You know, in times like these, consumers like you could really use a break. Sure, inflation’s slowed, but everything still costs more than we’re used to, so some new budget options would be great. Well, say hello to the 2025 Chrysler Voyager, which promises to be — wait a sec, why on earth does it cost $350 more than a base 2024 Pacifica yet have styling from 2016?
Yes, Chrysler seems to be weaseling its way around a slight price hike by bringing back an old Plymouth nameplate. The new base-model Pacifica is the Voyager, and you can tell by the fact that equipment levels are similar to those of the base-spec 2024 Pacifica Touring. Same 10.1-inch touchscreen infotainment system, same active safety features, even the same wheels. The Voyager does add leatherette upholstery and a bigger center console from 2024’s Pacific Touring L trim, but at the same time, standard heated seats aren’t mentioned in the press release, so who knows how big of a feature jump we’re actually looking at?
Actually, do you know what doesn’t carry over from the 2024 Pacifica Touring? The entire front end. Yes, the Voyager gets the headlights, bumper, and grillework from the old 2017 Pacifica, along with the taillights, making this new van look like an old van. Oh, and don’t even think the model name is new to Chrysler either because the Chrysler Voyager was available for retail customers earlier in this generation of vans.
Chrysler claims that the Voyager is “a budget-friendly option under $40,000 with a starting U.S. manufacturer’s suggested retail price (MSRP) of $39,995 (excluding destination charge).” Frankly, that’s a bit of a stretch for two reasons. Firstly, is it really such a budget-friendly option when you can walk into a Stellantis dealer and buy a 2024 Pacifica Touring for less? Secondly, nobody gets to skip out on the destination charge, so let’s call the price what it really is — $41,690 including freight.
If you’re doing the math, that’s $2,555 more than a 2024 Toyota Sienna LE, $1,795 more than a nicely equipped 2025 Kia Carnival LXS, and only $205 more than a Kia Carnival Hybrid, the latter of which will pay its own premium back after just a few fill-ups. Sure, second-row stow-and-go is incredibly practical, but is it worth this sort of premium on a van that dates back eight years if we’re talking start-of-production?
Don’t let any of this marketing hoopla distract you from the fact that the cheapest Chrysler minivan is now $350 more expensive than it was for the outgoing model year. Possibly the richest line in all of this is in the media release, stating “Chrysler remains committed to the minivan segment Stellantis created more than 40 years ago with a full minivan lineup for 2025.” That’s a whole lot of words to say that Chrysler only sells two vehicles and they’re technically the same damn vehicle. Come on, Stellantis. Chrysler deserves better.
(Photo credits: Chrysler)
Support our mission of championing car culture by becoming an Official Autopian Member.
-
The 2025 Toyota Sienna Gets A Vacuum And A Fridge, Is Officially Now A Studio Apartment
-
I Went To A British Duke’s Ball In A $600 Minivan And $35 Tuxedo And It Was Absurd
-
The 2025 Kia Carnival Hybrid Is Theoretically More Expensive Than A Toyota Sienna Hybrid, Might End Up Being Cheaper
-
Minivans Have The Hardest Life Of Any Car, So It’s Time To Stop Calling Them Uncool
-
Let’s Remember The Hilariously Half-Assed Engineering Solution Ford Devised To Compete With The Chrysler Minivan’s Dual Sliding Doors
Got a hot tip? Send it to us here. Or check out the stories on our homepage.
This is the rental spec, leather seats for better cleaning basically.
Mine is the Touring L Hybrid that costed me 52,000 – 7500= 44,500 with better interiors (plastic look cheaper in this one) and updated look.
This should be $36,900 if they want to grab customers from other segments and advertise as the cheapest option.
Stellantis can’t seem to understand that we’re in a new era, where people don’t expect that they can walk in and talk the price down 10%. Customers are going to see that 41k+ number for their “budget” option and not even bother to walk in and take a look. It’s hard to find a Sienna or Odyssey for that number, but most people are going to try.
37k is probably the golden number here. It’s a pre-refresh design from 2017 for crying out loud.
