Three questions decide almost every van purchase, and none of them is “which brand”: what has to fit in it, what has to fit in the seats, and where it has to be parked overnight. Get those three right and the badge on the front barely matters. Settle the size first — and the size that counts is the load area, not the name. The mistake we see most often is buying a size up “to be safe”: a medium van three-quarters full every day is a better buy than a large van a quarter full, on price, running costs and parking. This page is the signpost; each question below has its own guide, and all of them sit under our Van Guides hub.
In this guide
- 5-seater vans: your options — what you can buy when the van must carry five people and still earn a living.
- Crew cab vans explained — what a crew cab is, and what that second row costs you in load space.
- Small vans: which one, and why — Combo, Berlingo, Partner, Doblo and Transit Connect, side by side.
- Automatic vans: what’s available used — which vans you can realistically find with an automatic gearbox.
- Best base van for a camper conversion — what to look for in a van you plan to convert rather than work out of.
- Compact vans surge: small-van growth — why small vans are taking a bigger share of the market than before.
- What does a budget van actually buy you? — what comes down with the price, what does not, and how to spot a neglected one.
- SWB, MWB or LWB: which length do you need? — the three wheelbase lengths in plain English, picked from what you carry.
- Panel van, commercial vehicle, LCV: what the words mean — the trade’s vocabulary translated, so an advert stops reading like a foreign language.
Before you size up: medium vans are about 40% of what we sell and small vans a little over a third, so most buyers end up in one of those two rather than in a large van.
Where to go next
Once size, seats and format are settled, see what we have in stock now, or ring us and we will tell you which one we would keep. Down to two models rather than two sizes? Van comparisons takes it from there.
