Considering Prius, questions for Gen4 owners

I believe the CVT also masks some of the altitude power loss, compared to traditional transmissions.

As long as one is not yet flooring the gas, the engine can compensate for this loss merely by spinning up to higher RPM. This need for higher RPM is blatantly obviously with manual transmissions, where I needed to downshift one or two gears (depending on which car I was driving and how it was geared) when climbing at 10,000+ feet in CO, compared to the same slopes near sea level. This might be a bit less obvious with ordinary automatic transmissions. But it is transparent with the Prius eCVT, unless one pays close attention to the differing engine noise.

This no longer applies once the gas pedal hits the floor, but I generally don't do that.

I don't live in CO, but even in my world, 5K feet isn't 'altitude'. Coming from the east, you won't be experiencing meaningful altitude. That is only west of Denver.

For someone coming from 1980s econocars (my first Prius replaced a 1986 Honda Accord, which was far peppier than my 1984 Ford), my Gen3 Prius is not at all underpowered. Anyone who thinks it is, must have been taken in by the 1990s+ horsepower wars.

 

Seriously, even grocery shopping is more fun, and allergy shots, too!