2026 Lucid Gravity

Hi, everybody. Welcome to another episode. I'm Mike Monticello. I'm Maddie McCarty. I'm

Alex and Isaac. So today we're going to be talking about our first impressions of the

2026 Lucid Gravity. I think maybe the most important things that if you don't know anything

about this car, basically it's Lucid's second model. It's joining the Air, which we've already

tested, which was a sedan. The gravity is an SUV that can actually be configured as you can get

a third row option. So it can be either a two-row SUV or a three-row SUV. And then I think something

else to think about is 828 horsepower, right? So lots of horsepower, long driving range,

and then the price. It starts at $94,900. So those are kind of the main things to think about.

And maybe also what does it compete against, right? Well, you could say Tesla Model X,

yeah, very old, but it does, it is, you know, three-row SUV, Mercedes-Benz EQS SUV,

Rivian R1S, Volvo EXC90. And I kind of figure, like, why not lump the Kia EV9 and Hyundai

Ioniq 9 into that mix? Because they're really good, right? So that's kind of the quick hit.

But what I really want to do is just get right into kind of the gritty-gritty, like, what do we

like and what do we not like about this? And so Maddie, let's start with you. What did you

like about the Lucid Gravity? I liked how it drove. So I like taking it on the highway,

and it's very zippy because of all that horsepower. And it's kind of a smooth ride,

very easy to just pass someone really quickly. It goes very, very fast.

I'm not going to do that. Yeah. So I think that was probably one of my top things about it that I

liked. Yeah, there's something, there's something very luxurious about that much power, right? You

don't need that much power. It's exhilarating, but it's also just luxurious that if you need

to get around, there's almost like no two-lane passing zone that it can't just handle like that,

right? So there's, besides being thrilling, it's also kind of a luxury to have that much power.

Luxury, at least in my eyes, is convenience, right? And it's super convenient in the sense of

you just like blast around people. You're not waiting for a downshift from a transmission or the

power to build or whatever you just do the thing you want to do decently. And it's an SUV. So having

that amount of power to be able to just zip around through traffic is impressive. So we have a new

kind of version of DreamDrive that we've, so we previously evaluated DreamDrive, which is their

ADAS system. Yeah. So that's going to be like lane-centering and adaptive cruise control.

We previously looked at this under 2023 air. So that was a long time ago. So for us, this is a

newer version. And so I think there were a lot of issues that we found in the air. So hopping

into this gravity, I think was a much better experience. So previously in the air, it was very

like rigid when you're in terms of steering. So you didn't really feel like you had much control.

It was like, felt like the car was kind of driving you instead of you being the driver.

Like if you tried to add steering back in, it was resistant to that?

Yeah. Like if you wanted to, like even change lanes, you'd have to pop it out of the centerline.

And then reactivate it every single time. Now in the gravity, it's much more fluid,

and you can give it your own steering so that like if you're passing like a semi,

you can just give it a little bit of more distance. And it will automatically even do that. If

you want it to, there's a setting that's like lane biasing. So I experienced that. And I was

actually quite impressed because it even showed me on the screen that it was doing that. So I

understood why we were no longer exactly centered in the lane. So I think that has a lot more

capabilities now. It's smoother, definitely is communicating a lot more in the display,

in the driver's screen, so that I know what's going on. And I can see what the car is seeing in a way.

Yeah. Well, that's good. It's nice to see that they're improving things.

And a lot of those improvements, they're also making to the air, right? Like we still own that

air that you mentioned, and we're seeing it through over the air updates and the hardware

might be different, but like we're seeing better collaboration than we originally tested.

I think it's important to keep in mind that this is still, you know, in the grand scheme,

a relatively new automaker, right? So they're still, I mean, this is only their second model.

They're still kind of working the bugs out, right, of some of these things.

I'm glad you brought that up because I think the like, I don't know, the trope, I guess,

out there around this is, oh, they should have started with the SUV, right? Because SUVs are

popular. And yeah, probably from a monetary perspective, they would have sold more SUVs

and they did the sedan had they started with that. But getting into it, they, I mean, that

original air was pretty rough around the edges, right? In a lot of ways. So they've now had a

couple of years under their belt of not only designing that car, but producing it and putting

it together, which is arguably the harder part. And I think that shows when you get into the

gravity, like, is it perfect? No. And we'll talk about that. But just from the way everything

fits and is put together and the NVH and how quiet it is comparatively, it's better for it.

