2011 Jeep Compass is redesigned for the 2011 model year with two industry-pleasing changes: an updated exterior and an optional off-road-ready four-wheel drive system.
The 2010 Compass was the black sheep of the Jeep lineup. Its exterior styling didn’t look as rugged as the Jeep Grand Cherokee or Wrangler, and you couldn’t take it off-road. If you’re concerned with price, very few SUVS can beat the Jeep Compass’s $19,295 base price. The Jeep Patriot is one option.
An Off-Road package with low-range gearing, increased ride height, all-terrain tires and skid plates also gives the Compass legitimate off-road ability.
Jeep has added soft-touch materials to the cabin. The 2011 Jeep Compass is a five-passenger compact SUV available in base and Limited trim levels.
The Latitude package adds heated front seats, driver seat height adjuster, a fold-flat front passenger seat, reclining rear seats, a 115-volt auxiliary power point and a leather-wrapped steering wheel with audio controls.
Front-wheel drive is standard on the 2011 Jeep Compass, while a four-wheel-drive system is optional. The Freedom Drive I 4WD system operates in front-wheel-drive mode in normal situations and automatically applies power to the rear wheels when needed. The Freedom Drive II Off-Road package includes a low-range mode for the CVT to further improve mobility.
Every Compass except the base front-wheel-drive version comes standard with a 2.4-liter four-cylinder engine; this engine is optional on the base Compass. In Edmunds testing of a 2011 Jeep Compass Limited 4X4 equipped with the CVT (Freedom Drive I), the 3,405-pound vehicle accelerated to 60 mph from a standstill in 10.3 seconds and reached the quarter-mile in 17.6 seconds at 80.5 mph. EPA-rated fuel economy for the Compass is 21 mpg city and 26 mpg highway. A front-wheel-drive Compass with the 2.4-liter engine and CVT can achieve 21 mpg city and 27 mpg highway.
Available only on the front-wheel-drive base Compass, the 2.0-liter four-cylinder engine makes 158 hp and 141 lb-ft of torque and offers the same transmission choices as the 2.4. EPA-rated fuel economy ratings stand at 23 mpg city and 29 mpg highway with a manual transmission and 23 mpg city and 27 mpg highway with the CVT.
The Jeep Compass has not been rated using the government's new, more strenuous 2011 crash-testing procedures.
Although the Compass did well in the first year after its May 2006 launch, interest quickly cooled, and through the end of 2010, Chrysler had totaled only 111,000 Compass sales. A "softroader," the Compass was meant to compete in the growing field of compact, front-wheel-drive crossovers often derided as "Cute Utes." For 2011, the base Compass starts at $19,295, some $4,000 more than Jeep was asking at introduction. Even more galling than our Compass tester's sticker price, however, was its fuel economy panel. The normally reasonable highway mileage, which can even hit 29 mpg in front-drive configuration with a five-speed manual and the smaller 2.0-liter engine, drops to just 23 mpg in the "Trail Rated" Compass models. The Jeep Compass does have some revised suspension bits designed to improve its road manners – and it rides and handles about as well as any other compact crossover – but this was never the biggest problem with the Compass. Four-wheel-drive Compass models are only available with a 2.4-liter four-cylinder engine making 172 horsepower and 165 pound-feet of torque.
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