Toyota Prius Test Drive

Cars.com experts take the Toyota Prius out for a test drive to review its important new features.

Toyota Prius Test Drive Hi! I'm David Thomas of Cars.com and this is the 2010 Toyota Prius. If you haven’t seen one before, you’re probably hiding under a rock. What's new for this year is the car gets 50 miles per gallon combined. It also packs a new technology and it’s pretty affordable. The overall shape of the Prius is very much the same as before, probably the front end is much more aggressive looking. If you walk around the back though, it’s almost identical to the previous generation. The real story of this car though is the efficiency. Whenever anyone asks me about the new Prius, they always ask “Does it really get 50 miles per gallon?” And the simple answer is “Yes, it does.” We’ve tested this car over 100 of miles in different weather, in different traffic and it always returns at least 50 miles per gallon. To get 50 miles per gallon is pretty simple. You turn the car on and just go. The Toyota has actually four different driving modes in this car. There's a Normal mode which is just on when you start the car. There's an Eco mode which adjusts the air conditioner and some other settings. So, you get a little better mileage here and there. There's a Power mode. It’s a little more responsive. Offers little more thrilling ride although it’s really not that thrilling and then there's an EV mode. EV mode is all electric. Now, you can’t use it all the time. You get that if your battery is fully charged and it can only go up to 25 miles per hour. Then bumper to bumper traffic the other day, I use it for about two and a half miles but I got my mileage up to 60. There are three different screens that Toyota uses to show you how you get the best fuel efficiency drive in this car. However, I don’t find most of them that useful. What I do like, it kind of shows the correlation between what your right foot is doing on the gas pedal, how fast you're going. If you're trying to go too fast, it will show you you're not getting the best efficiency and if you're going just right, getting the maximum efficiency. That one I do like a lot. Because your eyes are focused up on the display screen so much in this car, Toyota has built in this new technology called Touch Tracer and it’s standard across the Prius lineup and basically your steering wheel controls have this nice rubber pads for volume control the stereo controls, as well as the temperature and the trip computer and that cool fuel efficiency display. Now, what it does is you kind of just lightly press before you actually press down on the button and the display will pop up over your speed and show you what you're about to press. The point is you shouldn’t be looking down at your steering wheel. You keep your eyes as close to the road as possible. In that way, you know you're hitting the right button. The biggest improvement with the new Prius is how great a daily driver it is. The ergonomics are improved, the interiors are really nice, it’s spacious and there's a lot of cargo room too. The Prius is the best selling hybrid on the market and I can take and look at the 2010, I can see why. For more car related news, go to Cars.com or our blog KickingTires.net.