Seems to Me Leather Seats are Way to Go for Max Comfort

I have a 2005 Prius with cloth and a 2010 with leather. I prefer leather. It looks better and wears better. You can also get in and out of the car more easily because it is smoother. I especially like the leather steering wheel. It is hard to hold plastic once you are used to holding leather.

 

Personally I would never own a car without leather interior. Even though the Prius is a bland as they go. The interior color choices and materials (incl the quality of leather which is barely average) are basic. I could not see having a cloth Prius without Scotchguarding at least. The-again very bland light colors and materials must be grime-catchers. The Prius leather seats are easy to enter/exit, kind-of comfortable (lumbar helps...) and I'm finding OK-cool in summer and OK-quick-heating in the winter. As Eoin says below - the leather steering wheel cover is OK too. I tested the base version and found the wheel to be quite cheap-feeling.

So IMO as a necessity choice - the Prius leather barely makes the grade.

Of course it's a personal preference and budget-based as well.

 

Moved from 335i BMW with leather to 2010 Prius III with cloth.
It only took a month to change from cloth to Katzkin leather!

 

I've had both...non-leather and leather on my Prius and BMW. Here's my brief summary.

Leather: GREAT if you wear a lot of business suits or carry pets. Why? No lint... or you can easily pick-up lint. Looks elegant and some people like the smell. Bad things... if you like fast cornering, sometimes depending on the seat design you slide around, it gets FIERCE hot in direct sunlight and it will start cracking after a few years if you don't treat it with conditions.

Cloth: Save $$$ over the leather option, but harder to clean (shampoo) and your sweat smell stays on it unless you shampoo it. You don't slide around as much if hard cornering. Depending on where you park it, some discoloring may occur, maybe.

Both are great, depending on your lifestyle.

 

I think it depends on the car, but I compared both in the G3 and the leather was more comfortable to me.

 

I agree with another poster here that the Prius leather isn't exactly the highest-end, most sumptuous. In fact, I think the leather on my parents' gen II is nicer than that on my gen III (decontenting to keep the price lower?). But still, I'd rather have it--a few reasons:
- If you take care even a little (use a leather cleaner/protector 1x/yr even), it will last pretty much forever;
- It won't as easily absorb various stenches as will cloth;
- Cleaning up pet hair is easy;
- It feels much better on the skin in heat or cold (or neither) than the 'leatherette' (=vinyl) put on some cars, and also lasts longer and can be treated unlike the leatherette (what a dumb name for vinyl);*
- IMO the cloth in the Prius looks cheaper than that on some others;
- The only way to get a lumbar support in the gen III Prius is to get a IV or V, which means you get the leather. (This was the kicker for me).

If you really refuse to clean or treat it or get the car detailed once in every blue moon, the cloth might last longer, as the leather will probably start to crack after 5 or 6 yrs or so...

* When I tested a VW TDI, the salesman told me they used leatherette rather than leather because supposedly the leather would wear out faster than the diesel engine. I'm not slamming the TDI engine--I liked it, especially with the DSG, but, c'mon dude, really... BS meter got pegged on that one.
~T

 

BMW, Mercedes, Lexus, etc. only sell upgraded versions of their cars in the US (no cloth seats, crank windows, etc.). Nothing to do with comfort--it's marketing.

Leather seats aren't really more comfortable than cloth (other than it's easier to slide in an out)--though they are more durable and luxurious looking.

I've owned a lot of cars, and can't remember the last one that didn't have leather seats.

 

I have to say, leather is without a doubt, the best option.

In our 2005 Gen II (My wife's) we had cloth. Terrible to maintain, wears down easily, stains easily (Even with scotch guard everything sticks to it, including body and animal odors), and it just has an overall look of mediocrity. It's more comfortable then leather from a temperature perspective.

In our 2007 Gen II (Mine) we had leather. Easy to maintain, easy to clean, doesn't really wear down except for areas that are under constant use and with conditioning will last the life of the car without the shampooing or cleaning expense. Can be uncomfortable from a temperature perspective (i.e. sticky and hot wearing shorts or short skirts etc) but that's the only con I can think of with leather.

We have factory installed in the 2010 Gen III/IV and in the 2010 Gen III/II, port installed (With aftermarket leather console cover and leather door panels. Thats the FIRST thing I did the day after we took it home from the dealer!:rockon .

Personally, I will never again have a cloth interior in any car I own or a cloth couch in my house.

Brian

 

Leather all the way. especially with Prius 2010

 

I actually prefer cloth or suede or sport fabric over leather at this moment in my life. I posted my review above and i know that I'm going against what everyone is recommending here, but I live in SoCal and it gets SUPER HOT in the summer and the leather was way too hot to sit in after leaving the car in the parking lot...and this is with 20% tint and leaving the windows slightly opened. Sometimes you just can't find a shaded spot. Also, leather was freezing cold in the mornings and if you wear shorts often, leather might not be the best idea ever.

What I *do* miss are the heated leather seats...they hold heat much better than heated cloth seat (which I don't even have, but have tested on other cars).

Maybe if I had the solar roof option and found myself parking in coverage garages all the time, then I'd reconsider leather...but for now, just cloth.

 

The Prius cloth is actually some of the nicest cloth seats out there. It's smooth, fine grained, and inconspicuous. Almost everyone who rides in my car for the first time comments about my cloth seats: "It feels like suede," "This is pretty luxurious," "This feels better than I thought..."(from a friend who is a Prius hater)

Thats why I don't feel like you're sacrafacing anything by having cloth.

 

It's all a matter of personal preference, obviously. I've had a bunch of cars since buying my first one back in 1972, and never had leather seats. And don't care if I ever do.

That being said, I never really paid attention to being in cars with leather seats, so I may really like them if I did.

But my motorcycle has a leather seat, does that count??!

 

it's faux leather, right? they don't actually kill animals for seating?

 

Well, I guess I too am going to buck the trend. I only had leather in one car and didn't like it. Where I am from the summers are extremely hot and the winters extremely cold and I have found cloth to be much more comfortable. As for cleaning, a little care is required for either. Cloth has the greater potential to stain, while leather cracks. As for smell, the smell of sweaty leather can be much worse than cloth, although I didn't find this a real problem with either.

 

It's a combination of real leather, faux leather (pleather) and vinyl. Most of the visible seating surface is real cow, the rest is pleather and vinyl.

 

My 2010 Prius is my 4th car with leather seats. When I was shopping for the Prius, leather seats and the nav system were must haves and the solar roof was a nice to have. I have actually never sat in any of the seats other than the driver seat for more than a few minutes, so I can't really vouch for them, but the leather driver seat in the Prius is very comfortable and supportive even on day-long, several hundred mile drives.