They should call it the Voyageur, with “Portage” for the PHEV given the amount of time it will be carried around on a flatbed tow truck.
Not the first time a car company has pulled out an old front end for a model. Oldsmobile in 1998 made a version of the Eighty Eight called the Regency which used the pre 1995 chromed egg crate grill instead of the newer Aurora style grill.
Didn’t VW do something similar for the very last Beetles in Mexico? They de-modernized some of the trim.
The 2004 Ultima Edicion (last 3,000 Beetles built) re-instituted a lot of the chrome that had been dropped over the years – chrome bumpers, chrome wheel covers, chrome mirrors, chrome body side molding, chrome running board molding, enameled Wolfsburg crest on the hood, chrome headlight trim, and wide whitwall tires.
They also came in two paint colors taken from the New Beetle option range, Aquarius Blue or Harvestmoon Beige
Wasn’t the Eighty Eight Regency the top trim and Olds’ way to attract the customer base that mourned the loss of the Ninety Eight? The kind of customers that would’ve only recognized the Rocket badged vehicles as Oldsmobiles?
Uhg. I am a van person, and I like the Pacifica, but this this does look awful. It makes me sad inside.
You didn’t even edit the first sentence of your piece, which is understandable, but the whole piece feels like Jalopnik filler. 1% price increase and there’s some added content and some lost content (fascia) and you didn’t really do any math. Not highly informative, not very entertaining
Yeah… yeah. Inflation sucks but year-over-year if a $39,700 unit turned into $40,000, you (the buyer) are still ahead of inflation as it is right now.*
*I didn’t independently verify these numbers, just that… this post seems like a big deal of outrage over “minivan price announced, is priced like a minivan”
Well, the non-heated seats, no power foldaway mirrors, no LED headlights and no fog lights are also lost content. You are effectively getting less for more + a different nameplate and older styling to remind everyone with the least bit of knowledge in cars that you went with the cheapest (but not really) option.
That’s when you realize the “1% price hike” is far from true.
If they had just left the Pacifica nameplate and styling alone I would’ve agreed with pricing, but as it is you’re effectively paying more for less compared to 2024MY.
It’s a balance but I’d argue the equipment offered is more important to shoppers. Do most base minivans have adaptive cruise like the voyager does?
Also there are heated steering wheel and heated seats mentioned in the press release. I think the author just missed that when reading it.
Just keep digging Stelantis – the bottom is down there somewhere
Honestly I don’t know how they managed to stay alive up to this point. Especially now, when the budget brand decides to luxury price all their crap.
It’s like Stellantis is trying to go out of business. Maybe they’re doing the George Costanza reverse of everything they think is right.
I think the price hike is a little bit of a self-red-herring (even with the warmed-over parts bin parts), when the real frustration is that it’s priced too high for being warmed over and cursed with the stench of Stellantis “quality.”
Don’t let the reputation scare you: Stellantis has their problem vehicles, but the Pacifica has mechanically been very solid.
Gas Wranglers
Ram 1500
Pacifica
Charger
300
Challenger
Durango
Any of these vehicles are absolutely capable of a 300,000 mile life with very little issue, despite what the internet likes to say.
I’m glad you didn’t include the Town & Country, whose inability to start when we had it as a rental (full of the important stuff you don’t put in a moving van) is the vehicle that will cause me to never, ever buy anything from Stellantis.
As much as the PHEV concept was great for a van, the adverse effect that it’s had on the perceived reliability of Pacificas has been a serious problem from Chrysler.
Yep. And Pacificas in particular have heat exchange issues with their V6s due to a flawed design from their cramped engine bay leading to frequent head gasket failures below 100,000 miles. Assorted electrical issues abound as well. We just bought a used minivan ourselves, and the Pacifica was a non-starter for me to begin with based on friends’ and acquaintances’ experiences with them.
If I end up with head gasket failures, I will be very, very annoyed.
The Stratus (blower of many a gasket) my dad had when I was a kid is the reason no one in our family has touched a Chrysler till I bought the van.
