The Mazda CX-5 is a small SUV. This episode is specifically about the 2026 version and what’s changed, like how it rides and what the dashboard screen/controls are like.
Lumbar support is the adjustable (or shaped) support area in a seat that supports the lower back. The speaker links it to comfort and reduced fatigue—specifically avoiding back aching during trips from A to B.
Adaptive headlights are headlight systems that change direction (and/or beam pattern) based on steering input to better illuminate where you’re going. Here, they describe the headlights moving as you turn the wheel, which can feel disorienting at first but improves visibility through curves.
A track test is a controlled way to evaluate handling limits—cornering grip, balance, and driver confidence—more than typical street driving. In this segment, the speakers use track driving to judge how the CX-5 behaves in wide, sweeping corners.
A naturally aspirated engine doesn’t use a turbo or supercharger. It gets air in through the engine normally, and that can affect how the car feels when you accelerate.
Infotainment systems combine media, navigation, phone connectivity, and sometimes vehicle settings into one interface. The segment contrasts Mazda’s built-in controls with using phone-based interfaces (Android Auto/Apple CarPlay) for easier day-to-day use.
Android Auto lets you connect your phone to the car and use certain apps on the car’s screen. The speaker likes it because it’s easier than using the car’s built-in menus.
They mention a 12.9-inch screen size on other CX-5 trims. Bigger screens can make controls easier to tap, so they’re curious how climate controls will look on that display.
A wireless charger is a charging pad in the car where you can set your phone down to charge it. They’re saying this Mazda doesn’t include that as standard, even though many cars do.
This is a seat setting that moves the driver’s seat to help you get in and out. Here, it’s annoying because it moves when they start the car instead of staying put.
Fit and finish is how “well put together” the car feels—like how nice the interior looks and how solid everything seems. It’s basically about what you get for the price.
Ground clearance is how much space there is between the ground and the bottom of the car. More clearance can make it easier to handle rough or uneven roads.
Adaptive cruise control (ACC) automatically adjusts your speed to maintain a set following distance from the vehicle ahead. In this segment, the speaker describes ACC behavior during traffic changes and how it can issue warnings and braking when it thinks you’re too close.
AEB is a safety feature that can automatically brake if the car thinks you’re about to hit something. They’re saying this particular car didn’t trigger it in the situation they tried.
Lane centering is an advanced driver-assistance feature that helps keep the car centered in its lane by steering input. In this discussion, it’s tied to trim level—only higher trims get it—and the speaker questions whether it’s worth the added cost.
Ventilated seats have built-in fans to blow air through the seat so it doesn’t get as hot. It’s a comfort feature you often see on more expensive trim levels.
The Hyundai Santa Fe is an SUV that can have a “bird’s-eye” camera view. When it rains, water can stick to the camera lenses and make the picture hard to see.
A backup camera is the camera that shows what’s behind your car when you’re backing up. If the lens gets dirty or wet, the picture can get blurry, so it’s harder to park safely.
LIVE
Hi, and welcome back. I'm Mike Quincy. I'm Maddie McCarty. And I'm John Williams. And
on this episode of Talking Cars, we are going to get into the 2026 Mazda CX-5. This is frequently
considered the sportiest among small SUVs, certainly in consumer reports testing. It
looks pretty similar to the predecessor. It's longer, a little bit wider. And initially, in terms
of powertrain, it's only going to be available with a regular gas engine. A hybrid Mazda source
hybrid, I should say, is coming, but no word about a turbo. But the big news is, and we're
certainly going to dive deep into this, is that the CX-5 gets a touchscreen only infotainment
system, finally putting an end to Mazda's frustrating knob-based infotainment system,
even though we know that some people like it. And we'll get into that too. And we will, won't we now?
We borrowed a Top Trim CX-5 Premium Plus from Mazda, which cost $41,080. And so let's go all gas
and no brakes with the new CX-5. Mr. Williams, please tell us what you like about the CX-5.
Sure. So right off the bat, I mean, I think you mentioned the CX-5 has always been known to be
kind of one of the sportier vehicles in the segment. I think that that kind of sometimes goes
along with a little bit of a stiffer ride quality. They've actually kind of softened things up for
this one. And I actually, I like that. I think this one rides pretty comfortably. It absorbs
most bumps pretty well. The body is pretty well controlled. You know, your head isn't moving
all over the place. So it's softer, but it's not uncomfortable in that sense. So I think that
ride comfort is actually something a lot of people will probably be pretty happy with.