So it's almost, at least in my opinion, that perspective, it's better. They started with

the sedan kind of got that out of the way in terms of learning curve and things because they are

now the more popular one comes out and it's out. Yeah. Yeah. So I mean, we'll see as far as the

sales strategy and stuff like that. That's the other part, right? But I think it's better because

they got one car under their belt first, right? Yeah. Yeah. And I think they're definitely

utilizing over the air updates because they are advertising, they have hands-free lane

centering coming when that is exactly. We don't know it's supposed to be this year, but...

And so this would be something along the lines of a super cruise, of a blue cruise,

that kind of thing where it's intended for you to have your hands off the wheel in certain

sections of highway. So you have a driver facing camera that's going to be monitoring

the driver's eyes to make sure that they're looking at the road and that would enable them to take

their hands off the wheel, still remaining attentive and looking at the road and making sure that

there's no hazard that they need to intervene for. But that hasn't happened yet in the gravity.

So that is a software update that should happen in the future, has been promised. But

that's the problem is we don't know when and they're selling the car before that capability

has been put on the car. So that's positive in a downside of having a vehicle with over the air

updates like this. The owner just doesn't know when it's going to happen, right? Is that what

you're saying? Yeah. Well, they start selling the car before it's done. We're seeing that more and

more, not just from Lucid, but when the promise of over the air updates is there and you can do it

in a more comprehensive way like this car is capable of. You just put the car out before it has all

the features that were paid for and promised to the customer. Any more likes? I mean, I like the

interior kind of. Like the design, the style. There's a lot of different textures of the fabrics.

I did see in the logbook that we have misaligned panels or just some small imperfections that

maybe we don't see on more established luxury vehicles. But overall, the effect was I sat and

I felt like I was in a luxury vehicle. The seats were comfortable. It has massage seats with many

different types of massages. They're pretty decent too. Yeah. A lot of times massage seats are kind

of just like. The lumbar just like inflating and inflating. I think kind of what you were

touching on is that it feels like, correct me if I'm wrong, high quality materials, but maybe

some of the actual build quality is still not quite there. Some things are a little misaligned

or seem a little cheap in the way they operate. The seat folding mechanism was a little

funny even the second row. The third row had some issues, which some of them,

look, this is a borrowed car. It's been around different. We're not the only ones to put our

hands on it. It's who knows. We'll see when we buy ours in the future. And what about you, Alex?

Kind of above and beyond what Maddie was talking about that she liked. Or if you want to expand

on any of those, feel free. Yeah. So I think what really stood out here and it was true on the air

and they're just kind of taking it to the next level is the efficiency of the car in a couple

different ways. One, of course, the powertrain efficiency. I mean, it was just anecdotal driving

it around, but saw pretty high miles per kilowatt hour, which is great. So basically that means

they're getting more range at like 380 something range coming from, at least we'll call it a more

modest size battery pack. Then they kept comparing it when we were talking with Lucid to the

Escalade IQ, right? And it has basically double the size battery pack for a similar

type of drive. The Cadillac does. Yeah. So they're really attempting here to make a vehicle that

gives you that type of space and driving range without just throwing a bunch of battery pack

at it, which I really like. It makes the car lighter, hopefully less expensive, right? Because

an EV is mostly driven by its battery, you know, cost at this point anyway. So that was cool. And

then also packaging wise, like they are designing and producing their own motors and house, which

just like the air, they're really, really small. If you look at them, so you just get a bunch of

storage space and then you add it to this basically mini van shaped thing and you put all the seats

down and you look at this gigantic interior volume that you have. It's massive. It's pretty cool.

So it's an interesting approach that they're taking. There's way more room inside than you

would expect by looking at it and that it's a third row. And we're just so used to third rows

being penalty boxes, you know, for adults. Yeah. It's actually not that bad. It's not that bad.

