Did you consider the Civic Hybrid and why did you pick the Prius?

40 years ago, that would have been a neat feature. Nowadays, I need my queen- or king-size bed!

 

Yes, I drove both.

Admitably I had more seat time in a Prius (I drove my parent's for almost four weeks this winter while visiting for Christmas), but I did give the Honda a fair chance.

I used to drive a Honda Qualude, ere, I mean Prelude. It was actually a good car, but you need to have very small hands if you want to work in the engine compartment, and you need to like surprises....(Yes, that permanently colored by opinion of Honda, it was a cool car, but real pain in the behind at the same time.)

Seriously, the Civic is, well a Civic with a big honkin' battery in it. The car doesn't drive any differently than the conventional Civics and I needed to be reminded of that, as I didn't like it the first time I drove one and seem to have forgotten the fact.

In general the Prius is a better ride, and honestly there's more stuff ther for the money. The Civic is just a Civic with a big battery and a bigger price tag.

Just my two cents...

 

I considered the 2006 Honda Civic Hybrid for 12,000 miles and about 8 months before buying my 2007 Prius, but I don't recommned this type of serious consideration as it can be more costly way to test drive.

 

The civic hybrid look sharp and i really like the style. Prius is special it looks like those concept car design that never see in production.
Prius win in every category that matter to me. More room, more storage, better MPG, more color choices (hey you cant beat spectra blue), and Prius can run in electricity only but civic cant ??

At last, i just love hatchback. Wonder why honda has no hatchback... is Fits hatchback?

 

I hear ya! I usually have a Cal King but on road trips and work outings a twin-sized thick matress works just fine. I'm only 32 though so I'm sure at some point I'll pay for all my weird sleeping habits. lol

 

Back in '06 I seriously considered and extensively test drove the new Civic Hybrid. It's a great car, but the fact it can't travel from a stop on electric only, and everytime you take your foot off the brake the engine starts, I didn't care for. Thus you can't take full advantage of the ICE shutting down in stop and go traffic. Everytime you move forward the littlest bit, the engine starts. That would annoy me.
I know some owners have learned how to let off the brake just enough to let the Civic roll, without letting off enough to disengage autostop. Too tedious, impractical and only possible downhill.
Prius wins!

I have a co-worker that got a civic hybrid, and I taught him how to "glide" and use it's version of "stealth". His average has gone up 10MPG!

 

A couple of years ago I drove the Civic and the Prius and ended up buying a Camry. I read so much on the Net first I though I was going to go blind. After the driving sessions the Prius won hand down.

My research, talks with dealers, and test drives left me with the following:

• The Civic is a Gasoline car with an Electric Boost.
• The Prius is and Electric car with a Gasoline Boost.

Now, two years later, I have my Prius and no regrets.

Bob

 

I did not seriously consider the Civic Hybrid since I believe that the Toyota hybrid design is much more elegant.

I test-drove the current model Civic Hybrid several months ago. I think the handling of that car is superior to Prius. However I cannot stand the fact that the gasoline engine runs at all times while the car is in motion.

 

When my GF was car shopping in 2003, we test drove a HCH. It was ok, but my GF wanted a bigger car, she ended up with an Avalon.

When I was shopping in 2006, I sat in the newly redesigned Civic. My upward visibility was severely restricted to the point that it was not a viable option. Amazingly enough, I was able to fit into the Fit. My GF wanted me to buy one on the spot, but they only had one auto trans car and I wanted to drive a manual before buying.

In addition, I think that the HSD is a much better hybrid design than the IMA design.

 

I liked the style and handling of the HCH but it was a bit too small for my 6'4" body. Prius fits me fine and gets better mileage.

 

My son drives a manual transmission HCH (2004 I think). I've never driven it (I hadn't driven stick shift since the 50's & didn't think it wise to start now), but as a passenger I know it is a smaller car. Interestingly enough (to me anyway) is that I never even looked at another hybrid but the Prius. When I was ready to buy, I walked into a Toyota dealer & said I wanted one. I didn't even know exactly what they looked like, but I really liked it once I saw one. I like that it looks different from a "regular" car.