I had good service out of the only Stellantis product I owned since 2010, but that doesn’t justify paying more for a warmed over, decontended Pacifica. Some people will play the inflation card and yada yada, but removing several features + using pre-refresh parts while also daring to increase MSRP is just doing your best to keep customers away from your products.
The new CEO can’t come soon enough
Honestly, I’m pretty excited for it. Thats how bad Stellantis has been to us lately.
At least its not another 70K electric car, 50k subcompact crossover, a mildly refreshed Heavy Duty when the competition left us in the dust 3 years ago on those.
It’s been 4 years of Stellantis asking us dealers what we would like, we answer them, and they deliver the exact opposite. This at least is the first sign of them going somewhat in the right direction, even with the absolute audacity of them using the same front clip that came out in 2016.
As it stands, for the past year the only way to get a pacifica with leather and heated seats was to pay 45 grand because of required packages.
In a way, it just got 5 grand easier for me to get someone a new minivan with that magic leather/heated seat/heated wheel/remote start package.
On the other hand, what we’ve been actually asking them for was a basic transportation minivan in the 30k range, because we havent had that in 5 model years.
But this is just life with Stellantis. You guys think YOUR sick of the bullshit, pull up a barstool, let me buy you a beer, and I’ll tell you a tale of what it’s like to work under this regime. I will have you actually feeling bad for a car salesman.
$30k seems a little low for a fully functional minivan these days. That’s Civic money.
But if there were a $30k minivan that wasn’t a complete penalty box, I’d consider it as a utility / dog vehicle. I was seriously tempted by the Kia Carnival the last time I shopped and I don’t even have kids.
Just that Range, for example: At the end of the Grand Caravan’s production, sticker on an SE was about 27k
Thats about 33K in todays money. Right now my cheapest 8 person hauler is well past 40 grand.
I do not envy your position.
Don’t get me wrong, I still love my job. I meet people every day. I play with cars every day. I make enough to support a family.
But man, I long for back in 2019. We had fresh product. Everything we sold was pretty damn reliable. I had a car for every budget. Leasing was strong. Banks were generous with their rates. FCA paid us well, and they at least seemed commited to building better cars. I didnt have to set up email addresses and download apps on customer’s phones just so the dealership could stay in compliance. I didn’t have to explain to boomers daily that V8 half ton Rams are gone and not coming back anytime soon.
Well I hope Stellantis pulls their heads out of their asses sooner rather than later.
I bought my Sienna in 2016, but not before checking out the Canadian Value Package Dodge Caravan.
It was a miracle at about $21,000 Canadian. That’s $15,400 USD.
They could put any family in a new minivan.
We wanted power doors, which would have more than doubled the price, and would have been more expensive than the Sienna
Consider yourself lucky you went with the Sienna. We went with same package on our 2016 Caravan as we wanted something as basic as possible (kids are gross, couldn’t justify going high end). Haven’t cracked 100K on it and I’ve had to replace the transmission, the oil cooler assembly, and several rocker arms due to the notorious Pentastar tick. Holding on to it out of spite now.
Yeah, definitely no regrets going with the Sienna. At about 125km, I haven’t done much outside of routine maintenance.
The biggest issue I’ve had is with a slow leaking AC. I just add about half a pound every spring.
The powertrain has been remarkable. Just oil changes and an occasional air filter.
That’s just it! A lot of people just need something safe and reliable, and with room for a bunch of kiddos. I used to be able to make that happen for about 400 bucks a month. Now people have LESS money available for a car, and the prices have shot through the roof.
400 a month was a brand new minivan in 2016.
Now, it’s a 100,000 mile used vehicle.
Hate to bring the Civic up again, but when I was recently shopping I was interested in them. At the advertised interest rate they were offering a few months ago with excellent credit and $10k down, it was going to be over $400/month for 60 months.
Having bought a Civic new in 1998, this was a tough number to swallow. I’m not really willing to stretch the finance terms, and I’m not willing to hand over a down payment that would pay for a perfectly functional car by itself. I leased this time for the first time ever.
