Fabia 3 1.0 110 strange noise

Hello,

I own a Fabia 3 (facelift model) with the 1.0L 110 hp engine and manual transmission, purchased new in 2020; it has covered about 37,000 km.

A few weeks ago, a strange noise appeared, seemingly coming from the front of the car.

The noise starts to occur after driving for about ten minutes.

To me, the volume is clearly noticeable, but not loud enough to be picked up on a recording made with my mobile phone, as it gets drowned out by normal road noise (engine, tires, wind, etc.).

It isn't a humming sound; it’s more like a rubbing or friction noise.

Once it starts, it remains virtually constant in both volume and pitch:

. regardless of vehicle speed (starting from around 20 km/h)

. regardless of the gear engaged

. whether the car is in gear, coasting (clutch disengaged), or in neutral

. it doesn't change when shifting the load—testing by turning/loading the front-left and then front-right sides while driving at 70–80 km/h (I’m lucky enough to have stretches of good road nearby with smooth asphalt and relatively light traffic at certain times).

Technicians at my Skoda dealership—where I just had the 6-year service done—said they took it for a test drive and didn't hear anything unusual. They also found no issues with the wheel bearings.

The only option they offered was to run a diagnostic check for the tidy sum of €375.00.

Before committing to that, I thought I’d check the forum to see if anyone might have an idea what the problem could be.

I’ve searched online but haven't found any similar cases.

Thanks for reading.