Do you think making it, I guess, softer? Do you think Mazda is attempting to make it more,
appeal more to a mainstream? If the last one was sort of, oh, it's the sporty small SUV,
and now it's more embraceable? Yeah, I would say so, because Mazda is known for its sportiness.
And we're kind of bringing it down to the average level, I guess you could say, of
many other small SUVs. So it's going to feel a lot like any other small SUV you see on the road,
which is kind of sad. Right. I think if you want a car that rides comfortably,
it's going to get you from point A to point B. This is a good car for that.
Okay. And that, Maddie, is that sort of like the top on your list? It's just a good all-around
functional car? You got other things that really stand out to you. Oh, you know what? I think it
actually had pretty comfortable seats. So that goes along with, you know, getting from A to B and
stepping out of the car and not having your back aching. So I like the lumbar and the seats.
I actually really liked the adaptive headlights that they have. So that's like when you turn
the steering wheel to go around a curve, your headlights also move to illuminate the curve.
And I really like that. And it took a second for me to get used to it because you can like see
the lights move or the illumination move. But I got used to it and actually ended up really liking
it. Yeah, certainly looking at headlights evolution here at Consumer Reports, the first time you drive
a car with adaptive lights, the lights are all sudden moving and you're, what's happening?
It can be a little disorienting, right? Yeah, definitely. You know, you talked about the sportiness.
I think this CX-5, even though it's softer, it still handles really, really well. You might not
really notice the kind of athletic manners, if you will, on the road. But I did take it out on
our track and it hangs on pretty good. We have a lot of really kind of wide sweeping corners. You
can pitch it in there faster than you might expect and hangs on pretty good before it starts
understeering. Pretty easy to adjust your line. Obviously, that's not the kind of driving most
people are going to be doing. But for a compact SUV, it still handles really well.
I did not take it around the track. No, I'm just that your average striper right now,
we're just taking it to the grocery store and it did a good job.
And that's okay. That's what most people will be doing.
I too took it on the track and it really did surprise me. It felt better on the track than
it did just on the road. And what's interesting about this car is, you know, writing up all my
notes for this podcast and I kept typing MX-5 and that's, you know, I wish to speak for Miata.
And that kind of, you know, tells you where my brain was when we were preparing for this.
You can't, it just, I guess it's a feather in the company's cap when you think about Mazda and
you immediately think sporty. But I think that's, for me, one of the downsides of this is they kind
of lost their sporty edge, which if you're driving a previous version of this and you get
into the new one, you think, where did the phone go? Am I wrong about that?
No, I don't think so. That was something I noticed as well. I think it's, again, it still
handles really well, but there can be a difference between how well a car handles and how engaging
it is to drive for it. I think it just feels a little bit less sharp, a little more muted.
The steering is on the softer side when you first start turning it. And that's something
that previous Mazdas, the steering's always had kind of a nice heft to it. Good feedback.
You still get some feedback about grip and the road surface and things like that, but
it just overall feels a little bit muted. And again, going back to what you're saying, Maddie,
that might be okay. That might be what a lot of consumers are maybe more looking for. But if
you're a longtime Mazda buyer and you're kind of used to that sharpness, you just kind of keep
in mind it is a little bit more dulled, I think. Right. So we don't want to mute the likes. I don't
side here. Can I say one more thing that I think you can say anything you want.
Okay. So on the powertrain side of things, like you mentioned, it is carried over,
it's only available with the naturally aspirated engine, the old one, you could get a turbo.
But we'll save that discussion for later. Even with this carried over powertrain,
Mazda did tell us that they did some refinement of the transmission tuning on the way that it
shifts essentially. And I think they did a good job with it. So when you really first tip into the
throttle pedal and you're trying to accelerate, the downshifts actually come pretty quickly,
especially compared to some other cars on the market. When you get into the gas pedal and you're
waiting for a solid second or so for the car to downshift before you can accelerate, that can be
kind of frustrating. So I think throttle response is actually pretty good and they did a good job
there. And the mapping of the engine and the transmission is, I agree with you, it has a lot
of energy to it, but I think it has to because there's not a ton of horsepower. Correct.
