The 2010 Mazda Mazda3 is Mazda's compact, featuring a sedan and a 5-door hatchback. Similar foreign cars include the Honda Civic, Kia Spectra, Nissan Sentra and the Toyota Corolla and Matrix. American cars in the same class include Chevrolet Cobalt, Dodge Caliber, Pontiac G5 and Ford Focus.

The 2010 Mazda3 has taken on a new look - lower, meaner and with better lines than past versions. Past versions, especially of the sedan, just looked like a small car. But the 2010 model has a look reminiscent of recent German sports cars.

The Mazda3 comes in five trims, from least to most expensive: i SV, i Sport, i Touring, s Sport and S Grand Touring. The s models come in both sedan and hatchback, the latter giving you more than five extra cubic feet of cargo space. Mazda3 is a front-wheel drive vehicle.

There are two available engines for the Mazda3, both gasoline powered. The i models come with a 2.0 liter, 148 horsepower I4 with a standard five-speed manual transmission with overdrive. The s models get a slightly more powerful 2.5 liter, 167 horsepower I4 with a standard six-speed manual transmission with overdrive. There is an optional five-speed automatic transmission with overdrive available on all models.

Mazda3 Fuel efficiency is slightly better with a manual transmission. The i models with manual transmission are rated at 24 miles per gallon city and 32 miles per gallon highway. s models with manual transmission are almost as good at 22 miles per gallon city and 29 miles per gallon highway. That's right on the class average for the s models and a little better than class average for the i models.

Whichever trim you choose, the Mazda3 has better than average headroom. On the downside, the warranty (at three years or 36,000 miles) is weak and the smaller engine has a lower than class average power to weight ratio, which is less than optimum for pulling into city traffic.

NHTSA numbers are not available for the Mazda3, but IIHS numbers are. The Mazda3 gets a G rating (the best) everywhere except leg or foot injuries on a right side impact collision, which gets an A, the second best rating.

The 2010 Mazda Mazda3 really shines on price, rising just $355 from last year to a base of $15,045 in spite of the upgraded looks. That's almost $10,000 less than the class average. At $21,500 the base price on the s Grand Touring, the most expensive of the Mazda3 offerings, is still thousands under the class average. Which means you can get a really nice car for the money.