The second-gen Toyota Prius (2004-2009) was cyber-bullied for years, particularly by automotive journalists. I was not one of them, but I did not stand up and defend the poor little hybrid hatchback; instead, I sat there and laughed. Laughed. Like some kind of heartless schmuck, I probably even commented about how much of a “beigemobile” this “anti-car” was. But now, over a decade later, I can no longer hold in the guilt — I need to apologize to the second-gen Prius on behalf of the car-enthusiast community. We need to make this right.
If the second-gen Prius never forgives us, I’ll understand. Even if its owners were often entitled greenies perched on the lankiest of high-horses, why does the car deserve the hatred? Like a person can’t choose their parents, a car can’t choose its buyer. And yet, we ragged on the poor Prius. For years and years. It was brutal and unjust.
So I don’t open up too many old wounds for the Prius, which is no doubt traumatized by the years of harassment, I’ll cite only a few examples of this unfair Prius harassment. December of 2011, my friend Raphael from Jalopnik wrote the Answer of the Day article Ten new cars we’d take to a demolition derby. Look at entry number eight:
The Prius is not the best car to enter into a demolition derby. The overhangs are tiny, they’re going to get crushed into the engine, and you don’t even know what’s going to happen to the hybrid drive.
The great thing about the Prius is, even when you lose, everybody wins.
When Jalopnik wrote Ten Worst Cars To Have Sex In, it of course included the Prius. Why? Well, because anyone driving such an “uninspiring object” clearly won’t know how to have a bit of fun. From that story:
Let’s just get this right out of the way and acknowledge that no one wants to have sex in a Prius. First of all, it’s tough to get your swerve on in such an uninspiring object, something that’s more consumer good than car. Second, you risk bringing a new life into the world, which will certainly be a waste of precious resources. Third, if you’re a Prius owner, the idea of a car being fun is completely alien to you so you have your 20 minutes of lights-off missionary-position relations in the futon like a proper citizen anyway.
When Neal Pollack wrote Screw You, I Love The Prius back in 2012, a Jalopnik editor had to write this note right up front:
(Part of encouraging a diverse, intelligent car community is attempting to understand those with alternative points of view. In that vein, I invited humorist, car reviewer, Prius owner, and alterna-human being Neal Pollack to write up an explanation for why anyone might love the Prius.
Specifically, I told him over drinks that he was basically a terrible person and completely wrong for enjoying a beige hybrid and he told me to go to Hell. Here’s his half of the story. — Ed.)
Here’s what Johnny Liebermann wrote on The Truth About Cars (one of Jalopnik’s biggest competitors back 15 years ago) in 2008:
As many of you know I manage Autofiends.com . Our unofficial motto (can’t get the tech guys to change the site…) is “No Boring Cars.” Which means as the news of the day rolls in (grist to the mill) I need to parse it to determine what is and what isn’t “boring.” For instance there’s those pics of the new Prius that Jalopnik has whipped itself into its daily frenzy over (). And through the magic of search engine optimization Autofiends could probably get some decent traffic out of the post. More traffic makes the boss happy and (maybe) gets me more money! Only problem: the Prius is dull. Like, rock in sand dull. And not fancy Japanese rocks in Zen sand, but regular Texas Hill Country rocks in Great Plains dust.
The thing about these early car blogs is that they had absolutely absurd amounts of influence on what people thought of certain vehicles. Millions of people read just a few blogs, and the young 20-somethings behind the keyboards often spouted out all sorts of hot takes and random thoughts. Readers couldn’t help but be influenced by these, well, influencers. I was one of these readers; I nodded along every time one of my favorite writers called the Prius a “blob” or a “jellybean” or a “beigemobile.” As a result, for years, in the car enthusiast community, the vehicle was considered the anti-car. But this morning, Matt Hardigree wrote something in The Morning Dump that reminded me of my guilt; here’s the operative quote from his piece:
Then, somewhere along the way, the appliance-like dustbuster second-gen car appeared and it felt like I was supposed to dislike it. In retrospect, that car was cool and I was the dork. I don’t think anyone views hybrids that way anymore, and it’s kind of amazing.
Obviously, I will keep beating the hybrids-are-good drum like Samantha Maloney, but it’s still amazing to me that there’s been such a turnaround.
Matt’s totally right. We were the dorks, and the Prius was the cool kid.
