What precautions should be taken regarding E20 for a new car?

Question

Hi everyone, I’ve recently joined the group and I have a 2-month-old Škoda Slavia, which has currently run around 2,000 km.
I wanted to ask experienced owners about the precautions I should take regarding petrol. Which octane/RON fuel do you recommend, should I specifically look for E20-compatible fuel, and are there any particular petrol pumps or fuel brands that you prefer?

Also, are there any other fuel-related precautions I should follow with a new German car? Would really appreciate your advice and experience. Thanks!

Mohitsinh Chavda · Answer

1. Get only premium fuels like xp95, power95 or speed95 only.
2. Get fuel from COCO(Company owned and company operated) pumps or trusted pumps with very good traffic. Use indian oil's "XtraPower" app to find specifically COCO petrol pumps. If you want specifically good UI, then use indian oil's another app called "IndianOil ONE", which will enable you to find petol pumps nearby and you can confirm whether they are COCO pumps or not from the XtraPower app.
3. If not getting fuel from COCO pumps or not able to find COCO pumps, go for jio-bp or nayara regular fuel.
4. From 1 April, 2026, as per govmnt borms, all normal petrols from all companies and PSUs is RON 95, however some PSUs might not be compliant and giving RON 95, due to inconsistant ethanol % in their fuel (This is a claim and not a fact, and do not apply to all PSU pumps). Hence, I suggest to go to COCO pumps and JIO-BP, Nayara. Private players like jio, nayara and even shell more likely to be compliant for this rule and giving RON 95 for normal fuel. (Shell V-power might not worth it, go for normal fuel in private players <jio, nayara, shell> case)
5. Keep your car at least 25% filled up and max 50% filled up, if you are not driving it too much. Use petrol as much as possible after filling it up, but also do not bring it lower than 25%. Always be mindful about fuel level and strictly do not keep the car standing for long so that fuel goes unused. Filling it up 4 times in a month for 1000-1500 from a busy station, is better than getting 2 times fuel tank.
6. Use additives from trusted companies like LiquiMolly and MileX which are specific to E20. LiquiMolly provides wide range ofnproducts, 1 of them is for E20, so only use that particular prodouct. Avoid using proctone as it is not required to boost the RON vakue due to RON95 rule. System G, I have heard of and only used for my bike, do not have experience of using it with car.

(Next advice is not specific to E20, but overall good for long runs)
7. Use Liquimolly injection cleaner every 1 year or every 12-15k kms to clean the fuel injectors. Buy specific cleaner of liquimolly for petrol injection cleaner as it is diff product for diesel.

Prithviraj Tarafdar · Answer

I have a Slavia 1.5 manual and I started with Indian oil pump regularly but when I filled up in hp my car started behaving much better. I will suggest HP regular petrol. No need to go for xp 100. Anand Singh has adviced me to add SystemG fuel additives which will enhance the mileage and fuel pump of the car

Sayantan Datta · Answer

Adding to the comment from @mohitsinhchavda .  
I use a cocktail fuel of jio-bp 60% and xp95 40% with 50 ml Add lub Ethanol Petrol additive. The drive smoothness is pretty good.  Getting a mileage of 12.5 kmpl in city with heavy traffic in Bangalore , and 19kmpl in highways ( drove to sakleshpur 250km from bangalore) and  18.2kmpl in chikmagalur -(hills 56km)  (240km from bangalore). 
I have a 2 month old virtus 1.0 topline  and drove 2900 km  , pretty much on same boat. 
Also to mention , my first refueling was from shell select normal . But the drive though smooth , I felt lack of power and punch.
I would also advise injector clearer at 10k km .

Rishi Raj · Answer

Your Slavia is one of the cars where you can basically fill E20 and forget about it. Use good fuel, service it on schedule, and enjoy the car.

Sandip Kar · Answer

Very useful information. Thanks for sharing your experience. I have Kushaq Prestige 1.0 L Automatic, purchased on January this year and drove almost 6200 km. So far experience is good. I initially tried Shell Normal petrol, but that is in expensive side. I then started filling from JIO BP petrol pump. Performance is good. In city I am getting between 11-12kmpl when there is less traffic, but in bumper to bumper traffic giving 5-6 kmpl. In highways with 100 to 120 km/h speed achieved max 13 kmpl. Next time I should definitely try with cruise maintaining speed at 80km/hr.