So it's all about gearing. Right. I'm afraid to move on. No, you can move on. I'm ready.
Okay. I'm ready. I'm bracing myself, but I'm ready. So Maddie, tell us. Sure. What bugged you
about this CX-5? I guess, but we'll see if I'm right. Oh, take a while, I guess. Yeah. So
the controls that you mentioned earlier where they have upgraded it, and I do the air quotes
to a large touchscreen. We used to have a smaller screen kind of recessed into the dash that you
controlled with their little Mazda knob, and it was only touch available if you had like
Android Auto or Apple CarPlay. So it really was just controlled with this little joystick.
And now they've gotten rid of that, yay, in my opinion, but they have also gotten rid of
all of the climate controls, the physical ones that were fantastic, and they put them into the
touchscreen in this top trim. It's 15.6 inches, so it's quite large. It looks like an iPad that
they just stuck into the center stack. Kind of similar to Tesla in the early 20 times.
I was going to say, it sounds like Tesla, but whatever. Yeah. So I think it was the hardest
thing was to just adjust the climate control, and I struggled with that a lot, especially since,
for some reason, I don't know if it was just because it's an early model, but the climate
wasn't working very well. So I found myself really trying to adjust it, and it was just like, I felt
like my eyes were just off the road, and they have a few different ways to access climate,
and it just was, it was a pain. Yeah, I totally agree with you. And functionality of the climate
system aside, it comes down to what you test, usability. I mean, maybe it's not as hard when
you're on a straight highway and you have lane centering on, you can take a little bit of time,
which we still don't love to take your eyes off the road, but with a physical control,
you never have to move your eyes from the road. It's worth mentioning to our track,
we're in a pretty rural area of Connecticut, right? There's a lot of really twisty back roads with a
lot of elevation changes. You're going up, down, left, right. Your hands are busy all the time,
right? So taking that time to take your hands off the wheel in the middle of a corner can
get pretty sketchy sometimes. And it seems so contradictory because the screen for this top
trim is pretty big. Yeah, it is. But Mazda devoted such little amounts of space to something as
important like the climate system. Yeah, there's like this tiny little rectangle
by the driver that has a bunch of tiny little gray icons that like light up depending on status,
but it's so small and I don't understand why. Yeah. And you can tap on it to like make it
bigger, but like why? And it kind of, it brings up this other kind of shortcut bar, right? But
there's no way to pin that at times out. So you have to tap this tiny bar like you mentioned,
and then you have to hit the button you want before it goes away. Yeah. And then the way that
you open the main climate menu is swiping up from the screen. Swiping up, and there's no indication
that you should do that. So how are you supposed to know? You really have to take the time to sit
in there and get to know the touchscreen before you drive off. Otherwise, you're going to be doing
that while you're driving, which is not good. And quite often we tell the talking cars audience,
when you go to buy a car, take a lot of time with your salesperson to get a full explanation
for how these things work. Now, in my opinion, if the controls require lots and lots of explanation,
they're not well designed. But so, you know, we're not trying to talk people into or out of
buying one of these things, but if you do buy- No, what you're getting into. Yeah, exactly. Yeah.
I think, and we were talking about the support of like if someone hops into it, coming from another
Mazda, they might be, depending on whether or not they liked the knob, they might be happy to see
that gone. And especially like if you're coming from a car that's 10 years old that doesn't have
this technology, you might be enthralled by it. Right. Because it is, it does look nice,
but it's just hard to use. So sit with it, explore it, because it's brand new and it's unique and
there could be some changes that I would make to make it a little bit easier. So it was like,
you know, controller knob, I'm glad it's gone. I'm glad. You're glad. I'm so glad it's gone.
