The Honda CR-Z Should Have Been Perfect, So Why Did It Bomb?

In 2010, Honda excited enthusiasts with a car that looked like nothing else and had promising marketing. The Honda CR-Z was touted as the driver’s hybrid with sporty driving dynamics, a design nodding to the iconic Honda CRX, and stellar fuel economy. There was only one problem as the production car wasn’t that sporty, that economical, or all that practical. Somehow, it gets worse from there.

The late 2000s and the early 2010s were a different, almost unrecognizable time in the automotive industry. EVs weren’t quite yet all of the rage, but journalists and the public alike had their eyes on how the Tesla Roadster helped make electric cars sexy and the Tesla Model S added practicality to hot design. At the same time, electrification was a big deal from hybrids like the Toyota Prius and Honda Insight to wonders like the Chevrolet Volt. Shorter-range EVs also became a thing including the Smart Fortwo Electric Drive, the Nissan Leaf, and the Th!nk City.

This was an era of alternative fuel exploration. Electric vehicles didn’t get to have all of the fun as automakers also tried their hands at furthering the popularity of diesel-powered passenger cars. Then there were the weirdos like the Honda Civic GX which ran on compressed natural gas and the hydrogen fuel cell Toyota Mirai. Even motorcycles got in on the bandwagon as Harley-Davidson launched the development program that would lead to the LiveWire, Zero Motorcycles was a rising star, and Brammo was still a thing.

Honda noticed a problem in the electrification landscape and it was that nobody was combining hybrid power with a sporty driving experience. The Honda CR-Z was supposed to change that.

Compact Renaissance Zero

Car news sites were abuzz in 2007 with news of a new Honda concept.

In October of that year, Honda released images for a concept car it called the Compact Renaissance Zero. Later that month, the concept car made its debut at the 2007 Tokyo Motor Show. At the show, Honda explained what Compact Renaissance Zero means and sadly, it’s a little bit of marketing jargon:

‘CR-Z’ stands for ‘Compact Renaissance Zero’—an expression intended to capture the idea of a renaissance in the design of compact cars that begins anew from fundamentals.

This design research model of a lightweight hybrid sports car features advanced technologies that deliver enjoyable driving for all while reducing the vehicle’s environmental footprint.

The CR-Z concept was a stunner. It had a face that made it look like a relative of the Mazda RX-8, but the rest of its hatch body and that name “CR-Z” pointed enthusiasts in the direction of an ’80s and ’90s icon, the Honda CRX. Before we continue, I will note that Honda stylizes the classic hatch as the “CRX” in some markets without a hyphen. It was marketed without a hyphen in America, so that’s how I’m going to write it here.

As Car Magazine UK wrote in 2007, the CR-Z built on the Honda Remix concept from 2006 and the production version of the CR-Z has its own design story. As Autoblog wrote in 2009, Motoaki Minowa created the proposal model and production concept while Makoto Iwaki was responsible for the production of the 2007 show car. The design team included Chief Designer Takashi Nagura, Exterior Designer Yosuke Tokoro, and interior designers Takashi Ozaki and Mr. Takahito Tsuchiya.

Nagura indicated that the CR-Z wasn’t a hybrid early on in its development, but when the hybrid part was added, one of the design concepts of the CR-Z was a “Hybrid Café Racer” for Everyday Enjoyment. In this case, Café Racer is making a nod to the enthusiasts who gathered at cafés in London with their fast rides. Basically, the CR-Z is supposed to be a sporty car that you can enjoy and talk about with your friends over some tea. At the same time, Nagura pointed out that London was concerned about inner-city pollution, so the design team wanted to make a sporty car that you could enjoy guilt-free by making it a hybrid.

So, the design brief of this car was something sporty, but clean. Honda also uploaded a video detailing the design team’s mission. According to the video, Chief Engineer of Chassis Dynamics Terukazu Torikai said “the basic concept of this car is ‘fun-to-drive’.” But more than that, they wanted to take the agile handling of a Mini and combine it with easy-to-drive daily performance.

Torikai mentions Honda engineers went out and bought a bunch of different cars to drive and benchmark. These included a Mini, a Volkswagen Scirocco, and a Lotus Elise. The Elise would become the engineering team’s inspiration throughout the whole development period of the CR-Z. I mean, who doesn’t want a car that handles like one of the best modern Lotus cars?