The hate for the Prius was wrong. Obviously, as I said before, much of it stemmed from the holier-than-thou attitudes of its environmentalist drivers, but some of it also stemmed from weird styling and poor vehicle dynamics. Still, we should all have realized what the Prius was: A technological marvel. Just look at the love the BMW i3 gets. It’s a car journalist-favorite; I am about to buy my second because I’m an engineer and I think the i3 is an absolute engineering masterpiece. But why didn’t we see the Prius in that same light 15 years ago?
The thing was fascinating; its powertrain featured an eCVT that — along with world-beating aerodynamics — helped the car get roughly 50 MPG all the while scoring top crash-test scores from IIHS when equipped with its optional side-curtain airbags. I strongly suggest you spend about 8 minutes watching this video, because the eCVT’s function is truly fascinating, using two electric motors and a planetary gearset — all embedded inside the transmission housing — to propel the vehicle forward, either alone or along with the assistance of a 1.5-liter Atkinson Cycle four-cylinder gasoline engine:
Total output from that tiny 1.5-liter engine is just 76 horsepower, 82 lb-ft of torque, but motor output is 67 horsepower, 295 lb-ft of torque, yielding a total system power of 110 horsepower (the two are not additive) — I’m not sure what peak torque is, but it’s probably pretty high given that motor output figure.
Powering the electric motors in that eCVT are 28 7.2-volt Nickel Metal Hydride battery modules (which each are made up of six 1.2-volt cells) that together yield an 86 pound 201 volt pack with a capacity of about 1.3 kWh. It’s an air-cooled pack, as you can see in the image below (those are the ducts on the right side of the pack):
But it’s more than just the tech under the hood/rear bench that makes the 2900-pound hatch compelling; the car’s looks have grown on me (just as the i3’s have), it’s legitimately comfortable and practical, and I think the car is a lot of fun to drive.
I had a chance to pilot my friend’s Prius in Germany, and I was fascinated by the screen that showed me you when I was driving full-electric, when I was generating electricity via regenerative braking, when the gasoline motor is assisting the electric motor, and on and on. It was juts fun to see what was happening, and to adjust my driving accordingly:
I reached out to my friend, Andreas (who has written here before — he’s shown with his wife Josi in the image below) to ask him for his diehard car-enthusiast take on the Prius, and whether or not the thinks the enthusiast world got the Gen II Prius wrong. Here’s what he told me:
I absolutely do and I did so myself before I got one into my life.
I feel like most arguments I can bring for the Prius sound like stereotypes, but I guess they are stereotypes for a reason. It’s simply a bulletproof vehicle that still after all these years has decent fuel economy for it’s size. It’s a roomy car after all (for European standards). It’s comfortable and quick enough for daily driving. And it has it’s own “aura of enthusiasm”, it’s hard to describe but while other cars motivate you to go faster and drive crazier the Prius motivates you to chill and to hypermile.
That may also come from the CVT screaming at you whenever you punch the gas, but you get used to that fairly quickly and once you’re on the autobahn it gets a quiet bachground noise anyways. And I’m still surprised on how technologically advanced it was all these years and how many firsts it had. Keyless entry/go, big touchscreen, navigation, …. I’m not lacking anything even though the car is 20 year old now. I even think it looks pretty good now, maybe that’s because the car industry overall got more and more alien-looking over the years, but I like the clean look and even the stance, especially with the factory magnesium rims. And while it seems a complicated car to work on at first it’s just a regular toyota and parts are cheap and simple. and remember, I even repaired the HV battery.
Yes, that’s right, Germans apparently spell the word “background” with a “ch.” That’s the power of Magnificat.
Andreas continues:
And I know not everybody is able to have multiple cars but I stand by the fact that it’s way better to have different, specialized cars than one car that has to do it all. And if the daily is practical and has good gas mileage then the other cars can be even “dumber”
The only reason I’d like to get rid of it is because I am conviced that whoever is able to use an EV for his daily life should do so, I’m an engineer so energy efficiency is the key criteria for the vehicle that has to do the most miles. But otherwise I’d drive the Prius easily another 220k km (current ODO readout)
and last but not least: literally every single dog in my life loves the Prius like crazy, I don’t know what it is but they all want to ride in it, and who can argue with dogs? they have better senses then we humans
So on behalf of all car enthusiasts who besmirched your name for no good reason, dear gen-two Prius, I’d like to offer my sincerest apologies.
