t just your car. It becomes everyone else’s as well. We have an amazing village around us, and one of the ways we support each other is by sharing school and dance drop-offs. Around our house we simply call it “dance duty.” On those afternoons, our peaceful family car suddenly transforms into organised chaos. At one point we had seven children climbing in and out, along with school bags, dance bags, drink bottles and everything else that seems to travel with children these days. I’m still convinced school bags multiply when you’re not looking. Every afternoon I feel like I’m loading enough gear for a week away, yet somehow every child insists they only packed “the essentials.”

The Chery Tiggo 8 Super Hybrid handled it surprisingly well. The third row offered enough room for the older kids to sit comfortably for the shorter trips, and while having all seven seats in use naturally reduces the boot space, there was still enough room to throw in backpacks and dance gear without playing an elaborate game of luggage Tetris. Perhaps the biggest compliment I can give it is that loading everyone in never felt stressful. The children climbed in easily, found their seats quickly and we were on our way. As a mum, that’s exactly what you want. Not because it’s exciting. Because it’s easy.

The Camping Test

If the dance run proved the Chery Tiggo 8 Super Hybrid could handle everyday family life, our camping trip was always going to be the ultimate challenge. For this Chery Tiggo 8 Super Hybrid review, that camping trip was the real test.

Packing for a family camping trip is a completely different exercise to packing for a weekend away. It’s not just clothes and toiletries. It’s foam mattresses, sleeping bags, camping chairs, pillows, cooking equipment, food, towels, torches, toys, chargers and all the “just in case” items that somehow become essential once children are involved.

Looking at everything spread across our driveway, I honestly wondered how it was all going to fit. There comes a point before every family holiday when someone inevitably asks, “Do we really need to take all of this?” The answer, apparently, is always yes.

I kept waiting for the moment we’d have to admit defeat and leave something behind. It never came. Without needing to play an elaborate game of Tetris, everything found its place in the Chery Tiggo 8 Super Hybrid. We weren’t shuffling bags around to make the boot close or unpacking half the car to squeeze one more thing in. Even better, when we arrived at our campsite, I could actually find what I was looking for without unpacking everything else first.

That might sound like a small win, but anyone who’s travelled with children knows exactly how important it is. Starting a holiday already frustrated because you can’t find the tent pegs, the kids’ sleeping bags or the bag with the cooking gear isn’t the sort of memory you’re hoping to make.

Instead, we unpacked, set up camp and got on with enjoying the weekend. The snack box also proved its worth yet again. Somewhere between Sydney and the campsite it had transformed into emergency snack headquarters, and judging by how often it was opened, I’d say it was one of the hardest-working features in the car.

As I sat back that evening, I realised this was becoming a pattern. Throughout the ten days, the Chery Tiggo 8 Super Hybrid kept quietly removing little frustrations before they had the chance to become bigger ones. Whether it was making packing easier, keeping the snacks within reach or simply giving us enough space to spread out, it wasn’t trying to impress us with flashy features. It was simply making family life run a little more smoothly.

The Fuel Test I Wasn’t Expecting

Before this experience, I’d never owned a hybrid. Like a lot of people, I understood the concept, but I wasn’t sure how much difference it would actually make to everyday driving.

Over ten days, we certainly didn’t give the Chery Tiggo 8 Super Hybrid an easy life. We drove to Orange and back, tackled school holiday outings, dance classes, supermarket runs, shorter local trips and everything in between. It was exactly the sort of driving many Australian families do every week.

Chery’s own figures put the Chery Tiggo 8 Super Hybrid’s combined driving range at up to 1,200 kilometres. I wasn’t setting out to test that claim scientifically, but after living with the car for ten days, I completely understood why they’re confident making it.

What surprised me most wasn’t a particular number on the dashboard. It was the fact that I simply wasn’t thinking about fuel.

Normally, somewhere during a busy week, I’m doing that little mental calculation of, “Do I have enough fuel to get to dance, or should I stop now while I’m thinking about it?” My peri brain doesn’t always reward procrastination, so not having fuel sitting on my mental checklist was something I genuinely noticed.

Instead, we simply got on with our week. School holiday adventures, supermarket runs, dance classes, the drive to Orange and back, our camping trip to the Central Coast and everything else family life threw at us. The car quietly got on with the job while I got on with everything else.

When it was finally time to return the vehicle, I was genuinely surprised to see there was still around 250 kilometres of driving range remaining, along with approximately 14 per cent battery charge. I hadn’t been driving conservatively or trying to achieve impressive fuel figures. I was simply driving the way I always do, which made the result feel all the more impressive.

My Chery Tiggo 8 Super Hybrid Review Verdict: Would I Choose One?

That’s the question I’ve been asked most since returning the Chery Tiggo 8 Super Hybrid. Would I actually buy one? Ten days ago, I probably wouldn’t have considered a hybrid very seriously. Not because I had any concerns about them, but because I’d never experienced what living with one was actually like.

Now I understand why so many families are making the switch. It wasn’t one standout feature that changed my mind. It was the accumulation of dozens of thoughtful details that, together, made family life feel just a little less complicated. The car that locked itself when I walked away, meaning one less thing for my peri brain to remember. The generous storage that became our unofficial snack station. The space to carry camping gear one weekend and dance bags the next. The comfort on longer drives that meant arriving ready to enjoy the destination instead of needing a break from the journey. Most of all, it was the feeling that the Chery Tiggo 8 Super Hybrid quietly adapted to whatever our family needed that day without asking us to adapt to it.

After ten days, two kids and three road trips, I handed the keys back genuinely impressed. Not because I’d suddenly become interested in horsepower or performance figures, but because I’d experienced something much more important. I’d lived with the car.

As parents, we spend so much time thinking about the next thing on the list that we rarely notice the products quietly making life easier. The Chery Tiggo 8 Super Hybrid became one of those products. It simply got on with the job, whether we were heading to dance, setting off on a road trip or squeezing in one more family adventure before the school holidays ended.

And in my experience, that’s exactly what a great family car should do. It shouldn’t become the centre of attention. It should simply help your family spend more time focusing on what matters most: being together.

For more information visit https://cherymotor.com.au/models/tiggo-8-super-hybrid

Editorial Disclaimer: Products and experiences may be provided to Parenthood360 for editorial consideration. Coverage is never guaranteed, and all published content, opinions and experiences shared are independently created and reflect our own views.