Torikai continues that since handling was a big deal, the engineering team focused on precise tuning of the CR-Z’s electric power steering. They also engineered the CR-Z to have the body rigidity of a Civic Type R. Yet, remember that they weren’t trying to build a hardcore track day car, so they based the CR-Z on the base structure of the Insight so that the CR-Z delivered predictable control.

Once the engineers had prototypes together, they were taken to Europe and evaluated on roads out there to see if the resulting vehicle would meet the engineers’ expectations of a sporty everyday driver.

Next, Project Leader Norio Tomobe chimed in to talk about the market research Honda conducted. The brand found out that prospective customers wanted a vehicle with values that they would be proud to talk about with other people. The engineering team believed those values would come from the vehicle’s sporty performance and Honda’s hybrid system.

Combine all of this work into one vehicle and in 2010, the world got to see the Honda CR-Z enter production.

A Fun Car With A Big Promise

Honda began publishing press releases to its American sites in June 2010. Those press releases made some big promises that automotive journalists were about to put to the test.

Honda never shied away from comparing the 2011 CR-Z to the old CRX. The press release says this:

Honda designers envisioned the CR-Z as a highly personal coupe that symbolizes a new era of style that is sporty yet environmental at the same time. The one-motion wedge form, compact dimensions, light-weight construction and aerodynamic design help to improve performance and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The progressively raked roofline and sharply truncated tail of the CR-Z is a feature shared with many Hondas past and present, including the CRX, first-generation Insight and the FCX Clarity. All of these cars have been designed to cut through the air with minimal disturbance, reducing aerodynamic drag to increase efficiency.

The exterior design of CR-Z deliberately evokes the iconic style of the 1980s and 1990s Honda CRX, which was originally developed to provide a small, stylish car that could achieve excellent fuel economy. Signature features of the CRX, like the split-level rear glass hatch of the second generation model and the low, shallow raked roofline have been referenced in the design of the sleek coupe and then combined with a curvaceous and deeply sculpted exterior form.

The press release then gets pretty bold from there, even comparing spec sheets of the 2011 Honda CR-Z against the 2010 Honda Insight, the 2010 Honda Civic Hybrid, the 1991 Honda CRX Si, and the 1985 Honda CRX Si.

This seems like it could have been a mistake because cracks showed in the CR-Z right there in the press release. For example, the Honda CR-Z was shown to be the most powerful of the bunch, but it also weighed a hefty 2,637 pounds. That was weird when you think about it because the Honda Insight it was based on wasn’t even a full hundred pounds heavier despite having two more doors, two more seats, and a foot more in length. It also didn’t compare favorably to the CRX that Honda was so happy to reference, which weighed nearly a thousand pounds lighter at its lightest. Even worse was the fact that the CRX had a better power-to-weight ratio. But at least Honda was honest about all of this upfront.

At the same time, Car and Driver indicated that journalists got to drive the CRX before getting into the CR-Z, so Honda really wanted you to know that the CR-Z was basically the second coming of the CRX.

On paper, the CR-Z sounds pretty awesome. Honda says the CR-Z was the sixth unique application of its Integrated Motor Assist technology since its debut in the original Insight back in 1999. In this case, the CR-Z has a powertrain consisting of a 1.5-liter four-cylinder i-VTEC engine that makes 113 HP and 107 lb-ft of torque on its own. Mounted between the engine and the transmission (and functioning as the “Integrated” part of IMA) is a DC brushless motor good for 13 HP and 58 lb-ft of torque. The engine hits peak torque at 4,800 RPM while the electric motor hits peak torque at 1,000 RPM. Combine it together and Honda says peak system power is 122 HP and 128 lb-ft of torque.

Honda really wanted buyers to get their CR-Zs with a six-speed manual transmission for the best performance. Honda says CR-Zs with manuals have five gears for fun and a sixth gear for fuel economy. The CR-Z is fairly high-tech outside of the IMA system including the aforementioned i-VTEC Valvetrain, drive-by-wire throttle, dual-probe spark plugs, and a subframe torque rod damper system to reduce vibration, noise, and harshness.