Images: Toyota
I got rid of mine last year. I had to do some vehicle culling. It was an okay car. 286k. I But being a 20 year old car it had some issues. the Seam Seals on the roof were failing. I was also only replacing cells in the hybrid battery pack. After taking the battery out for a 5th time I said no more. I would buy a 2nd gen prius over a Leaf or i3 though. Nothing against being electric its I can get aftermarket battery packs from reputable sources (dorman)
Wait: Dorman is now a reputable source??
it’s been over a decade since I regularly bought parts for anything but German cars, but I had learned to avoid Dorman at all cost as I hate doing a job twice because a cheap part failed. Have they got their shit together now?
Not really, no – but some people may say yes strictly because they’re cheaper. Having worked in auto shops most of my life, I’m a “buy once, cry once” advocate with OEM parts, especially Toyota who are far more rigorous about their suppliers than others.
they bought dayton springs in the past year I havent seen any issues in quality…yet, I have seen issues with stock.
Who isn’t ashamed by some of the things we said and did back then. Thank goodness no one is calling out people on Twitter for 15-20 articles slamming the Prius.
That said, most of my ire had to do with the people driving them; the hypermilers were a particular bugaboo. I’m actually in favor of coasting up to a red light – why waste gas and brake pad material when it’s not necessary – but you need to have situational awareness. Don’t dally when you’re blocking someone’s access to the left turn lane, for instance; if you do, you might force someone behind you to endure a complete light cycle because they couldn’t get the left turn arrow because you’re in the way.
This and other behaviors – like cruising 10 mph under the limit – frequently felt to me like the driver was paying more attention to getting a high score on the MPG meter than watching the traffic around them.
I got one as a rental once, and it was better than a lot of rental cars, except for that CVT motorboat drone. I just hate having the engine speed essentially disconnected from road speed entirely. Maybe it would have been better with something smoother under the hood, like a rotary, but it just felt coarse and cheap, like a Nissan CVT. I know that the Prius acts like that, but it doesn’t mean I find it enjoyable.
Years ago I recommended a used Prius to a relative, and this person is the polar opposite of someone who would be considered a Prius driver…
At first they laughed, but then I broke it down for them and told them how reliable they are and that he basically wouldn’t have to do much maintenance on them… ever.
I also said that because they drive constantly in and around the DC/Baltimore area, wouldn’t they like to spend less on gas?
Throw some good all seasons or snow tires, and it will get them where they need to go in winter.
Now this person is in LOVE with Priuses, and is on his 2nd one.
If anyone can step up and similarly sincerely defend the 1st gen Prius on merits other than having groundbreaking technology under its hood, I’m down for it: I love to read fiction.
It’s like the stylists at Toyota looked at the Echo and thought “there’s room to make it uglier”.
I thought the interior of the 1st gen was kinda neat for its time.
Literally looks like an echo, aka like dogshit.
I’m pretty sure the Porsche Boxster is the worst car to have sex in.
A Boxster might at least entice a potential partner. A Daihatsu Midget (probably) won’t, and in terms of privacy, it’s more like having sex in a phone booth. That might be a turn on for some, though!
The old E36/37 Roadster would like to have a word…
As a kid who grew up on Mother Earth News magazine and its wacky EV/hybrid experiments I’m biased, but after taking a ride in one with my aggressively-driving sister-in-law, I was impressed with how much scoot and zig it has.
My partner drives a silver 2008 Prius. It is the perfect car for her, 100%-not-a-car-person that she is, and she absolutely loves it. If the new-car fairy landed on her shoulder and gave her her choice of new cars, she would just get a new one. Probably also in silver. I named it The Toaster, which she loved, and now everyone refers to her car as The Toaster (it’s perfectly appliance-like, and it kind of resembles a toaster.) I think everyone should call 2nd-generation Priuses Toasters, so I’m mentioning it here. I used to despise them, as they’re deathly dull to drive. That may be true, but I eventually came to give them a lot of respect for being the perfect car for people (like her! and zillions others) who just want a car that will car along, perfectly and at minimal cost, forever.
Long live the Toaster!
Exactly this. Perfect appliance cars for when you wanna get somewhere and not make a hobby of it.
“And not make a hobby of it” – this made me laugh, and will make her laugh when I tell her, too.
I’m still trying to convince her to let me modify it VIP style, with 16″ RS Watanabes, quilted black and grey leather interior, etc. etc. Still no luck.
Ever since I first saw one at the Chicago Auto Show (2010?) I’ve been calling the Nissan Cube a toaster car. In the years since I’ve extended the category to include others with a similar form factor, such as the Kia Soul.