Agreed. And then I did like, you know, not only does it have 800 something horsepower,

which is pretty ridiculous. 828. 828, that's right. But it manages it well. Like you step

on it. And we've driven some EVs where they just don't have enough tire or the traction control

can handle it, whatever it might be. This seems to have both of those things pretty dialed in. So

you put your foot down and you can actually use that power and it's not torque steering all over

the road or something like that. Right. There's a little bit of torque steer, but you know, we've

seen way more torque steer in vehicles with way less power. So I totally agree. It's impressive

how they're harnessing that. Yeah. And then I agree. The interior is definitely a nice place to

sit and just spend time and whatever the seats were comfortable. Can we talk about the experiences

that we put in? You go, you go. Okay. So when you're charging and you have nothing to do and

can we also, I'm just going to slip in there that the charging is very fast. But they have two

two displays. So they have one right here along from like the A pillar to about like, I don't know,

two thirds way into the cabin and then a lower screen as well. And then they have these experiences

where it's like tranquility. And what it does is it puts on this like nice little forest display

and then it can guide you through a meditation, which I didn't do. Is there soft music playing?

Yes. You can have the sound of the ocean and it's like surround sound and it's just very calming.

And I don't know if I would use it every time, but it was, it was fun to experience.

You used it, right? Yeah.

Yeah. So didn't you say you and your wife used it when you got back home or something? Yeah,

it was like, we were driving at night, we got home parking the driveway and I was playing around.

I was like, this is kind of silly. What is this? Click on it comes up and then like, yeah,

15 minutes later or whatever, we're still sitting there looking at the little dot and it's like

focusing on these stars or something funny. And yeah, it was actually kind of nice. I'm not

going to lie. Would I use it every time? Probably not. But at least for one time, it was, it was

fun. It's good to know that you can't do that while you're driving. Like it won't do the screen.

From a safety aspect. It will turn on the audio though. It'll like start guiding you through

a meditation while driving, which is a little, I don't know, that's a different level of distraction

we're going to have to take a look at. At least it doesn't show you the visuals.

Anything else? The handling, the ride, I agree. More objectively, it's good in the sense of like,

it turns in really fast and pretty low body roll. It has the, which I believe the one we're going

to buy won't have the rear steer where, you know, basically all four wheels are steering,

but this one did. And so that made the turning radius pretty good despite this vehicle being

pretty long with a pretty huge wheelbase. So yeah, it's, it's the steering is very quick

when you're on, you know, a twisty road or whatever that it is nice to have that quick

steering. And it's very responsive if you're making any throttle adjustments like mid turn.

So I agree. And, and I thought it rode pretty well too. You know, especially considering the,

how good the handling is, you know, it's not like it's a really jarring ride or anything like that.

I think the suspension is pretty firm, but there's a layer of absorption, absorption,

absorption that keeps most bumps out. And so I thought that part was, I thought they have

a pretty good ride handling mix. Yeah, agreed. And the other thing that comes to mind, and

again, holistically, maybe not the greatest, but there are some physical controls in the car,

right Maddie? Like maybe not the best, but they didn't go full touchscreen. Yes. You still have

a few climate controls and a volume roller in the center. So you can do a few things.

I don't really have much to add as far as likes. You know, I really enjoyed the,

just the driving of it from the, forget the controls for a second, but just the actual

driving. Like you said, Maddie, the, the, the powertrain Alex, you're talking about the,

the handling and, and those parts are really, really good. But we sort of touched on the

interior space and it just really is impressive when I think about the driving position,

there's no center console intrusion. The armrests are nicely placed and pretty well padded.

There's good headroom for the driver. Second row seats, again, lots of space.

Third row, I thought it was pretty good. Decent headroom, enough knee space for me. Again,

I'm not super tall, but I think an adult can sit back there for at least a little while.

And a lot of third rows, they just don't want to, right? So. Yeah, especially in this EV

three row segment, right? Like that EQS SUV you mentioned has just a,

it just shouldn't have a third row. It should take that third row out.

It saves some weight. So yeah, it's actually, and, and this is,

if you look at this thing next to any of those other competitors you mentioned,

it's way lower in terms of, you know, the roof height, it's lower to the ground,

kind of looks like you wouldn't have that third row space. But then you get back there and it's

pretty good. So yeah, again, that packaging coming into play. All right. So let's talk about,

so those are our positives. Let's talk about some of our negatives. Alex, do you want to start

since Matty went first with the, with the positives? You want to start with the negatives?