Honda drummed up interest during the vehicle’s 2010 launch by talking about how it was sporty, environmentally friendly, and the first-ever hybrid with a six-speed manual transmission:

“The CR-Z is a personal sport hybrid coupe for people with a spirit of adventure and an elevated sense of responsibility toward the environment,” said John Mendel, executive vice president of sales for American Honda. “It’s the first hybrid designed to maximize style and fun, in addition to efficiency and economy.”

Honda also talked about how its engineers achieved the difficult mission of melding hybrid technology with a vehicle that was still fun to drive. How did all of this translate to reviews?

Here’s a snippet of what Car and Driver said:

Where the impish CRX used lightness and a stripped-down approach to deliver entertainment and efficiency, the CR-Z looks to a gasoline-electric hybrid powertrain. The difference between the two paths is stark, or so goes conventional wisdom. With less weight and simplicity come fun and momentum-style hoonage, and with a hybrid powertrain comes, well, soul-crushing dullness. Somewhat shockingly, however, this hybrid is entertaining, even as it tries to marry the disparate concepts of sport and efficiency.

The chassis plays a big part in making the hybrid experience transparent. The brakes are a touch grabby, but they have only the slightest hint of hybrid-style sponginess, and the transition from regenerative to conventional braking is essentially seamless. The linearity of the brakes is good, too. The electrically boosted steering has more feel than we expected, and turn-in is eager in normal mode and quick in sport. Where the CR-Z impresses most is in ride quality. Generally, when something has the wheelbase of a Matchbox car, you can expect to be revectored as you hit midcorner bumps, plus a jarring, crashing ride—the sportiest Minis being prime examples. The CR-Z exhibits very little of such behaviors, though, with part of the credit going to the standard 16-inch wheels and relatively tall sidewalls of the 195/55 Dunlop SP Sport 7000 rubber. That’s not to say the CR-Z is firmly planted all the time. Pitch this Honda hard into a corner with stability control disabled and lift off the throttle, and the back will swing around (and quite quickly due to the short wheelbase), so you need to be ready to dial in some opposite lock. Blame the weight of the batteries, which live between the rear wheels.

The Truth About Cars noted that the CR-Z is pretty peppy at first, but the performance began running out quickly:

The problem lies outside the first two short gears, where the CR-Z runs out of breath. There’s simply not enough midrange grunt to label this car a performance coupe, and under determined driving the battery runs out, rendering the CR-Z a little more than an overweight Fit (pun unintended. Honestly).

And it’s a real shame. No, the CR-Z handles nothing like the CR-X, and it shouldn’t – the CR-X was a different car for a different generation, and expecting the 2010 car to have the 1990 driving dynamics is like expecting to get satnav in a Hyundai Excel. But the truth is that when you get it up to speed, the CR-Z can bring a naughty smile on your face.

While the steering lacks feel, it’s fairly accurate and well-weighted, and due to the low ride height and relatively short suspension travel, body roll is also relatively modest. The CR-Z responds well to steering inputs, and feels agile and capable in the corners. Gather enough speed and leave the throttle, and you’ll even manage to induce some old school back slips. Unfortunately, CR-Z doesn’t manage to shake off the braking syndromes associated with hybrids.

Car Magazine UK had a CR-Z as a long-term loaner and the publication adored the looks and the hybrid technology, but was let down by the “sporty” part of the car:

The CR-Z was far from perfect, but oddly – or encouragingly enough – it wasn’t the hybrid technology that let the side down, but rather straightforward dynamics. The Honda’s ride quality was terrible. Brittle, stiff and ludicrously lacking in compliancy, it made tackling our roads something to be done through gritted teeth. I don’t quite understand why Honda has got this so wrong over the last decade – every Honda I’ve driven in recent memory has been marked out by a stiff-jointed and unforgiving ride. The other major shortcoming was the mute and artificial-feeling steering. Sure, it was quick and unerringly accurate, and you could peel the coupe into corners with real precision, but my nephew’s plastic Playstation steering wheel has better feel and feedback. Maybe Honda’s engineers need to have a long drive in the 1995 Integra Type R – one of the finest front wheel-drive cars (along with the Peugeot 306 Rallye and Ford Racing Puma) I have ever driven – to remind themselves that they’ve done it once, so they can and should do it again.