When I saw there was going to be a video I hoped it was going to be Professor Kelly. Those Weber auto videos are absolutely perfect for trying to understand the way Hybrid Synergy Drive works. A DT John Kelly collab would go insane
He also has a 2000s automotive TV voice that goes perfect with the subject matter
Agreed, but I still hated driving it. Coming from anything similarly-sized of that era with proper hydraulic-assist steering, it was like the car had gone to the dentist and was numbed by novocaine.
Also the electric-only A/C did not cut it in TX summer heat. Needed that gas engine on to keep cool.
I agree, the 2nd Gen Prius never deserved our hate and looking back I’m not sure why we (I was young and less able to form my own opinions on things) piled on it in the 1st place. Sure it wasn’t fast or lustworthy but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t a good car. To me a good car is any car that is successful in fulfilling it’s intended purpose and by that measure the Prius achieved greatness. It was efficient, reliable, affordable transportation that wouldn’t require much thought beyond that. Never appealed to the enthusiasts because it was never supposed to.
Very appliance-like, and nowadays, quite roach-like. Just have to define “enthusiast” differently… Toyota modded and ran one at Bonneville when the second gen was launched. I saw it in person at Speed Week that year; it ran something like 130 mph at that time. I believe it has recently gone to the hungry jaws of the crusher.
I still don’t care for the way these look, but they have certainly earned my respect when it comes to durability. These things are absolute cockroaches. Ugly fuel sipping cockroaches, that can haul a surprising amount of shit. And for that, they have earned my respect. I was wrong about them.
David, I’ll give you this one. I’ll have to draw the line, however, if you try to convince us that the fourth-generation car wasn’t the most wretched automotive gargoyle ever unleashed onto an unsuspecting public.
The 4th gen needs more love–apparently it’s the most mechanically reliable generation (jury still out on the new ones, of course). One of those is on my shortlist if my Prius v ever gets totaled.
I like how they had the zig-zag taillights early on, then changed to something more conventional later, and the Primes had different taillights altogether.
As an enthusiast, my prius was the best car I’ve owned. It was great on gas, saving money to spend on my fun cars, I didn’t mind it got banged up at bit, saving wear and tear on my fun cars. I also realized not having to drive my fun cars on a daily basis made me appreciate it more when I did.
Having driven a second gen Prius several times I’d be willing to concede that it’s a very competent appliance.
On behalf of my 2007, I accept your apology.
I’ll give you weird styling, but IMHO the Prius drives better than almost any other small car available, at least at the time. The instant torque from the electric motors makes it feel peppier than most NA fours despite having a two digit HP rating on the gas motor. Honestly, if I have a complaint about the drive quality it would be that they sprung it too tightly and it beats you up a bit on long drives, but then it wasn’t really designed as a highway cruiser.
I think most people who criticize the way it drives have never actually driven one and are just bench racing it on specs that don’t tell the whole story.
Also, and I’m repeating myself, but it’s utterly incredible to me that a car like this came out of Toyota, a company renowned for being behind the curve on powertrain tech. The Prius is full of clever engineering. Sometimes too clever like the bladder-based gas tank, but sometimes also just clever enough like the eCVT. It’s quite an engineering tour de force.
Your last point is what I came in here to say. By the mid-2000s (and continuing until very recently), Toyota had settled into a routine of playing it safe and delivering aggressively mediocre cars that nevertheless sold like gangbusters due to perceived reliability.
The 2nd-gen Prius was not that. It was not “safe”. It was a demonstration of what Toyota was capable of when they actually cared. As a sucker for good technology, I thought this Prius was cool! The haters were just not getting it. It was groundbreaking on so many levels.
It’s still okay to make fun of the first gen a little though, right?
I barely see them (weren’t they only sold in California or something? And certainly in small numbers regardless) so I think I’d be ecstatic to see one regardless
Yes, first gen sucks
I’d gladly take one of those over a mid naught Versa sporting a CVT though.
I have always sung the praises of the first and second gen Prius. I thought they were both fine to drive and I appreciate a vehicle that does exactly what it was supposed to, which the Prius excelled at. It isn’t for me personally and that’s okay. I was behind an elder man driving a first gen Prius a few weeks ago and actually got excited seeing one still in use.
I bought Larry David’s old prius, the one used in the first few seasons of Curb Your Enthusiasm. No joke. Dude gave it away in a contest, a med student at UCLA won it, who wound up getting a job in Madison, and then it started giving him electrical issues, so I picked it up for $1500ish, and this was when a good 2nd gen was $7k+!