Yeah. Yeah. So I guess on that ride and handling front that we were talking about,

for me, it felt like, and it ties in the power train too, like the vehicle felt a little disjointed.

They're trying to make it do absolutely everything, right? Be really fast, be really comfortable,

be really efficient. I don't know, physics doesn't really let you have everything

all at once, right? There are compromises. And so the really quick handling and steering input

and things like that kind of felt like it was a little contradictory to what the vehicle was

trying to do otherwise and being really comfortable on a great highway cruiser. Like you mentioned,

Matty, we took it, had some people in the back seats driving to a concert. So we're on the highway

or whatever. It almost took a lot of attention and effort to indulgence to be comfortable with it.

To be smooth. Yeah, to be with the steering. Because the steering was so quick and the power

can get away from you a little bit if you apply too much, right? So just, I appreciated its

comfort and relaxation side more than I appreciated, I think, the trying to be a sports car side,

if that makes sense. It's almost like the hands-free might help the experience

from the perspective because, like you said, normally you can drive down the road and you

don't have to even, most cars, you don't even think about your steering on the highway, right?

It's just not even a factor, right? But here, any little input has a big output, I guess, is a way

of saying it. And so the driver has to concentrate more so that they aren't jerking the passengers

around. Yeah, so we'll see. I mean, again, ours won't have the rear steer, which could change it.

Also, if this had a certain type of adaptive suspension that I don't think ours is going to

have and air spring. So who knows? It might behave differently on the highway. Right.

Yeah, so that was one thing. Visibility stinks. Better than the air, maybe. In some ways.

That was one of the bad things about the air is that, I mean, it looks really cool,

but the pillars are so thick all the way around. The A-pillars are massive. And

at that point, it's like I was relying on my proximity sensors to back up anywhere or doing...

Also, at night, I know I'm kind of doing a little segway here, but the backup camera,

there's no illumination behind you. Yeah, really just relying on the beeping from the car telling

me I'm too close to something because the screen is just basically black at night.

And not even raining. I can't even imagine what it would be like raining, but...

I just don't see anything unusable. Yeah. So yeah, not great visibility.

Yeah, so I mean, at least that A-pillar doesn't come so close to my head like it doesn't air

because in that car, you're lower, right? So that A-pillar is like right here,

you're turning it. It's like you're going to hit your head on it. So this is a little taller,

which helps, but yeah, so that wasn't great. I think the steering wheel shape is just pretty

silly. Also, someone, I think it was Joe pointed out that it looks like it was put on upside down.

That was so funny when he noticed that, yeah.

But it literally looks like it's upside down. It felt like it too when you were driving the car.

Because it's also got that like little piece of fabric that's a different color.

Yeah. That's normally at the top of the steering wheel to indicate that that's like the center

in the top, but it's down at the bottom. So yeah, that was funny when you pointed that out.

Yeah. That's a strange choice.

You know, we're seeing more and more of these sort of square steering wheels or whatever, right?

And I mean, I would say because the steering is so quick, you know, the steering wheel is fine

when you're at 93. Yeah.

Okay. It feels fine. And because the steering is so quick, you can stay at 93 a lot more often

and during regular driving than most vehicles. But anytime you're parking or turning around or

any kind of, you know, even turning into, you know, a very low speed to turn into a parking lot

or something, you're going to feel the oddity of that steering wheel as it goes through,

as you shuffle the steering. And it's just a strange sensation. And I don't like it.

Car would benefit from the steer by wire that like the cyber truck has, right? So that

they could relax the steering ratio on the highway, excuse me, like we're talking about.

And then yeah, maybe you wouldn't have to, if they want the square wheel, right? You don't

want to turn it so much.

And they want the square wheel. And we have been seeing this from a lot of OEMs, like you said,

because they have that driver display up higher and they don't want the steering wheel itself to

block it, which I get from a usability standpoint, it works. But from an actual driving standpoint,

it can be odd and uncomfortable.

