Comment by bryanlarsen
5 days ago
OTOH, it really looks like Toyota is Goldilocks. Most companies invested too much too early and had to write off a substantial amount, but Toyota is rolling into 2027 with a small but nice selection of EV's.
Over 25% of vehicles sold world-wide were electric in 2025, and that percentage is steadily increasing. So VW & Ford were "too hot", Honda is looking like "too cold" and Toyota might be the "just right" of the three bears.
Observers and technologists have also consistently failed to appreciate the continuing value proposition of hybrids, and Toyota makes some of the best, top selling models.
My biggest peeve with hybrids is that it gives consumers the mistaken impression that they're going to have to replace the batteries in their EV.
Most hybrids aren't liquid-cooled (although that is changing), and the smaller size means that a hybrid puts a lot more cycles per mile on the battery than an EV does.
Which in practice means that a hybrid battery lasts about 100,000 miles whereas an EV lasts about 250,000 miles.
A Prius is an amazing car; a 300,000 mile Prius is often still in good shape and worth the expense to replace the battery in. Which means you might put 3 batteries in a Prius and then look at how expensive it would be to replace the battery in an EV 3 times and choke. But very few people are going to spend the significant dollars it costs to replace the battery in a 250,000 mile Tesla so in practice that's an expense you'll never have.
A lot of the older hybrids use NiMH batteries. With that being said, a replacement traction battery for a 2nd gen Prius isn't that expensive, at least compared to newer hybrids/EV batteries. The second gen Prius is practical, affordable, and reliable (assuming proper maintenance).
The biggest issue with the Prius (at least for the years in my price range), is that the driving experience is liable to make one fall asleep at the wheel. They're the perfect cars for monks; if you're willing to forego all earthly driving pleasures, you can get high 40s mpg.
My grandmother drove a Prius, and there was a stir in my extended family as to whether she should still be driving, as she'd been seen going 20mph below the speed limit and was driving pretty far to the right side of her lane.
I got the opportunity to drive her Prius and promptly found myself alternating between going too fast and going too slow. Between the awkward pitch of the windshield and the gross-feeling electric power steering, I wasn't the best driver either. I never have any of these problems in my 2005 Honda Civic LX or my family's 4-cylinder 2011 Ford Ranger. The Prius felt like one of those stoned driving simulators that police departments bring to high schools in an effort to prevent DUIs.
I like the idea of hybrids and EVs, but it's hard to justify completely losing the pleasure of driving for 10 extra mpg. For all I know, newer models may have improved this, but they're still to expensive for me to pay any real attention to.
...are there 300k mile Priuses out on the road and being used?
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Hybrids are just amazing and SHOULD have mostly replaced ICE-only a long time ago. I'm going to cry the day the midwestern winter road salt takes my Prius away from me.
Hybrids are kinda the worst of both worlds though - you have all of the disadvantages of a internal combustion engine (maintenance costs, carbon footprint, fuel dependence), and all the disadvantages of a battery (car is more expensive, battery can die) and the only advantage is range.
Isn't Toyota betting big on the Hybrid EV? To me, at least in the US, this seems like the best medium-term bet. The EV infrastructure just isn't there yet, despite there being a lot of Tesla chargers. Even with that, the charge time, etc are too long to get going again. Hybrid EV seems to resolve this, and eases the customer into an EV future. Current EVs are great for being around town, but a lot of people in the US live 45min to an hour each way just to work, have to get their kids to school or practice in the meantime. It's just added stress thinking about finding a charging station or having time constraints.
The biggest issue I think every auto maker needs to solve is cost. The average car payment is insane, with dealership markups it's even worst than it would be otherwise. I'm not sure how we got here on that, to me car interiors are no nicer than they were from 2005ish on. I don't even know what the cost is going into.
I recently drove a brand new Toyota EV. It was ... fine. But I wouldn't buy it. Kia/Hyundai make the best EV's for the US right now.
Doesn't that describe most Toyotas, EV or not? You buy a Toyota because you expect it to last forever (or because it has low running costs because it has great resale value because it lasts forever).
You want a Supra to drive much better than fine. But if you're in the market for a Corolla, "fine" might be better than some of the cars you're comparing against.
That used to be the case, but modern Toyotas have a lot of problems with their engines. This doesn't inspire confidence in the brand's overall quality.
Add the fact that EVs are a lot simpler, and I don't really see the reasons to pay the Toyota premium. Perhaps less depreciation?
> Kia/Hyundai make the best EV's for the US right now.
They are suffering with just incredibly terrible reliability. Every model was a failure on top of terrible support.
It's Rivian and Tesla, and it's not even close for the rest.
But it's not really increasing anymore, and the increase has been almost entirely tied to subsidies. When Germany and America pulled back on EV subsidies, sales dropped significantly.
The adoption curve hasn't been nearly as steep as predicted, and the political landscape is unstable. Other manufacturers are also pulling back on their EV investments.
I'm not saying Honda isn't overdoing it, but a retreat from EVs isn't surprising.
> But it's not really increasing anymore
EV's are a half trillion dollar market (20 million cars annually, average selling price $25K) that increased by 20% in 2025.
That's a massive increase in a massive market.
It's not the 50% per annum we were seeing earlier, but 20% of a big number is often more impressive than 50% of a big market.
It's not that simple, some markets are slowing down and others are accelerating.
Two of Honda's biggest markets are Japan and the US. The US is cooling on EVs with incentives and regulation changes making adoption less urgent. Japan already has an extremely low adoption rate. So the incentives for Honda to invest heavily just aren't there right now.
Other manufacturers are also pulling back. Ford is cutting way back on the Lightning for example.
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Where does that leave GM?
Quietly making some of the highest rated EVs right now.
After writing off $7B. So they were early. But likely better early than late. VW is an even better example. They wrote off many billions, but they're now the biggest seller of EV's in Europe.