I asked my son why he didn't buy a Prius. He said he would have, but he was able to get his HCH at the end of the model year & at a significant discount because it was a manual transmission & no one seemed to want them. His sister-in-law & lab colleague also bought theirs at the same time. His mileage is just about as good as mine, especially since he took to blocking his grill in the winter. (They also have a Toyota Sienna minivan of the same vintage for hauling the 3 kids - although he once took the 3 kids camping in the HCH, bribing them by giving them the money they saved in gas. The kids were 12, 10, & 7 at the time.)

 

The Civic Hybrid is the only other hybrid on offer in Australia outside the luxury car price band but I never considered it at all because it isn't made by Toyota. I also wanted a hatch or wagon about the size of the Prius. Some towing capacity would have been nice, maybe 300kg but as Prius and Honda hybrid had none it didn't come into it.

 

Oops, thanks for the correction about regenerative braking on the Civic. It was really the Toyota PSD that sold me. Fluid drives, clutches, and variable-diameter pulleys can't compete with it.

 

Yes, but not after seeing the trunk. The other reason is that the Honda salespersons in Palo Alto CA just stood talking to each other as I tried to look at the car by myself. They sized me up as a non-buyer I assume. So I went away and bought the Prius. Both are OK, just different strokes for different folks. I think the prius is capable of quite higher mpg's if really pressed to do that.

 

I did consider the Civic, testdrove it - but like a previous poster I found it to be too small. When I tried sitting in the back seat my head touched the back glass, which I thought was not a "good thing".

 

We had convinced ourselves that we wanted a hatchback, and the Civic's aren't made anymore. Plus, in the Civic Hybrid, the seats don't fold down because the battery space uses up trunk space. That was enough for us to not even take one for a test drive.

 

We did seriously consider the HCH. We were a Honda family with a 1997 Civic, 1999 Odyssey, and had a 2003 CR-V until it was totaled. We also have a 2004 Aquatrax PWC (jet ski). Our experience with Honda has been very good in terms of reliability and service. However I gave up driving the Civic because I felt cramped in it.

We drove the 2008 Civic and it is a far nicer car than our 1997 Civic. Near the end of our selection process we were down to the Fit the Civic and the Prius. The Fit was an interesting car, underpowered, less MPG than the non-hybrid Civic, but it was a hatchback and roomy which were attractive.

The HCH MPG numbers were lower which was a small factor, but the lack of a hatchback was a deal breaker. In the end the Prius was our selection for two main reasons.

1) The Prius offers more of a "sitting up" position compared to the Civic laid-back sitting position. I find that more comfortable.
2) The Prius hatchback and fold down rear seats offered more utility.

We put quite a bit of energy into comparing the non-hybrid Civic at $17K vs the Prius at $22K (pre tax) but in the end it wasn't about economics. We simply liked the Prius better than the Civic.

Service and sales are another question. Our experience with Honda dealers over 11 years has been exemplary. They have been near 100% on-time and 100% perfect in execution of our service needs. Honda has come through with post warranty assist on a couple of occasions. Honda sales has always been low pressure.

Our buying experience and first service experience with two different Toyota dealers leaves me wondering. The purchase experience was painful. The first service was about a 90% satisfaction event. Time will tell on the service.

05/12/09
Now a year and over 35K miles and we still feel the same way. Prius reliability has been perfect. Regular scheduled maintenance at the Toyota dealer is still 90% as good as Honda. They regularly underestimate the time to do the service while I wait. They make little customer satisfaction errors like making me chase down the key, or leaving the key in the car to be stolen. Sometimes the car is washed, sometimes not. If they get those little noticeable things wrong are they doing all the service steps they say they are?

I recently checked out the Honda Insight. I like the looks of the car but the Honda dealer had a $3,000 markup which completly wipes out any reason to buy it instead of the Prius.

 

At first I was looking for something small and cheap. I liked the Fit, and test drove one, but worried about hot summers and the Fit not cooling down enough.

I test drove the Scion Xd, and liked it, but wasn't overly excited about it.

On a return trip to the dealership, to test drive the Corolla, I started looking at the Prius, and said what the heck, let's test drive it. That's all it took. I fell in love.

I considered the Civic Hybrid, but my wife has the regular Civic, and I'm not too wild about the dash or the smallness of the interior. The lack of folding rear seat with the Civic Hybrid, which I didn't have in my Subaru Legacy either, was the deal breaker.