Yeah. We were driving what an Audi A5 was it the other day and has a perfectly round steering

wheel. And it almost like felt, it felt weird. Yeah. We loved it. But it felt so weird because

it seems like minimum, so many steering wheels have a release flat on the bottom, right?

But now of course they're going to even flat on the top. So Maddie, what do you got? And maybe

anything about controls? Maybe? I don't know. Just throwing that out there.

Yeah. So I think like overall, like when I hopped into the vehicle, I was like, oh yeah.

I mean, it looks nice. The displays are pretty. But to me, it felt like it wasn't quite refined

enough in terms of everything besides the powertrain because we had a lot of software issues of

like the system lagging or this whole screen just like not turning on at all and having to wait

like a few minutes for the car to turn on. I said it was like loading. Right. And then we had to get

the whole steering wheel replaced. Oh, I forgot about that. Because the steering wheel buttons

didn't work. And those are... Well, I thought you were going to say it was because it was on upside

down. No, they put the old one or the new one on the same way. So at least it was in the right

direction. No, the steering wheel buttons themselves are touch capacitive and unlabeled for the most

part. And they'll stopped working. So that didn't allow us to like adjust our adaptive cruise control

speed or like use their highway assist, which is early and centering as well. And then just like

interacting with media, which I think steering wheel controls are becoming more and more needed

because of how difficult it can be to just do everything media related on the touchscreen.

And the upper right portion of the display is also... You can also interact with it and also

the left side as well. But there's just a lot going on. I think in comparison to the air,

they have made a lot of improvements to the UI. And so it's a little less disjointed because

it's before it was like it very well was treated as like two separate things. And now they kind of

flow together better. But at the end of the day, you're still having to use this touchscreen

and look away and manage. Yeah. And it's down low. So I found myself trying to not use the lower one

and then try to use the higher one up instead, because you still have access to like media,

navigation and phone. And you can use the steering wheel to kind of like swipe through those different

menus. Yeah. So I found myself trying to find the best way of the worst options. Make the best out

of... Make the best out of a bad situation. Yes. Thank you. And then the wipers and the headlights,

those are all on the left side of the display. Yeah. It was pretty frustrating. It was raining to be

like your arm is up here like this trying to manage the little left display. Yeah. That kind

of frustrating. And trying to not like accidentally turn the headlights on. And what's the deal with

those unlabeled steering wheel buttons? I mean, those are just annoying, right? They are annoying.

You don't even like... You don't know what you're pressing until you press it and you get some type

of result. And now you're having to look somewhere. So you had to look at the steering wheel.

To make sure... Yeah. And then you had to look somewhere else to see that it's doing what you

wanted to do instead of looking at the wheel. Yeah. I found that the screens were really high. I

don't know if you guys felt that way, but like compared to the air, that upper screen, they

really raised it up. And it was fine during the day, but at night it just felt like I had so much

screen in my face. Yeah. It was hard to... Like even though when you turn all the brightness down,

but they didn't have, at least at this time, a purely black theme. There are OLED screens,

right? So you could make like a really dark theme so you don't have as much light coming at you.

I wasn't able to find one. So that was kind of bothering me. Yeah. You can turn off like the

lower screen. Yeah. They showed us how to do that. Right. And then you can't... I couldn't find how to

turn off like the right portion of the screen, which is like media and navigation. And there's

like a little pop up on like even just a little bit left to that so that theoretically you could

just turn off that screen and not need it. Yeah. But I couldn't find out how to do that. So yeah,

I was getting a lot of light at night that I was... I just really wanted to turn it off.

Agreed. Couldn't. Right. And mirrors and steering wheel adjusted the combination of the screen

and the steering wheel, right? That's not the best. Yeah. I mean, that's a situation where for me,

once you get to driving, now if I do want to make any more adjustments, I won't because...

It's too hard. It's too hard. Yeah. Especially the mirrors. That's just not acceptable.

The exterior door handles. So they're electronic. We're seeing these more and more.

And it's a huge delay. I found that really annoying. And because they're not like a pullout

kind, they're a lift up. It just makes the whole thing worse, right? You pull the...

Yeah, they got to pop out first and sometimes they do, sometimes they don't.

