Interesting "head to head" of the 2023 Prius and 2023 Hybrid Corolla.

It it weird that the fuel economy of the 2023 has dropped from the 2022.

 

corolla is probably a much more comfortable car as well

 

There is a reason they are not selling Prius in Europe any more - in the US it does rely on the name plate quite a bit. On roads, I am lucky to find 10 Prius cars per year, but I have no issue finding 5 new hybrid Corollas per day.

To MPG, I would not be surprised if the difference is pretty much non-existent when you compare Prius and Corolla HB FWD. The only major difference, I would expect, is a better, newer platform.

I am quite excited to get my hands on a new Prius ... the wait for more information on price and availability is getting quite long.

 

According to Edmunds TCO, I put in 2022 Prius Prime (there was no 2023 option) and 2023 Corolla Hybrid and the Corolla is only about $500 cheaper to own and operate in 5 years than the Prime, at least by their calculations.

I wished there were a Corolla Prime and Camry Prime, and in the USA. (And that they offered wagon versions of those cars, with a stick shift. Ya I'm weird.)

 

They went from 195mm wide 15" alloy wheels on the 2022, to 215mm wide (IIRC), 16" steel wheels on the 2023 LE. The SE has 17" wheels. This is probably the major reason why gas mileage is substantially worse.

 

I test drove a Corolla and the test drive convinced me to look at the Prius.

Not saying the Corolla is a bad car. I liked:
- Reasonably attractive looks for what it is, especially the SE
- Good cabin space
- The trunk is amazing, tons of room. Almost as much as my old Lexus ES.
- Amazing price
- Amazing reliability, rated #1 by CR out of all cars on the road

What I didn't like:
- Power was a bit lacking compared to what I would like. Fine for around town if flat driving. Uphill driving more painful if trying to stay in ECO zone. And getting up to speed or passing on the freeway was also a bit painful. You could do it. So yes, it had enough power. But for me, that's flooring it to get adequate power which I didn't care for.
- Mileage decline vs 2022 which had a reputation for getting 60+
- Steering felt dead. I've heard that and never knew what it meant until I drove the Corolla. Wasn't terrible, but I didn't care for it
- Suspension felt cheap. It wasn't bad. But yeah, you could tell. Stood out to me.
- The digital display on the instrument cluster is very, very small for the LE

My two main objections were:
- Power. I wanted more
- Tiny digital display on the instrument cluster

And as an aside I was annoyed by the worse mileage vs 2022.

Prius has more power, much larger instrument cluster display, and better mileage. So I put my deposit down on the Prius LE.

I would have got the Corolla Hybrid LE w/ the convenience package.

The Prius LE comes out to around $3500 more, which seemed worth it to me.

Corolla Hybrid is still a fantastic car to get if on a tighter budget and you are not spoiled by other cars. I would heartily recommend it for that price range.

 

I totally agree.

• I haven't had a car I felt was underpowered since my 1984 naturally aspirated 1.6L diesel VW Golf with about 54hp (but I think mine had less than that)
• Although the 1972 VW Super Beetle felt more powerful, and with "enough power" for me even though it was rated at 48hp.
• My 1993 Mazda 323 with 82hp had plenty of power.
• Currently I hardly ever get out of "eco mode" in the 200hp Avalon, and even then I never floor it as the car has way too much power. Of course it weighs a lot more than the other cars, so it's not an apples to apples comparison exactly.

I don't get why people always complain how everything is "so underpowered". I don't think there'll be cars that are fast enough to satisfy everyone until cars pull enough G's to make people pass out.

Of course I the weird one, since my philosophy is "go the speed limit." Even when passing another car, I won't pass it if I have to go over the speed limit to do so. I've got lots of steep mountain passes, but the speed limit is usually 45mph or less. Sure, if you want to speed up those steep ones at 60mph like a lot of the maniacs on the roads these days, yes, you need more power. But even the ol' 1972 Super Beetle would go up the mountain passes here in Colorado at the speed limit, no problem. I could even go up a lot of the passes usually at (or at least close to) the speed limit in a 30,000lb GVWR parially loaded truck with a 200hp engine.