Mr. Williams. I'm a little bit in the middle and I'll tell you why. I didn't necessarily love
using the knob itself, but my personal use of these infotainment systems in cars,
I'm going straight to Android Auto or Apple CarPlay if I'm an iPhone. So in that sense,
the screens, like you mentioned, Maddie, on the, you know, kind of newer outgoing versions of the
CX-5 were touch enabled for Android Auto and Apple CarPlay still a little bit far away from you in
terms of reach, but that being said, I'm going in there and I'm not using really any of the native
functions inside the infotainment system. So the knob didn't bother me as much. Once I'm in
Android Auto, I'm all set. I'm using the touch screen and as a trade-off, I would much rather
have my physical climate controls than moving to this system. That's it. That's an interesting
point because there's a trade-off. It's a trade-off with the new tech with the big screen. There's
a trade-off with the old tech with the controller knob thing. Yeah. And also, I feel like in the
older version, you also had great controls on the steering wheel. So you could bypass a lot of
the touchscreen or the knob, but you don't have great steering wheel controls anymore in the CX-5.
They're all on a flat panel with a little divot for the center button.
And I found myself making a lot of errors, even though I knew which button to press.
Maybe my thumb was too big and I just overlapped onto the wrong part of the
keypad or the four-way pad. Right. Having a keypad on a steering wheel is suspect,
as opposed to just a thumb wheel. Some of the Hyundai Kia models have a little thumb wheel
on the steering wheel too. They just devolve, for example. Or even just a single button. It's
easier. It's more clearly defined for what you're getting at. They had it. They had it in all of
their models with this really nice design of toggles. And they were straightforward and it
made sense. And now they're gone and I'm actually sad about it. It's like one step forward,
a couple steps back. I had to take my eyes off the road to do the steering wheel buttons,
because like you, I wasn't sure, am I on the volume? Am I on the mid-track? Am I adjusting
the cruise control? And that's the point of the steering wheel buttons is so you aren't distracted
from your road. Yeah. All right. I think the climate controls, like you said,
Maddie, were the biggest downside for me. I mean, the screen is massive. Again, once I'm in
Android Auto, I'm not leaving anyway. And it's so big, the people next to me and stop and go
traffic know exactly what I'm listening to. But also, okay, for Android Auto, they don't like
enlarge the size of the buttons. So it's like this massive screen and then tiny little button
still. Right. I don't know. Theme throughout, right? Yeah. Which is strange, because this is
like a software. This is like you can design the screen to be anything you want. Yeah. OEMs have
a certain level of control over how it presents within the system. So they can make those decisions.
So yeah, it's very interesting to see like that. All the other trims of the CX-5 come with a smaller
touchscreen 12.9 inches. So I haven't seen that yet, but I'm curious to see how they've implemented
the climate bar in Android Auto with this smaller screen size. Looking forward to seeing that.
Did you think after our active criticism of this screen, is this something like Mazda could kind
of manipulate even as they're producing this car, they can say, okay, we've got to change. Because
it does. It seems like a software thing as opposed to like it's harder to install hardware hard
buttons. Well, that car. That's just it, right? They can do as many software updates as they want,
but the controls are still always going to be in the screen. Yeah. Yeah. But if they were, if the
climate system controls were larger, that would help. Yes. And if the climate menu had an actual
button to indicate, open this climate menu, that would help. All right. So I'm going to
disagree with you. I had a couple things. Sure. Go for it. On the CX-5. I'm ready. I didn't like
the ride. I thought it was busy. I thought it was not comfortable. The previous CX-5,
which I've driven many times, was also pretty stiff. But again, maybe you got better handling
because of that. I didn't care for the ride. I despise the seat. You hated the seat?
Hated the seat. I liked it. The cushion was too short. There was this section where the bottom
cushion and the seat back meet that completely numbed everything. There was not enough support
for me in these seats. And in our meetings about this car, we kept bringing up the Mazda CX-5
Hybrid, which we've used in some reports to test it. That had a rather stiff seat. A lot of people
are like, oh, it's too far away. The CX-50 Hybrid. I'm sorry. You're right. But I drove both of
those cars for hours and hours on it. The CX-50 Hybrid seat was held up over time. It was like,
initially, it felt stiff to me. But then driving it for a long time, I got it. I was like, I was
fine. I couldn't wait to get out of the CX-5. That's too bad. Couldn't wait. I thought it was
absolutely horrible. And the other thing that just confuses me about the CX-5 is it needs
a mission. You either can make it sporty or comfortable or fuel efficient. And as it's now,
it really accomplishes none of these things. I thought it had no personality. I just couldn't
wait to be done with it. We're going to be buying, obviously, our own test car
and we're going to drive it and we're going to have a different trim and all that stuff.