Right. So those found on the air too. Those are kind of annoying. And then how were the

seats for you guys? Because for me, I kind of found them uncomfortable in all three rows.

Even though there's lots of space, there's... First of all, the driver's seat has too much

built-in lumbar support. So even when it's maxed out, it was kind of digging into my lower back.

Lumbar. You do?

Yes. I thought it was comfortable for me.

I don't like things poking me.

That's fair.

But that's why we... In our road test, we try and

bring in all the different body types and everyone likes different things.

But also just the upper seat back portion was just too hard for me in both first and second

design, specifically this weird tray thing that... I think you have a story. I definitely

have a story. I have a story.

Okay. We all have a story about something...

I have one other thing too after that that I don't want to forget.

Okay. Something getting stuck in there or whatever. So you want to...

It reminded me of the junk drawer that I'm trying to eliminate in my kitchen where

like a credit card or something gets stuck in there.

Yeah. You can explain a little bit what we're talking about.

Yeah. There was this like shallow tray thing that you can slide back. Basically,

it goes underneath the console under the screen.

Or you can have it come back out.

Yeah. Exactly. And so when you push it back, you can get access to what's underneath and

whatever. But the gap there between what you're sliding back and the top part of the storage

area is really low. So anything too tall is just going to get stuck or prevent you from sliding

it back or what happened to me is it gets stuck when it's in there and you can't bring the thing

back. So yeah. I don't know. I didn't find the benefit of it.

Yeah. What about you, Matty? What was your story?

Mine was well, the center console was out. So I didn't have the problem of it not coming out.

It was that I would accidentally move it and then the lid that you can use that kind of just like

you push it lightly and then it comes out and covers the whole thing. I would accidentally

like move the thing forward with my water bottle in it and then it would hit that lid.

And so the whole thing would just like just get stuck. And then my water bottle would

be right below the fan speed button. And so then it just blasted the fan all the way up to 10.

That was like a Rube Goldberg series of events just like unfolding.

Yeah. So it's like, I just, I don't want to have to worry about that.

Yeah. What about you? Well, for me, so I didn't even really notice it at first. It was pushed

in, right? And so, and I had my sunglasses and maybe some keys or my house keys or

something in there. And I feel like, oh, well, let's see what this does. And I pushed it and it

comes out and it got stuck so that my sunglasses and other things were stuck in there and I

couldn't get it. I couldn't get the sunglasses out. I really honestly could not.

That's something you can break.

I had to, well, I had to eventually just work so hard at it that the sunglasses got all

scratched up and they're unusable. They weren't that expensive. But it was like super frustrating.

I'm like, how could this happen? It's again, because it's just the wrong size to get anything

that's smallish stuck in there. And it was honestly, it was kind of frustrating.

Oh yeah. I mean, you also have sunglasses in your car.

So I had one other kind of ridiculous thing happen that I was just remembering. And it

happened to me in the air too. So it was raining pretty good and approached the car to get in.

And because they're trying to basically have the car wake up before you get to it, right?

It turned the windshield wipers on as I was going to get.

Oh yeah, you told me about that.

The driver's seat. So it just flung.

You got soaked like an acre of water at me. Just that was sitting. Yeah. And the air did the same

thing. Like I feel like you got a, that's an easy thing to not do. Just wait until you detect

that someone's in the seat or something. I don't know. That was kind of nuts.

Maybe what does this car made in Arizona? Maybe that never rains in Arizona or something.

I didn't think of that.

And they're like, we're just going to try to be helpful.

There's one tip for you.

I think we should talk about briefly the actually putting down the second row and third row seats.

Okay. Yeah. It's just kind of clunky getting the seats all down. Like it was clever the way that they,

if the front seats were in the way of the second row folding, that they would slide them forward

so that the second row didn't hit, which happens in some cars, believe it or not.

So they did that. That was kind of clever. But then, yeah, I just noticed like even with the

second row already folded, if you press the buttons again, it would move the front seats for no

reason. It's like, I think it happened to if somebody was sitting there.

Yes. You get a little notification, but it's kind of bizarre to just suddenly feel your

seat move forward and then move back.

Yeah. It's not like it folded the person in the back, but it just is a little, yeah, maybe surprising.

