The Favorit was a new beginning for the respectable, century-old brand, which tried to eliminate its older 120/Estelle models designed in the ’70s.
Various financial problems led the carmaker to delay production, especially for the right-hand-drive versions. Then, in 1989, the Velvet Revolution happened, and the country got rid of the communist regime and had a clear view of the export market. Skoda’s engineers even hoped for a four-door sedan, but that remained only as a prototype. In the end, the car was available as a five-door hatchback, a station wagon and a pickup.

It was the first front-wheel-drive vehicle built by the carmaker. Instead of a grille, the designer installed a metallic panel that almost blocked the air to the engine. The cooling was done via a slatted grille in the lower bumper area, which proved insufficient for city traffic. Skoda fixed that mistake later on. From its sides, the management chose the wedged bodywork lines for their lower production costs. The carmaker made a longer roof for the station wagon version and added a pair of side windows behind the rear doors.

Inside, the Skoda Favorit had a clean layout with straight lines. The wide and slightly slanted instrument cluster featured a glove-box on the passenger side and, a first for a Skoda, a center stack where the carmaker installed the ventilation controls. Its instrument cluster was wider than the instrument panel and covered an area used for vents and a few buttons used for the rear-window defroster, fog-lights, and interior lights. The gear-stick popped through the center console next to a storage area.

Initially, the Favorit was powered by a 1.3-liter gasoline engine that provided 62 hp. It was paired to a standard 5-speed manual gearbox.