We'll get into that in a second. But this one, it left me absolutely cold.
I have a weird question for both of you. Do you remember when skinny jeans became popular?
Of course.
And let me be clear here. I'm not talking about athletic, slim fit, four-way stretch, comfortable
sweat panties. I'm talking about low-rise skinny jeans, 2008.
Yeah, true. Painted on denim skinny jeans.
Where's the scene?
Where this is going.
Why did people wear those?
Because they were in style.
Fashion. So for the look, right?
Yeah.
Right.
Yeah.
They were not comfortable.
Right. You're waddling down the hallway like a penguin because you can't bend your knee.
But I think automakers kind of do the same thing with interiors, right? There's trends.
They want to follow the trend. They want to look cool. A giant screen looks good in a showroom.
To someone who hasn't bought a car in 10 years, like I said, Maddie,
even if it's you're giving up functionality.
But don't you think there are people within the car companies
that are looking at these presentations of this dazzling screen like,
but this has no functionality and they're just overruled by people?
I think they're definitely overruled. Clearly they've been overruled.
I think there are some very, very smart people who have contributed to the design of this car
who are overruled. That's what I think.
And I think sometimes they sell themselves on the features, right?
Oh, it has Google built in. It has over the year updates. It has all this stuff.
Let me talk about Google built in.
Let's do it.
It's not even free. You get one year and then you have to pay for it.
So why have Google Maps in it, but you just have to pay for it?
Or you can just, I mean, arguably you can plug in your phone and then have Android Auto.
But it's like the principle of it. Why did you equip it in the car if you're not going to give it?
And wireless Android Auto and Apple CarPlay are not standard,
which is kind of weird. It's standard on a whole bunch of cars.
Yes, like a bunch of them. And this stands out not in a good way for that.
And also the lack of a standard wireless charger, which again, is like an everything.
Right. And this was a $40,000 car, which is not inexpensive.
Yeah. I mean, it starts at like, what, $29?
Right, right, right, right. But still.
Good point. Yeah, still.
Yeah.
Okay. Any other, any other bones to pick on the CX-5?
Oh boy. Well, picking of Android Auto, it worked the first day that I had it.
So I took it over the weekend and then it did not connect after that.
And I was too frustrated to keep deleting my phone and repairing it for it to work.
And I, true, I only did wireless. I didn't try to plug it in because I didn't have a cord with me,
but I shouldn't need to.
This has happened to a bunch of us with a number of manufacturers, not just mouse.
No. Right.
Be fair.
To be fair.
There's a lot of variables. I mean, so just for example, I had it for a couple of days and
I didn't have any issues. So it's kind of your mileage may vary, I guess.
It's again, kind of one of those know what you're getting into.
Things you can't always expect everything to work perfectly with whatever phone you have.
I hardwired my phone to it and it worked fine, but I didn't do the wireless.
Yeah. So I guess, yeah, like you said, it may vary.
You, I was going to do a nice little segue when you were talking about
know what you're getting into, but that passed. So I'm just going to say it anyways.
Speaking of getting into access, the easy, easy quotes again, entry exit feature,
where it brings your seat back all the way so that you can get out easily and then get back
in easily. But it was so annoying because it would happen when you would turn on the car
after you'd already gotten in. Right.
So your seat wouldn't move when you opened the car. So you could hop it in and then as soon
as you're ready to drive, it's like, nope, I'm going to take the seat back.
And I didn't know how to turn it off.
Another thing that's in the highly fashionable touchscreen, right, or your seat memory controls.
So if you're used to just being able to hit a button on the door, that's gone.
You now have to go into the touchscreen, save your driving position.
I found it eventually and it takes a couple of steps to get it, but I shouldn't have to do that
every time. It was way more complicated and I never mastered that particular section.
