Real driving MPG?

48 MPG on my last trip. 70 MPH

 

With my 2006 Gen II I get 44 to 59 mpg without trying. The Gen III does even better than that. Obviously, the type of driving makes a huge difference. I get the high fifties on two lane roads with 55 mph speed limits and with warm weather. The low forties come from highway driving in the winter. If you do everything wrong, and the stars cross and conspire against you with traffic jams and cold weather, you *may* be able to force your mileage down into the high thirties, but it's very hard to get it that low.

Tom

 

I have a 2010 and get about 55 without trying and 61 when I concentrate on my driving.

 

From what I've seen (being passed on highways) not all Prius owners try to maximize mileage. Perhaps that's what so amazing, getting 50MPG while just driving reasonably. For me, techniques such as "pulse and glide" are still confusing. I do get the "no jackrabbit starts" and since I have an Echo, slow acceleration is my norm.

Rich N.

 

2010 Prius III with Navi

With over 5,000 miles averaging a little more than 50 MPG, based on miles driven and fuel used, the MPG dash guage is off usually and fairly consistently about 2-3 MPG.

My wife usually get 48-51 MPG when she drives and she does not drive for fuel economy.

I get 55-60 MPG when I drive, at the speed limits or above, and no hypermiling.

Alfon

 

I drive a mixture of highway and city each day. About 21 miles round-trip commute with probably 30 minutes of it in 15-mph max stop-n-go backups, and the rest of it either city driving or 60-70 on open interstate. A true mixture.

Just paying a little attention to trying to glide when I can, I get 50-55 MPG. (This is a 2010 Prius III.) I don't accelerate "slow", but don't take off like I'm trying to beat the guy in the next lane either. (Truly slow acceleration will probably hurt your mileage unless you really know what you're doing. It's counter-intuitive, but true.)

My wife drove 26 miles yesterday with the car out of ECO mode, a passenger, and I think it was in 3 (maybe more) short trips, all city traffic, so the car was warming up a lot. (Though it is summer.) She managed to get only 40 MPG over those miles.

So my "get better mileage" summary is:

1. Maintain tire pressure. I use 40/38.

2. Avoid lots of short trips where the car cools down between.

3. Accelerate firmly, but not like you're racing. (Depending on traffic and terrain, I generally run the gauge to the far right of the ECO area, or into the PWR area a bit. If you're not going to immediately be slowing down again, you should accelerate fast enough to use the engine, not on electric power only.)

4. Look for opportunities to glide: that is when you can let off the gas entirely for a second, then reapply it so that you eliminate the bar. (You'll see the instantaneous MPG at 100.) You can coast for a long time like this without losing much speed, depending on the geography, road, and weather.

5. Don't overuse the battery. It will eventually recharge, probably at an inopportune time. It's cool to "stealth" around a lot when you first get the car, but it's actually bad for mileage.

6. Don't be a slave to the gauges. You are the human and you can look down the road and determine if traffic is flowing or stopping, whether the road turns uphill or downhill, how traffic is behind you, etc. The beauty of the hybrid is that it's the mileage over a trip that matters and sometimes you tradeoff instantaneous mileage for long-term. (You'll learn more as you drive and experiment, and reading these forums.)

7. Keep it in ECO mode and keep the A/C at 78 degrees on hot days. In your house, 78 would be very warm, but in a car with the vents 2 feet from you, it's surprisingly comfortable. The ECO mode further regulates the A/C. (I think having to do with current flow, battery charge, and perhaps acceleration, I don't know exactly.)

8. Your mileage will increase as the car breaks in. Over the first 1,000 miles or so, the tires and car are breaking in and mileage will increase naturally. And of course you are learning things along the way. When I started, I got 50 MPG consistently. Now, I get 55 MPG consistently.

 

I filled the car last night and reset everything. Checked it today after my wife drove it. She refuses to do any thing "special".

The trip is in WV with hills. There is 4 miles of rural rolling hills (1 steep one), 15 miles of 70 mph interstate and then 3 miles of small city driving, with 1 very steep hill. Then she returns. Total of about 44 miles round trip. She showed 46.7 mpg. That's probably about 48 going up and 45 coming back. I did the same route last night and got 51. I allow myself to slow going up hills and practice lifting my foot and reapplying light pressure on the gas at all times when it is advantageous. (This is second nature to me after 3 years of hybrid driving). I do have the 17" wheels.