[Pulls up stool]
Interview me. I’ve got stories lmao
Chrysler is the Taco Bell of car companies
Ew. Harsh. Accurate, but harsh. I ate there for the first time in years the other day. My son had such bad diarrhea afterwards he had to stay home from school the next day.
I survived on $1 Taco Bell burritos through grad school.
Beggars can’t be choosers. Sometimes you just gotta suck it up and endure. Like Stellantis products.
Chrysler doesn’t have a product nearly as compelling as the Crunch Wrap Supreme.
Or Mountain Dew Baja Blast.
How dare you say such things about Taco Bell.
Chrysler is the Denny’s of car companies. The only place where the food is so bad you can’t eat it, but they still demand that you pay in full.
That’s the Chrysler experience right there.
Forty grand is too much. Full stop.
I say this knowing I can afford that for a new car. I just really, really don’t want to. And even though there are cars out there that I really, really want and am even fantasizing about buying at that price, I just won’t.
This is the hill my motoring budget will die on. Forty grand is too much.
Near me, the Pacificas have nearly $10k on the hood, at least advertised on the website. Can’t imagine that will stop with the “new Voyager”.
“Chrysler remains committed to the minivan segment Stellantis created more than 40 years ago with a full minivan lineup for 2025.”
Go home Stellantis, you’re drunk.
You didn’t exist when Chrysler Corporation dropped the minivan as we know it on the world in 1984. As a Dodge model.
May the ghost of Lee Iacocca come haunt you in your sleep, Carlos Tavares.
This makes me want to Voyage to my local Honda Dealership for an Odyssey.
Sure you can get a 2024 for less now, but that’s true of any model one year to the next, regardless of the name and whatever marketing jargon they’re doing. The price increase seems within a normal margin nowadays, so I think it’s reasonable to say the Chrysler minivan on a high level is up that small amount. Granted Kia just put out 2025 Telluride pricing and the base price stayed the same, and it’s been introduced and updated much more recently.
The Pacifica is one CDJR product that I also doubt will have 2024s still on the lots in September of 2025, they generally turn quicker and there’s so few on the lots now as there is.
Seeing a 4 at the start of the price is a bit of a shock all the same. Taking away and then bringing back the name in general is odd, it seems like just a ploy to have more than one/two models displayed on the website again, maybe for when they finally take the 300 off.
Hopefully they bring back the 200 next!
It may look like the 200, but they’ll go back to calling it the Sebring. For consistency.
Give me a Chrysler Breeze Expresso!
If they really want to tug the nostalgia strings, bring back the Reliant and Aries.
Valient or Saratoga?
I’ll take a Spirit R/T!
Is there something in the Chrysler dealer agreements that say they must have two models to sell or something? “See dealers, two cars!
I actually like the old front end better, but this is an odd move.
How about you make them reliable and don’t have the paint bubble up on the hood?
Can’t be, the 300 went away in 2023, so the Pacifica was the only model they had in the US for all of the 2024 model year (technically they also had the Voyager all along, but it was only for fleet sales until now, aside from two model years of retail availability from 2020-2021)
Yeah but I’d venture to guess that the 300 also was still on the lot in a bunch of places till last week 😉
The 300 is still on the website though, and the PHEV is broken out as a separate model, so it almost seems like it’s a move to fill a quota of models once they take the 300 down. And I think 300 inventory is sold down more than other LX cars so I could see that happening sooner than the Dodges.
The LX cars were more of a runout, most other 2023s that are definitely on lots still only see mention on the incentive pages (Hornet, GC 4xe), or aren’t mentioned at all (Renegade is off completely, Wagoneer only 2024)
You can put anything you want on a website, but there were no 2024 MY 300s built, production ended in late 2023 with the 2023 MY being extended a few months longer than usual
I am aware – just saying it’s still an active model you can spec on the site and purchase per the manufacturer, regardless of model year.
You can try and spec it, anyway, but you’re going to be stuck with what’s left in inventory from nearly 12 months ago. Chrysler only left it on the site to help make their model range look less pathetic and distrac from the fact that they pulled another Stellantis, in dropping a model without any replacement in sight
Yep, that’s kinda the point – there’s no change to the van lineup in the grand scheme, just moved a trim to a separate nameplate to look like they have more on offer than they do.