So every time I got into this borrowed CX-5 and I started the car, the seat would like fall to the
floor and I had to raise it up and get it and I had to reset it every time. I know there's a way
to do it. So hold your comments about, well, you don't understand the controls. I get it,
but it shouldn't be that complicated. You shouldn't have to worry about that every time
and have to redo the seat every time. And theoretically, you should be able to tie it to
like your key fob or they have like the driver, I forget what they call it, but basically it links
a profile driver recognition. Right. And to be clear, they do have that ability, at least in
theory. It was on the screen that you can link it to the key. I couldn't get it to work, but again,
it could just be a, you know, maybe pre-production model kind of button type.
Right. And we're going to get into this more with our own, our own test model. So, you know,
the criticism to Mazda on this should be, you know, with kind of a footnote, it's early in,
it's not, the trim is not the actual one that we're going to be buying. But still,
we all drive cars, different cars all the time. We deal with different types of manufacturers
controls all the time. When a type of control dexes one of us. All of us. There's so many
comments in the logbook about this. That's insane. I mean, we're kind of, you know,
the experts here, we're used to this stuff and it shouldn't be this as complicated as they're
making it. Yes, absolutely. I agree. All right. Any other, any other knits to pick? Keep going.
I think there's one more important thing, at least that I can think of, and that's fit and
finish, right? Which is for in plain English, that's how nice is the interior? You know,
what are you getting for your money? And Quincy, this is something I know you evaluate. So, I'm
sure you have some, some things to say here. Oh yeah, I have opinions. Way, way too much hard
plastic, way too many unfinished edges. It just, and it's also missing a lot of the little trim
bits that we found in our CX50 hybrid, the little, you know, the little exposed stitching on the,
on the dashboard of the CX50 hybrid, not there for this top trim CX5. Which I think it's important
too to point out, I looked at the window stickers and was shocked to find out that our CX50 hybrid
was less, less money. Right. So, so less money for the CX50 hybrid, nicer interior, better fuel
economy obviously, because it's a hybrid. And again, in my opinion, better seats. I know, I'll
lose that argument. Better controls. Yeah. Perhaps. Yes. Yeah, better controls. That's what you want,
even with the controller thing, et cetera, et cetera nod. That brings me to my question though,
as I was going through this, I was like, what is the difference between a CX5 and a CX50?
It's an interesting question, right? A question like, why is Mazdi having us debate this?
Now that there's this new 26 CX5, the difference is much more clear, right? The interior is very
different. You can only get the CX5 with one powertrain, the 50 you can still get with a turbo,
you can also get it as a hybrid. So, you have some more options there. But as far as
when they were more similar, and they had the same powertrain, similar interiors, all that.
And just almost a similar, unidentical name. Yeah.
Yeah, do we have the five or the five zero? Right. Right.
But so, what I did find, just the brief looking over is what you said about the powertrain.
Also, the CX50 is better for towing, and it has a little bit higher ground clearance. So,
I think they market it as a little bit more sporty or outdoorsy.
Yeah, outdoorsy, I think, is kind of what they've said. It's also a little shorter, it's a little
wider. Not that those things necessarily make it more outdoorsy or not, but the proportions are
a little different, right? Yes. Although the new CX5, the proportions are much closer.
And that's, you know, I'm glad you brought a fit and finish reminder. This was the top trim
CX5, and it was kind of disappointing, which is kind of a bummer. But it brings up the point of,
you know, how do we decide what trim that we're going to be buying for our Consumer Reports test
program? And John, have we involved in the car buying? Maybe, you know, briefly shed a little
light about how we decide which trim to buy. Yeah. So, I mean, unlike other outlets, we want to
focus on the trim that most people are actually going to be buying, because if you get the nice
trim with all the bells and whistles, it's probably going to score higher in a lot of areas,
right? Just because it's inherently nicer. So, we talk to manufacturers, we look at
old sales data, and we just try to see what we can gather as far as what we expect to be
the highest volume, you know, the highest, most popular trim that people are going to buy. Right.
And that's what we buy. And historically, sometimes we'll buy a trim that has new tech.
So, if we have a new type of ADAS system, a new type of whatever, a driver assistance,
you know, we'll go to you, Maddie, and say, you know, is it worth getting this higher trim
so we can try this new technology? Yeah. And we have done that before. We absolutely have
gone and gotten a trim that people aren't, isn't going to be the most popular specifically, so
that we could test out the system. And sometimes we just borrow cars so we can get a sense for it.
