MIKE HUMBLE

Car of the future styling with efficiency, superb refinement and a really great drive – this current Prius is by far the best one yet. I was very surprised at just how good it is

 

Finally, the Prius comes of age and becomes good – well not so much as good… I mean really good and it’s shrugged off some of its annoying image problems too.

It’s not that I had any real ‘beef’ with the original Prius, more the reason that I found the car slightly annoying and the owners more so. For most of us, we simply have to accept that being green is the new black. Again, not that there is anything wrong with that on a political level, it’s just that, well for me anyway, driving a green machine should be equally as enjoyable as something exotic, classic or dare I say it – petrol powered. I don’t want the world to think I’m an UBER driver, nor do I wish folk to wrongly accuse me of wearing liquorice shoes and underwear made from a byproduct of lentils. When it comes to driving cars, I don’t want to make any form of statement thank you very much, just let me get on with enjoying the drive – I don’t ask for much.

And that is where some of the stick the old Prius used to get comes from. Not that it was ever a bad car, far from it fact, more the reason that it became a victim of its own success. Bystanders started getting bored with the eco-notion and sometimes you could feel a bit a berk for driving or being shuttled around in one. No matter how much you tried to explain what the car was all about, people never really fully understood you – as the saying goes: ‘you can’t educate the stupid’. Not that I am accusing everyone of being stupid I must stress, more like I was beginning to resent the Prius in a world where hybrid vehicles are pretty much the norm. Other manufacturers have been getting on with their own technology without suffering from any form of nerdy reputation that the old Prius was starting to get.

Well look at what they have done now. We now have a completely restyled Prius inside and out, it’s got a little bigger too while looking like a traditional five door family hatchback. On the subject of styling, I actually thought from the moment my eyes first clapped on it that the new Prius is a really smart looking car. I will go so far as to say it’s a really smart looking motor. The styling shouts out ‘technology’ rather than ‘here to save your souls and the world’ and I love that. Here you have a cutting edge hybrid machine you can be proud of owning without your petrol – headed friends sniggering when your back is turned. Equipment levels are impressive, quality is pretty good and the overall package simply works. The instruments and displays have lost their Atari like fonts and given over to two visual screens that display the critical stats in a much simpler, clearer and importantly – a much more modern style.

On the interior side, the seats are trimmed (on the Excel) model in a synthetic type of leather, and honestly yes, you could have fooled me. Front space is generous but you do have to really stoop when getting in owing to the rake of the windscreen and A – posts. In the rear you’ll find decent legroom but the sloping roof stance robs rear passengers of headroom for those who are even slightly taller than average. The fixtures and fittings are made of materials that can sometimes feel a little odd to the touch, but in terms of overall quality, you shouldn’t have anything to worry about. The lack of wind noise is superb and overall refinement of wonderfully relaxing and smooth going, but I did notice a bit more tyre and road noise in the back than I would have liked. You’ll find a decent boot with a flat floor with enough overall space for an average family thanks to good sized door pockets and a reasonably spacious glove box.

Other nice touches include a wireless mobile phone charger that features a spring loaded clip that holds the phone securely in a deep slot within the centre console. I found this so much better than the usual wireless chargers that have tended to be nothing more than a flat base where your mobile goes skidding off into the passenger footwell during hard cornering. This is typical of the kind of forward thinking Toyota seems to be featuring in their latest portfolio of cars. Not so great features I noted was the annoying way the steering wheel often blocks some of the displays on the drivers side display screen. I found myself stooping down on more than one occasion to get a good view and that A post is all too easy to clonk your head on when getting in or out of the car, especially if you have a curb on the offside.

Other stick poking items? Well, there aren’t that many that come to mind apart from what has been mentioned in the previous. I did note that the interior lighting, despite being LED’s are rather feeble in pitch darkness and owing to the charge acceptance rate only being 3.3 kilowatts, charging the battery pack takes a smidge over four hours. Staying with this though, the battery pack is a smaller by half than the outgoing model. This ensures less space is taken up by the cell pack and Toyota claim you should be able to do 53 miles on electric which to be fair is about on the button for most people’s daily slog to work. Have no worries when it comes to overall efficiency though, on a run to Essex and back from West Sussex, the Prius worked out at over 80 miles per gallon and I found its motorway cruising to be as effortless as a candle-lit bath.

Toyota have sharpened up the handling too. The steering weights up as you enter a quick bend and despite the narrowness of the tyres, roadholding, whereby not remotely racing sharp, gives the driver confidence. There’s also a nice bit of ‘feel’ in the steering too, nowhere near as numb as some ePAS systems can display. All in all the handling and especially the ride comfort will not give cause for concern, there’s a great deal of engineering gone into the body and chassis – and you can feel it from the moment you push on that little bit harder.

Car of the future styling with efficiency, superb refinement and a really great drive – this current Prius is by far the best one yet. I was very surprised at just how good it was.

THE HUMBLE OPINION:

The Prius was everything I hoped it would be. It drives pretty much as well as it looks. As with any Toyota, it comes well equipped, bristles with technology and really promises to be cheap to run thanks to some serious efficiency advances.

It may not be the cheapest hybrid option out there but the quality, allied to the level of convenience and safety kit in book makes it fair value for money. Some silly little things make you tut such as the stooping you need to get in and out and the instruments being part obscured by the steering wheel – but none of them signal the end of the world.

It has the minerals where they count, insofar as it drives brilliantly and is wonderfully refined – especially on a smooth motorway. Add those factors to a real world 80+ mpg on the motorway and its goods looks, you’ll soon forget having to spend that little bit more.

A cracking car!

WHATS GREAT?

• Sleek and future-proof styling – no longer the ugly duckling
• Impressive level of convenience and safety equipment
• Extremely efficient
• Comfortable interior
• Very good build quality inside & out
• Agreeable performance and tidy handling
• Excellent ride quality

WHAT GRATES?

• Some minor ergonomic irritations
• Only two levels of trim
• Not the cheapest hybrid option out there
• Some slightly odd feeling interior trim – especially the dashboard

THE SPECS:

DRIVELINE: 2.0 petrol with eCVT hybrid FWD transmission

TOTAL SYSTEM POWER: 220bhp / 164Kw

ECONOMY: 403 to 565mpg on the WLTP combined cycle

EMISSION OUTPUT: 12 – 17 g/km based on combined cycle

PERFORMANCE*: 0 to 60 in 6.8 seconds with 110mph limited maximum speed

BOOT SPACE: 284 litres

INSURANCE GROUPING: 31A

PRICE AS TESTED: £39,995 including optional metallic paint @ £655

* Manufacturers claimed data

 

For more information on the Prius or other Toyota models CLICK HERE

Finally…. Thanks to Nicole and the team at Toyota GB