 

One thing I notice from spec sheets is the Corolla and Prius have almost identical leg room, front and rear. Sadly, neither have as much leg room as the Avalon I currently own. Even the newest Camry has less leg room than it, but more than the Corolla and Prius. As a family with two teen boys, having more leg room is nice.

 

The Prius NP is gone from Europe because of assembly location and taxes. Which leads to a steeper price difference between the two models. In the US, Corolla hybrid sales are lower because of poor selection. The hatchback isn't available as a hybrid, and there isn't even an ICE wagon available. Some have chosen the Prius simply because it's a hatchback in a land of SUVs.

The cars are close in size and weight, with the same drive trains. The Corolla just has higher air drag. Outside of high speed travel, they should be close. The 2L in the Prius was in the Corolla first.

Ah, that would reduce fuel economy. Though I'd expect that to be an across the board decrease, while the 2023's loss is all on the highway test.

Curious, what car are you coming from?

Past Prius owners won't be fazed by the power out. My commute is about a 500ft elevation change, and the 2005 Prius never had an issue.

I think it comes down to three things; marketing, perception, and ignorance.

Marketing includes auto journalists. People that get to drive high end sports cars one day, then a family sedan the next, and then write about it for millions to read.

A car can feel slow when it isn't. Best example of this is in cars where you sit higher. The further from the road surface, the slower speeds feel. Other aspects of the car can cause this perception difference.

Which leads to ignorance. The person's issue with a car may not be with the power, but they don't know the terms of what they are dissatisfied with.

 

The Prius is just an upscale Corolla in my book. Corolla LE Hybrid is the winner for value/utility, but the base Prius LE definitely does compete with the Corolla XLE (I would argue better value than the Corolla XLE). Once you cross over into the Prius XLE and Limited territory and AWD models it's really not so budget friendly anymore.

 

4th gen Lexus ES (200ish hp) and a 3rd gen Audi A6 (250ish hp). I also recently drove a 3rd gen Prius for about a year.

My experiences and what I've learned about what I want in my next car:

• Most freeway onramps where I live are uphill and there's a few that can be dangerously short. I'd have to floor it in some cases to safely merge with the Prius. I want something that doesn't feel like a struggle / flooring it to merge. The ES is fine, and the Audi no problem.
• It's hilly where I love. At certain lights where it is uphill, I'd have to push the Prius into power mode with a lot of drone to keep up with traffic which I didn't like.
• There's a lot of 2 lane highways nearby (out in rural areas) and having the power to pass slower people (some people go very slow) on the sometimes shorter passing zones is very nice. For this, it comes down to convenience and safety. You ideally want to spend as little time in the incoming lane as possible when doing passes. With a car with less power, I had to be far more conservative and picky about passing and there were many opportunities that I couldn't take because of the lack of power. Driving behind slow people on these 2 lane highways can be frustrating.

I think you are right about existing Prius owners not being bothered by the Corolla power since it is more than existing models.

Given that the new Prius has around 200hp, it should feel like the ES. While there is a very noticeable difference between my A6 and ES, the ES is adequate for most situations. The A6 is "nice to have" territory for sure

 

That certainly was the case for 4th gen Prius and 2019+ 4th gen Hybrid Corolla.
I had 2019 Corolla and two years later I "upgraded" to Prius PHV; I am guessing 2023 Corolla vs. Prius 2023 would be a bit bigger difference in details and ride quality.
Technology wise it's kinda questionable Corolla can have 10" HUD, 12,3" instrument cluster and 10,5" infotainment screen + option for adaptive suspension compared to Prius 7" instrument cluster, no HUD and 12,5 infotainment.

To me, it feels like they made Corolla pretty much way too awesome, and it did affect sales of Prii in a big way. BTW, they make Corollas locally and Prius is manufactured only in Japan, right? That might contribute to price / value ratio as well.

 

Just a reminder that Europe Corolla =/= USA Corolla. Corollas over here don't have any of that tech. No HUD, 7" instrument cluster, 8" infotainment screen, no adaptive suspension.

 

The engineers aren't in control.
The accountants and marketing managers ARE.

Would it surprise you to know that way more people buy a car for the LOOKS than for technical superiority ??

 

Calling a Prius an upscale anything makes me laugh

 

Oh, that was painful information to read
In that case, Prius makes a lot of sense, even it is just because Toyota is supplying US market much more differently.