That's kind of what we're doing here, because we have heard that their Mazda's lane centering
assistance system is not going to be trickling down very much to like lower trims. You have to
get the top trim in order to get lane centering assistance. Yeah. So, in that case, we don't
expect it to really infiltrate the rest of the fleet very, very much as much as say like Toyota
or Honda or Hyundai. So, that's why we didn't, we're not going to be getting the lane centering
assistance, but we were able to try it out, which was really, really interesting to see.
We haven't officially ever tested lane centering, so it's just been like what general impressions
are. And I think in comparison to what we've last seen, we did borrow a CX90 a while back.
And the lane centering was a little bit sketchy, I'll say. And it has improved. It does
feel a lot more confident. It's a lot smoother at steering. It's better at staying in the center
without any like micro adjustments or swaying when you're going down a straight road. But once
you introduce like a curve, then you start to swing wide. And then it can feel a little uneasy
because you're not quite sure if it's going to get it. But you can steer with it, which is good,
so you can help it through it. So it's not the most reliable system, but I think it's
moving in the right direction. And we always tell people, you know, even with all of these
driver assistance features, you still have to kind of pay attention and still be engaged.
Yes. So if you're still needing to help the system, why do you have the system?
Convenience. I don't know. I mean, it is a convenience feature. I like using these types
of features. I get sad when I have to take a car that doesn't have lane turning.
Opposite. I'll literally turn the lane stuff off because it's never driving the way that I want
to drive the car down the lane. Yeah, I hear you on that. I'm in the middle. If I'm going,
you know, 400 miles on the highway and there's nobody else around, I'll turn it on
because it gets tiring. But most of the time I leave it off too.
Do you use adaptive cruise control? All the time.
Okay. Love it.
Did you try it in this car?
Yes.
What did you think?
It was a little wonky. I think a couple of times the traffic was in front of me and the car was
slowing down and the traffic moved away and then I got this warning and the dashboard hit
brakes now and there was no one in front of me. So, I mean, obviously that's what adaptive cruise
control is trying to tell you how close you are to the car in front of you and regulating the
speed appropriately. But I thought it was not quite on the ball.
Yeah. Do you remember how adaptive cruise control was in like the CX-90?
Do I remember?
I don't think I remember.
You probably didn't use it because it was terrifying.
So, your point is that it's gotten a lot better in this car.
It's got the new marketing slogan. Buy a Mazda. It's terrifying.
This is a positive though. It's gotten better.
It's gotten better. I agree though. It's not like the best one out there. It did this weird
thing where if a car changed lanes out from ahead of me and so I had a clear way ahead,
it would just sit there and it would sit there and so I'd be like, okay, I'm going to hit the gas
and then it would go. But I don't know why. It wouldn't just go by itself and it's like you said,
we try so many different systems across the board and this one stood out because of that.
It was so delayed and when I was coming up behind like really slow vehicles or even like a traffic
jam, it was not going to stop. Like maybe whatever. I did not try. I didn't let it go all the way.
It did not activate AEB at that point. But in certain vehicles, it'll start letting off the
gas quite far away and then you'll start to feel the brakes and it's a very comfortable experience.
You're quite confident that it's going to be okay. In this car, I was like, I don't know if it's
going to break and then I would have to slam on the brakes a little bit. And that's what we do at
Consumer Reports. We test them all. We find it. We take them to the limits. So go ahead. Yeah,
getting back to what we were talking about with terms, right? You were saying lane centering
is only available on the higher trims. Is that what you were saying? Yes. So you kind of wanted
to talk about that a little bit Coins, right? Yeah. Is it worth buying higher trims or not?
Definitely is a topic that is worth going into. Are you ever compelled?
Again, you're talking about spending your own money. Yes. Let's make that clear. Sure. So,
Maddie, is it ever worth buying a top trim? Well, we bought a top trim of the
Palisade calligraphy. Yes. So we thought so. And is it worth it? For your money. For your money.
Yeah. It really depends on what's important to me. And so in this case, I would not buy the top
trim because I don't think the lane centering is worth the money. For the CX-5. For the CX-5.