The other thing too is the hatch. They, similar to the air, they,

the way they do the cut line of the hatch, it like is this big clamshell thing in the back,

which is, I guess, it's unique. It looks cool. And you can also get stuff in a little easier,

but at least with the one that we had, which had the air suspension, it would sit pretty low.

And for me, I would open the hatch and I had to be really careful to not hit my head

on the sharp edge of the clamshell when it's open, just the, yeah.

Tall people issues.

I guess. Me and Matt, we don't have those problems.

Okay. So we do have a first drive about this, this gravity that we borrowed upon cr.org.

We will be purchasing our own version. And yeah. So with that, let's move on to the next segment,

which is audience questions. And don't forget the best place to send those questions, comments,

videos is cr.org slash talking cars. And I, most people probably know by now, but if

we choose your question and use it on the show, then we will send you some cr swag,

like maybe a t-shirt, a trucker's hat, or I don't know if we have trucker's hat,

but maybe we should. Maybe we should.

Don't make empty promises.

Yeah. Okay. And so, and we do like those videos. So wouldn't you know, we actually have one today.

And this comes from Ryan, who lives in British Columbia, Canada. But it sounds like he might

be from somewhere else originally. So let's give a listen to Ryan.

Hi, Talking Cars. I've got a question about the lifespan of vehicles, sort of getting the most

out of them. Recently upgraded from a Toyota Camry Hybrid 2007 to this 2015 Sienna. But as

you can see, I've also got Tundra here and MR2 from 1992. Trying to find a sweet spot between,

you know, a new vehicle and depreciation, while also getting sort of the best years,

I guess, out of a vehicle and then resale at the end of a sort of period. So 215,000 miles on

that Tundra, hoping to get a bit more out of that. 120 on the Sienna and 180 something on the MR2,

which I'm hoping will go for a lot longer. Yeah. Just curious scenario thoughts about

appreciation, vehicle lifespan and resale. Thanks. Keep Talking Cars.

Okay. So right off the bean, it seems like he's doing most things right. But Maddie,

tell Ryan about maybe some potential downsides to the way he's, you know, these older models,

high mileage, all that kind of stuff. Sure. Yeah. So older models tend to come with

not as many active safety features as newer models do. We're seeing a lot of newer models come with

standard like AEB, Ford collision warning, even AEB on the highway and with pedestrian detection.

So Toyota in this case with for his, both his Tundra and his Sienna, those are going to likely

come with standard Toyota safety sense. So that's going to include like lane keeping,

lane departure warning, the AEB and Ford collision I was talking about. So older versions,

I believe the 2015 Sienna had some of these as optional, but some most of them as not even

available. So really missing out on a lot of those features by holding onto older models,

as well as the crash structures of the vehicle themselves. There's always advancements going

on in the structure and the metals and like those crumple zones and airbags. And so if in the

future he's looking at newer vehicles, take a look at IHS's website, they do a lot of crash

testing. They're always updating their protocols to always keep the bar higher so that these cars

just, you know, increasing safety. So that's, that's my suggestion. And also kind of to your point,

and that's, this is part of the reason why we are seeing more and more vehicles with these thick

roof pillars because they're meeting these, these, you know, crash standards, right? So they, they

kind of, the downside is that it does hurt visibility, outward visibility, which is a safety

detriment, right? You can't see as well out of the cars. But yeah, you know, you look at a car

from the 90s, the pillars were super, super thin, so much glass here everywhere, but the

craft structure is just nowhere near what they are now. Yeah. It was hard to, for me to look at

these vehicles and especially that second gen MR2 and not be like, oh my gosh, you know, like this,

this fleet seems perfect to me, especially that MR2. Yeah, he's doing it right. I mean,

if you're trying to balance, you know, the depreciation and getting the most out of these

vehicles and resale like Toyota, right? These, these 10 year old Toyotas are doing that.

He chose the right brand. Yeah. Yeah. But that MR2, I mean, 180,000 miles on that MR2,

that's sweet. I hope they were all from you, Ryan. Yeah. I hope you put all 180 on it.