Yes, this is the better front end styling.
Technically, Chrysler sells three vehicles that are all the same vehicle, because the Voyager is called the Chrysler Grand Caravan in Canada (and has been consistently available for retail sale there, while the Voyager was fleet-only in the US from 2022-2024)
WTF is going on over there at Chrysler? They’ve out Mitsubishi’d Mitsubishi at this point.
In 2019, when I was looking to buy a minivan, I gave fairly serious consideration to the Dodge Grand Caravan. A dealer was advertising the base model for under $20,000. Sure, that was below MSRP, probably included some incentives I wouldn’t have qualified for, didn’t have the stow ‘n go, and I’m sure lacked anything nice at all.
Still, it was a new minivan for under $20,000. That’s a budget/base model, just five years ago.
And no, I didn’t buy it. Got a much nicer used minivan from another brand in the same price range. So maybe that’s why they don’t bother selling budget models anymore — they just can’t compete with off-lease vehicles from reliable brands.
This wise guys in the C-suites at Stellantis are just the bees knees. I mean, who could come up with such a genius plan to sell an outdated model for more money and say they are offering a full line up of vans….Such a long way to fall from the olden days of the Plymouth Voyager.
So you get more and better features than the base Pacifica for $300 more, plus you get better styling in the deal?
I guess I’m not seeing the outrage here. Comparing MSRPs to Toyota and such is ridiculous given the immense difference in actual selling prices.
When in doubt, Chrysler never does anything right, and the companies that:
do everything right.
That’s the name of the game, duh.
Don’t forget the Pacifica is absolute junk anyways, despite the gas-only vans being extremely reliable vehicles compared to the not-often sold Hybrid!
/s
Did you just call the 3.6 Pentastar V6 reliable? Ooof.
Got more proof looking over my counter at work than anyone does online.
My only complaint is that they skimped and used the front clip from the base model. At least give us the MUCH more handsome front end from the the upper trims. I guess they didn’t want to shell out for the fancier headlights with the LED running strips.
The siennas are massively expensive for sure, but all our nutso CJDR dealers still seem to be reluctant to deal on Pacificas (or really anything).
Honestly, I would have guessed this were a prank. Just an outright stupid move here.
Oh boy, something I’m uniquely qualified to comment on!
I own one of those earlier Voyagers (as I’ve probably stated 1000x on this site). Yes, this was Chryslers attempt to separate the lower trims from upper trims to… well pretend that they were selling two models instead of one. I personally own an LXi, which was a fleet only trim that brought vinyl seats and Stow N’ Go to the Voyager that typically didn’t get those features.
Bringing the Voyager name back for the second time in the same generation of van is flat out bizarre. And with the old face on it! Which honestly is a positive, but how Chrysler is getting off selling what looks like the older van, for the same price as the newer van, is even more bizarre.
While I love my van, Jesus does Stellantis test my patience with this nonsense.
Huh, somehow they made the least-appealing minivan even less appealing. Well done Stellantis!
Hey now! We have Stow N’ Go damnit!
That’s the only thing that made us even look at the Chrysler vans when we bought our Odyssey, but the rest just wasn’t up to the competition for us.
I’ll admit, it was the whole “the Chrysler is 21k and the Odyssey is 30k” that made me choose the Chrysler. For comparable year/mileage. I still nearly pulled the trigger on the Odyssey, but the price gulf between the two was outrageous.
It appears I got lucky, as I bought it from a local dealer who didn’t seem to know exactly what these fleet Voyagers were worth, as these were the first examples coming into the market. Two months later similar vans were being listed for 26k at the same dealer.
Stow N Go keeps making me look at the Pacifica every couple weeks online, before I go to a forum and see all the complaints.
Reliability is definitely something I took a risk on, but the van now has 82k on it. So far so good. My understanding is that for the most part the regular Voyager and Pacifica are fine. But watch out for the PHEV.
And a new slogan from the Stellantis Marketing Team…..
The new 2024 Chrysler Pacifica, “For the most part, it’s fine”.