Front impact
In the first frontal test, a small disturbance shortly before impact resulted in late firing of the airbags and protection of the driver and passenger was compromised. Mazda investigated the problem and upgraded the airbag control software to handle such situations more effectively, as disturbances such as these can happen in real accidents. Production cars now have the new software and all cars manufactured before the change will be upgraded. In the re-test, the airbags fired as intended. The passenger compartment remained stable and the knees and femurs of the driver and passenger dummies were well protected. Mazda were able to demonstrate that the knees and femurs of occupants of different sizes and those sat in different seating positions would be similarly well protected.

Side impact
The rear door on the struck side opened during the test and the car was penalised one point.

Child-protection
The Mazda 2 scored maximum points for its protection of the three year old, based on the dummy reponses in the frontal and side impact tests. Mazda dealers can disable the passenger airbag, allowing a reaward facing child restraint to be used in that seating position. Without this modification, a rearward facing childseat should not be used in that seat as the airbag cannot be manually disabled. The label warning of the dangers of doing so was not adequate and was visible only when the passenger's sun visor was in the stowed position. The presence of ISOFIX anchorages in the rear outboard seats was not clearly marked.

Pedestrian protection
The bumper was rated as predominantly fair for its protection of pedestrians' legs. The part of the bonnet surface likely to be struck by adults' heads was rated as predominantly poor.