The problem wound up being a super easy fix; the battery terminal was loose on the 12v starting battery (not hybrid battery). Because it was student owned, it had a lot of parking damage, so I paid to get the car repainted, put new tires on it, and drove it as a 4th car for a few years.
Now, I love 1st gen Insights! 1800lbs, manual trans, fun to drive, crazy MPG, but…. otoh…. the 2nd gen prius is a great car. 45mpg without even trying, comfortable, tons of storage, good stereo if you get one with the JBL package, and when you fold the seats down in back, it’s big enough for a pair of mountain bikes.
Yeah, it was boring to drive…. but it was ultra reliable, hence why they are used as taxis. Since then I have suggested them to anyone who needs transportation; the best part is you can be picky since htey made so many, and you can use it a few years and sell it for what you paid for it, so they are basically free cars.
You gotta stop talking up 1G Insights before I end up having to buy one……Citrus, with a manual transmission. No no! Closes Facebook Marketplace.
I’m the same way with the manual CR-Z
At one point a friend of mine had 3 first gen Insights. Another friend still has one. I don’t think any of them had working batteries but still put up fantastic fuel mileage.
I thought he was joking about having to drive it everywhere at full throttle and the first time I rode in it I said it was surprisingly spunky as I thought he was just taking it easy; we were still on the Portland (PDX) airport access road after all. He said it should be, it’s been floored since I picked you up!
He literally can’t use 5th gear on the highway unless it’s a slight downhill. But with well north of 200k miles, at least 100k of him driving it like that, it still drives like new with cold A/C (that can’t be on when climbing a hill on the freeway in 3rd gear).
You should do it, and realize why Smart Cars shouldn’t exist in the first place. Insights are superior by every metric 😛
Good luck finding a nice citrus tho! I’ve owned mine since 2013, paid $3k for it with a non working IMA battery, bought a grid charger and do an annual deep discharge to help keep it functional, ice cold AC, upgraded tunes, and the car has paid for itself so many times over that it’s better than free, it actively saves money.
Fun fact for both you and Mercedes – they’re now becoming legal for import from Japan. Seeing how the following is there, as well as their generally better care taken of vehicles, and you may be able to find a really nice Citrus one yet!
Counterpoint: The 2nd gen Prius had that stupid joystick shifter that heralded the current crop of weirdly-designed shifters with nonsensical shift patterns. The Prius killed the PRNDL everyone understood and was comfortable with, and should not be forgiven.
We gotta look into ways to free up center space and move them to the dash though!
I think they still do it better than a lot of things. Not the best, but still usable and understandable.
Was the column shift really that bad?
Depends on the car, I guess. But it definitely occupies the least space in my Prius than in any other vehicle I’ve owned or used so far.
There’s definitely some variants that are change for the sake of change, but I think it’s a good balance of “new” and “intuitive”. In fact, if I hadn’t spent 7 years driving an Econoline, I don’t know if I’d know how to use a column shift. I’m honestly not sure if I’d have found “apply brake, pull level toward me, then up or down” to be intuitive.
3 years ago, we took one in on trade. Well worn, well used, with 260,000 some miles on the odometer. But we took it in for about 2 grand. I decided to take my chances and pick myself up a little gas saver.
I had owned it for all of 3 weeks when my father-in-law lost his trans in his old Escape. I signed over the title and handed him the keys.
3 years later, that thing faithfully gets him from A to B every day, happily chugging along to the tune of 45 mpg, well on past 300,000 miles and all we’ve had to do was both front spindles, tires, and brakes.
What an outstanding little car.
I cosign this and look forward to the rehabilitation of other automotive punching bags of that and subsequent eras.
People are always surprised when I defend these since I put off the image of someone who would hate electric/hybrid based on what I drive. I own a supercharged V8, 2 turbocharged Miatas, and an old S10. The S10 does fine but otherwise fuel efficiency is not something I am familiar with. I have a feeling you can relate.
Your feeling is accurate; I don’t own anything capable of better than 25 mpg or so.
The Prius is the nerd that everyone made fun of in school. But now it’s a 30-year-old retiree because it developed an app instead of partying and it just sold that app for a billion dollars.
Too bad they didn’t have a Prius V back then (that came with the 3rd gen)
I like to think of the Crown Signia as the spiritual successor to the Prius V. Just like the current Prius, it looks good and has good mpg and power now too.
I will think about it if Prius drivers stop driving like Aholes. Every time I see one it is in the left lane doing 90 plus passing everyone.
Better than driving it in the left lane at 60mph.