New Cars for 2017: Toyota

Corolla: Toyota is celebrating its compact model’s 50th anniversary in the most appropriately beige way possible, with an anodyne mid-cycle refresh. The old-feeling 1.8-liter four-cylinder engine stays—as do the standard manual and available four-speed (!) automatic and CVT—but the bumpers, grille, headlights, and taillights are new. The 50th-anniversary special edition should find homes with folks who are easily upsold at the dealership or entirely too excited by the Corolla’s golden anniversary.

Highlander/hybrid: It’s mid-cycle-refresh time for Toyota’s mid-size SUV, too, bringing with it revised bumpers, headlights, and taillights, plus an SE trim level with a sport suspension and special wheels and trim. Like many 2017 Toyotas, the Highlander and its hybrid variant gain the Toyota Safety Sense [see sidebar, page 124] bundle of active-safety technol­ogies as standard equipment. Both models swap their port-injected V-6s for the same port- and direct-injected 3.5-liter V-6 that made its debut last year in the latest Tacoma pickup. The nonhybrid also trades its six-speed automatic for an eight-speed unit.

Prius Prime(shown above): The plug-in version of the latest Prius gets a name change to Prius Prime and a significant increase in battery capacity for more electric-only driving range. And unlike the last Prius plug-in, the Prime gets its own front- and rear-end designs. As with the current Prius, it is still weird-looking, but at least it’s a more coherent kind of weird. With an 8.8-kWh lithium-ion battery pack in place of the last Prius plug-in’s 4.4-kWh unit, the Prime is rated for 22 miles of electric range at up to 84 mph before reverting to hybrid gas-electric power. See prototype drive ››

Sienna: Here, too, Toyota swaps its old 3.5-liter V-6 engine and six-speed automatic transmission for its latest 3.5-liter six and eight-speed automatic.

Minor trim changes: Prius C, Tacoma, Yaris, 4Runner
Unchanged: Avalon/hybrid, Camry/hybrid, Land Cruiser, Mirai, Prius, Prius V, RAV4/hybrid, Sequoia, Tundra

New Cars for 2017: Return to Full Coverage