Most reviews followed a similar theme. Journalists found the CR-Z fun, but heavy and not the most sporty thing out there. Alright, so the car wasn’t quite the Lotus Elise or Mini that it was benchmarked with, but what about that hybrid part? Honda was once the king of hybrids. The original Insight scored an incredible 70 mpg in EPA testing before the EPA revised its metrics and downgraded the Insight to a still awesome 60 mpg.

Headwinds

Well, it wasn’t great. The official numbers were 35 mpg city, 39 mpg highway, and 37 mpg combined, but that’s if you defeated the purpose of the car and bought it with the CVT. Those with the six-speed manual faced 31 mpg city, 37 highway, and 34 combined.

The problem is that these numbers weren’t that great for an economy car, let alone a hybrid. This car was on sale at the same time as the Smart Fortwo, which was officially rated for 33 mpg city, 41 mpg highway, and 36 mpg combined without any hybrid trickery. The CR-Z wasn’t much better on paper than Honda’s own cars. The Honda Fit got 28 mpg city, 35 mpg highway, and 31 mpg combined, but did so with two more seats for $15,870, compared to the $19,950 base price of the CR-Z.

In other words, CR-Z buyers paid more money for fewer seats and not a whole lot more performance or fuel economy. Speaking of those seats, those journalists never keyed readers in on the CR-Z’s dirty secret. The owner’s manual of U.S. market CR-Zs says that the vehicle’s maximum load limit is just 400 pounds. The average American male weighs around 200 pounds. So, two guys would be putting the car technically overweight after lunch at Subway. Or they would put the car overweight if they used the deleted rear seats for luggage.

Now, I’m someone who tows trailers with Smart Fortwos, so I’m not trying to cast any stones here. But an official weight limit of just 400 pounds is unfortunate.

The CR-Z continued to disappoint the press after its launch. In 2010, Paul Niedermeyer published probably the harshest opinion yet when he said “Why The Honda CR-Z Is So Ugly And Should Never Have Been Built” in the Truth About Cars:

Ok, it’s not exactly a new phenomena: car company shows a low and slick concept, and the final product looks like an obese baby seal. We took GM to task with its Volt bait-and-switch routine. And now we take on Honda, although probably not quite so ferociously; given that the gap between the CR-Z concept and production version is a tad bit narrower than the Volt Grand (Lie) Canyon. But the Volt was always intended to be a four-seater; not the CR-Z. Therein lies the Honda lie: it’s ok to just chop off the back of a sedan and call it…not good.

Reading the various reviews out there, it seemed as if the Honda CR-Z wasn’t a bad car, just that it didn’t live up to Honda’s hype of a thrifty sporty experience. The CR-Z was neither super sporty nor super economical. I’ve gotten to drive one of these for a short time and liked it, but just thought of it as a weird economy car.

Perhaps others felt the same. Honda moved 5,249 CR-Zs in the opening sales year of 2010. Things were decent in 2011 with 11,330 examples finding new homes, then sales fell off of a cliff and never came back. Between 2010 and 2020, Honda sold just 35,040 CR-Zs in America. To put that into perspective, that’s roughly a third of the cars Smart USA sold in America in roughly the same amount of time and the Fortwo wasn’t considered a sales success.

Honda officially killed off the CR-Z in 2016, but there were enough leftover units to keep registering some sales until 2020. Just one person somehow managed to find a brand-new Honda CR-Z for sale in 2020.

If you’re interested in getting one of these sweet oddballs, you won’t have a problem finding one for sale. These cars also haven’t held on to a ton of value, so it should be easy to locate one for under $10,000.

As a reminder, calling the CR-Z an Unholy Fail isn’t necessarily saying that the CR-Z is a bad car. I know that the CR-Z has a lot of fans and for good reason! It’s a cool little ride. However, it was a failure from the standpoint of Honda setting expectations so high that the car just couldn’t reach them. It’s a shame, too. If the CR-Z had just a little more power, a little better fuel economy, or maybe a lower price, it might have found more buyers.