Meet the 3 Series’ overachieving little brother

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2008 BMW 1 Series - Notable Features

Besides sharing engines, one of which is a 300-horsepower twin-turbocharged six-banger, with the larger 3 and 5 Series models, the new 1 Series packs a lot into a small package. There’s the fact that you can get your little Bimmer in coupe or convertible guise and then outfit it with HD radio, a USB port, voice-activated navigation, and a number of other standard and optional features designed to cater to your comfort or sport tendencies. All buyers will benefit from free scheduled maintenance spanning four years or 50,000 miles, whichever comes first.

That’s comforting piece of mind backed up by a slew of safety features including front-side and side-curtain airbags (not available on convertibles), a tire pressure monitor, start-off assist technology that temporarily holds the 1 Series on steep inclines, and a rollover sense for drop-top models. Strong emphasis has been placed on the brakes, too, with Dynamic Brake Control, Brake Fade Compensation, Brake Drying, and standard ABS. These items all work in conjunction with Dynamic Stability Control and Dynamic Traction Control, both of which can be completely deactivated.