I took the same trip a few days ago, but travelled the back roads and hypermiled. Still steep but with no traffic I drove between 40 and 55 and got 56 mpg.

The milage is good enough to me that 4 mpg difference for difference in effort that I'm not going to worry about it and will drive it closer to normal in the future. If I can get an average between us of 48 then I'm extreemly satisfied. (Our first 600 miles was around 48.7 with her driving it most.)

 

43 MPG at 75-80 and occasional 90... but what kills me is the frequent acceleration to get rid of left lane bandits
AC on all the time! which costs you some mpg...

 

I'm driving the snot out of my prius (doing an experiment through this tank of gas) and still getting 40.2 mpg as of this morning.

 

I picked mine up yesterday at a dealer 350 miles away with 3 miles on it. Drove it home from Lewiston ID to Vancouver WA which offers only about half the route on interstate. The first half (good for break in) was on state highways with speed limits that for the most part were 55 to 60 but there were at least ten towns where it went down to 25 and we stopped at a few wineries. I always use AC when its over 60 out and yesterday it was 100+ so had it on high (not sure if that matters anymore). Today, I drove about 50 miles at all speeds over to PDX to do errands. I use the power mode quite a bit whenever I am entering the highway or going up hills in town; so not trying at all. The computer said 50mpg and I needed 8 gallons when I filled up. So first fill was exactly the same and based on this web site I am expecting at least as much in the future!

 

no real examples here. my SO drives the SPM, has short in town commutes, runs the A/C all the time and does not drive efficiently in any way other than she does not drive in a extremely aggressive way or anything like that. she does about 47-48 mpg in summer, 42-45 in winter.

im sure you could do worse if you do 75 on the freeway and what not.

 

Are you computing by miles driven and gallons used or relying on your MPG dash guage. Remember mine is off consistently 2-3 MPG with well over 5,000 miles. If I fill up the guage may read 55 MPG and the gallons used and miles driven will be, for instance, 52.8 MPG.

Alfon

 

As Ryan lives in Hawaii, I don't think he will see the "winter blues" mileage those of us in the colder regions suffer Though if his trips are all 2 miles and shut down, he could see some pretty ugly numbers (for a Prius. Still 2-3x what he would get in most cars).

 

Prius should do well in Honolulu. Why? Well, heavy traffic, and relatively low speeds -- you can easily keep under 47 MPH. Also, lots of hills to glide down. My prius has never been to Hawaii, but I have been there a lot. Assuming you commute from something like Hawaii Kai to Downtown, or Kaialua (sic?) to Honolulu, you will be happy.

Going up the hills, you will be lucky to get 30, but going down, you will get inifite. I expect that 60 MPG will be reasonable, assuming you are not stupid.

 

I've only been to Maui, so I don't know if your area is the same, but I don't remember roads like we have in the states. Here in WV I have hills, long drives at 75mph for a couple of hours, etc. I took a trip to Pittsburgh last weekend at 80mph and got 45 mpg. Today I drove the back roads for 25 miles and got 60 mpg. I was trying on that one. The Prius really shines if you have flat ground and 30 to 50 mph roads. I would imagine with an understanding of the hybrid system you would have no problem averaging 57 to 60 in Maui.

 

I am coming from a generation I Prius into a generation III Prius. The difference between the generations is night and day. That said, I can attest that my gas mileage for the current model car ranges between 55 mpg and 60.7 mpg. I drive a mixture of stop-an-go and highway. I usually keep my speeds between 65-68 mph on the highway. The terrain where I live is hilly (I live in central Connecticut) toward the eastern hills.
I did notice something, however, that is strikingly different from the 1st generation Prius. At speeds less than 30 mph, it usually runs solely on battery. While this doesn't seem like a problem, I've noticed time and time again that the charge on my battery goes down, down, down. Once I even got it to be two bars from "zero bars". Should I be concerned? It seems to me that this car runs on more electric than the conventional engine at these lower speeds. Only once in the three weeks I've had the car has my battery been "fully" charged. It usually holds a charge about 1-2 rungs from the top of the battery icon.
Has anyone else had a similar experience?
Keepin' it Green in CT

 

Last time I checked, Hawaii is a state, and has been since 1959.

In Honolulu, there are hills, and there are flat regions. For example, when I go there I stay in Waikiki and commute to Ewa Beach. The drive is about 25 miles each way, with non-traffic travel time of about 50 minutes. That is good for the prius.