Will Hybrid Corolla make Prius Better?

Hatch or sedan (or wagon?)

 

Sedan

 

Is it as ugly as the Chinese version?

 

Thanks. The back looks quite balanced - but the bit angry grille is even worse than the Chinese which is broken up by a bit of chrome. Or is it that the big black grille looks more stark with white paint?

The car below is far better balanced - at least the front.

 

On previous Corollas some trims have the chrome.

 

I could hardly agree more. If I were looking at purchasing one of these, I would feel constrained to either black or dark (magnetic) gray, to minimize the maw. I guess we all project our reaction to the look onto the car -- I don't so much see "angry", I see an asphyxiating catfish! I'm pretty sure that wasn't the look the designers were hoping to create. . . Yes indeed, the Prius front end is way, way more balanced and attractive!

 

Ewwhhh, my first look at the front end of the new Corolla hybrid. Looks like another Dustbuster vacuum cleaner fake plastic grille. IMHO probably Toyota’s attempt to make a very fuel efficient and capable vehicle look better on the highway, give it more Macho against all the huge trucks and other gas guzzlers. I’m sure Toyota has their finger on public opinion and what sells more cars. Too bad we can’t move on to a more enlightened world

 

If the Gen 4 Prius had that look I likely would bought a different car. I know we were considering the Corolla until my wife sat that BUG (Black Ugly Grille) front! Yes, the Prime is ugly too!

 

An even more cynical view: this sort of design requires less paint. For every 15 or so cars they paint this way, they probably save enough, compared to one with a front like the Prius, to paint another whole car. Minor advantage for owner who has to live with butt-ugly car: smashed bugs will do less damage to the plastic than they would to a painted surface. For me, not enough of an advantage. . .

EDIT: if you absolutely MUST have a Corolla hybrid, get it in BLACK or maybe MAG GRAY.

 

It’s been 4 months. I washed my car today. We both feel better.

 

And just think -- if you had one of those Corolla Hybrids, you wouldn't have been able wash that "smile" off of its face. . .

 

Toyota seems committed to building some seriously ugly vehicles. It’s plastic paint and sheet metal on the outside; the car itself and engine are solid and very reliable; that’s what really matters. So why the strange exterior styling?

 

Amen to that. It also seems to me that it goes in cycles. To my eye, for example, the previous generation Camry was a nice, clean design. The current one is a cluttered, insectoid monstrosity (IMO of course...). Corollas have gone pretty-ugly-pretty too. Again, to my eye, the Priuses, since Gen-2 anyway, have sort of stayed in a class of their own, neither too pretty nor too awful. Maybe it's that they exhibit enough function in the outward design (aerodynamics, mostly) that the look is less important. But yeah, I think Toyota needs to step up the random urinalysis program over at the design department. . .

 

The rot with PRIUS v started with the 2015 model - I was considering one, but thought I'd check out the better equipped, safer new model - till I saw how ugly it's face was.
vs

Then PRIUS Gen 4 came - I forgot about the idea of a "v". I didn't need the 7 seats, just the thought of having a larger interior as I was dreaming about a camping conversion.

 

Another twist on this question. In comparing the stats on these cars, I noticed what I thought at first must by an error on Toyota's site. The passenger volume is listed as 88.6 cubic feet on the 2020 Corolla, including the hybrid, whereas on the just-retired previous car, it was 97.5! That would mean that a cube more than two feet on each side has disappeared from inside the Corolla. Surely they didn't just give up almost ten cubic feet of interior volume!

Turns out, they did.

I sent an email inquiry to Toyota, and this is what they sent me back. Apologies for the size. AS you can see, this new Corolla HAS lost 10 cubic feet of interior space. It's now hardly any larger than Yaris, which sports 85.9 cubic feet of space. I wasn't exactly in the market (my Prius isn't three months old yet...), but this just totally obliterates any passing interest I had in the car. I'm also suspecting that the less-attractive, made-by-Mazda Yaris is living on borrowed time. . .

 

It was trying to fit a ,medium dog crate in our 2008 Corolla that directed us to get a 2017 Prius instead of a new Corolla at that time.