Absolutely. Yeah. I think if you're gonna, you know, it, you know, your resale is not going to

be great when you are trying to resell a vehicle, an older vehicle with a lot of miles. But like

you said, if there's any vehicle, any automaker that you can do it with and get away with,

still getting some money back is going to be a Toyota. So sure seems to us, Ryan, that you're

doing, doing things pretty right. And again, especially that, that MR2, that thing looks so

cool. Okay. Next question comes from Mel from Greensboro, North Carolina. Gonna put my glasses

on here, kind of do my Mike Quincy old man thing. Just Mike Quincy dig. Okay. So Mel says,

my husband Shane with his dad Bob just got a 2025 Kia Soul EX for his 50th birthday.

We have a 2020 Kia Nero hybrid with nearly 120,000 miles as well,

and trying to maximize the life of each. When we drive from North Carolina to Florida to see

my family, which car should we take? Should we save the Nero for a round town in my occasional

one hour commute? Or should we continue to put big miles on it with trips to Florida? Obviously,

the Soul isn't a hybrid. So how much should we take the mileage difference into consideration?

So Alex, I'll start with you. What's your answer from Mel here?

Yeah. I mean, Mel, honestly, I think like we can get into all the nuances of,

you know, the mileage and trying to, you know, save one car and its mileage over the other. But

for me, or if it were me, I would say take whichever one is most comfortable. If one of

these two vehicles is better for you on a longer trip, take that one on the trip. Because

both of these vehicles, even though ones of hybrid ones, not are pretty efficient and good

on gas, right? But I guess if that's not a sufficient answer, I'd probably just start,

I would keep putting the miles on the Nero hybrid, right? It's already got 120,000 miles on it.

So you've kind of reached that point where this is going to be considered a high mileage vehicle.

So adding more from a long road trip is not really going to change things other than maybe

having to do maintenance on that car. So yeah, that's my suggestion. And then just quickly

plugging our website, if you go onto cr.org and you go use the compare tool for cars, we actually

have a little thing in there where you can say basically how much you drive. So in this case,

I just put in like 1000 miles and you can put the soul next to the 2020 Nero and use all of our

information to see the difference in cost. And it's not that much, honestly. So, but anyway,

play around with that. That might help answer your question. Yeah. And that compare thing is

very easy to use and pretty darn cool. Yeah, definitely. Definitely suggest that.

Maddie, what about you with any thoughts for Mel? Yeah, so I think in this case, I mean,

I am the safety person on this panel right now. So I am going to talk about the differences in

the safety. And so back in 2020, there weren't as many standard safety features, of course,

and you're going on a really long trip. So anything could happen. So my recommendation

is to use the vehicle that has the most active safety features. Like I said, you never know what's

going to happen. But in other areas, I did see on our website using the comparison tool that the

soul has better braking distances, better daily and emergency handling. And then in terms of comfort,

we did rate it as having better comfort, seat comfort than the 2020 Nero. Take that into consideration.

If he's going on this long trip, then luggage becomes a question. And the soul does not hold

as much as the Nero. So I do recommend if you're not packing a lot of stuff, take the soul.

Well, that's the kind of the funny thing, because hybrids are typically actually more efficient

in the city driving than they are on the highway. They're going to get better fuel mileage there.

But in this case, the Nero is so efficient all the time that it's more efficient than the soul

in the city and on the highway. So from that perspective, it doesn't really matter.

You're certainly not losing anything by using the Nero on your long trip.

My only suggestion would be, I personally would probably maybe take the newer vehicle just because

it's newer and has a lot less miles. And so there's just percentage wise, I would think,

less chance of breaking down on a longer journey. So that might be a reason why I might go with that.

They also just announced, since we first talked about this to recording today, that the soul goes

away after 2025. So you might have a collector's item. So maybe don't put the miles on it.

Another reason to keep those miles. Yeah.

All right. Well, that's going to do it for this episode. If you want to learn more about the

topics and the cars that we talked about, you can click on the links in the show notes.

Don't forget to send those questions, comments, videos to cr.org slash Talking Cars.

Thanks so much for watching and we'll see you all next time.

2026 Lucid Gravity

About this episode

Request an Explanation

Want to learn more?

Help improve this episode

More from Talking Cars (MP3)