What about in general? I honestly don't know. I wouldn't discount it. I think in the case of
maybe Toyota Lexus, maybe the top trim of the Toyota comes with more bells and whistles than
the lowest trim of the Lexus. But they're going to drive very similarly perhaps. So I think it all
just depends on what is being offered. John? Yeah. I think that's a good take in general. I mean,
top trims, we're seeing now kind of this trend of it used to be top trims would come with better
powertrains, right? But now I feel like companies are getting away from that due to the development
costs. And we're seeing it's more feature based. So you might get some fancier ADAS features. You
might get ventilated seats, things like that. That's kind of more what we're seeing. Personally,
I think a lot of the time, if it comes with a better powertrain, that can make it worth it.
You know, like you mentioned in this CX-5, it's a little bit underpowered. You really have to
rev it out on the highway. That can get kind of unpleasant. So if we're talking about the old
CX-5, I'd probably get the turbo one for that reason. It's just a more pleasant driving experience.
You don't have to work the engine as hard powertrain wise. I think that can sometimes
make a top trim worth it. And then on the feature side, again, like you said, Maddie,
you really just have to look at what is important to you. You know, maybe you live in a really hot
climate and you want your ventilated seats, but are they worth the extra $5,000? That's only you
can decide that, right? Yep. And sometimes the top trims have more seat adjustments, like more
power adjustments. And for those of us that have passengers frequently, the top trims
might have lumbar adjustment for the front passenger, which is not necessarily that common.
I'm also a big music fan. Sometimes the top trims come with better speakers.
Oh, yes. That's the point.
So that is, you know, one of the reasons, a couple reasons why you want to get a nicer trim.
Sometimes top trims come with bigger wheels and tires, which can degrade the ride, which can
you can hit the potholes will be a lot stiffer. But I agree with you, Maddie, it comes down to the
making model. For example, I got to bring up the Toyota for the SR5 was the mainstream trim,
that's the one that most people are going to buy. Also happens to be the base, right?
And it's miserable. I mean, the fit and finish, the features in that truck are just terrible.
There's no way I would buy an SR5 forerunner, I would consider one of the higher trims.
So it isn't it isn't just a simple question of top trims are always worth it.
Top trims are never worth it. Yeah, because it really got to get down to the details.
I think in this case, the top trim does come with a lot, right? Like the difference between
the base and the top trim, I think is about 10 grand. And you get a lot for that, I do think.
I think the base should come with more features like wireless phone,
charging and wireless Android Auto. But you do get quite a lot. I don't know if I'd go for the top
trim because I don't need the, oh, they call it the driver personalization system. That's that's
allegedly. Yeah, but like the adaptive headlights were nice, you know, and I put,
I don't need that large touchscreen. But on the other hand, it has that 360 degree monitor. So
like you can see basically almost what's underneath the car, you get this whole view around you,
which is nice. So I think I would go for a mid trim. I think I'd go for one higher than maybe
what we I think we're going to buy. I'd go for a premium because you do get,
you get heated and ventilated seats. I think with the one that we're buying,
which is the preferred, you just get heated seats. And I have found that I like ventilated seats
in the summer and a steering wheel heater. I just want to make sure I just mentioned what the
standard active safety and driver assistance features are on the CX-5. We have automatic
lane departure warning, lane keeping assistance, adaptive cruise control, and automatic high beams.
So you do get a full suite of safety, which is nice. And that's standard. And that is,
you know, you know, kudos to Mazda for doing that. They can make it a standard for every trim.
Yes. Excellent. So here's a good question then. You're talking about which trim you would buy
in general, would you buy a 2026 CX-5? No. Or what small, what small SUV would you buy?
Okay. Well, the thing that is most important to me, I do want to preface it with this,
is that I go for reliability. That is like the number one thing, reliability and gas mileage.
Those are number two things that are important to me. Also safety. Probably important to a lot of
followed closely by Honda. And so I personally would go for the 25 RAV4 hybrid.
Oh, look at you. Yes. That's an inspired pick. Because there's still a few of them left over.
Yeah. The 26 has changed. And I really like the design of the 25 because it still has
physical climate controls that are really important for me. And that's about 34 grand.
And it's a hybrid. So it's going to have really good gas mileage. It's going to last forever.
And it's going to have some of the amenities that I like. Excellent.
That's what I would go for. John, top pick for a small SUV. Well, I know you said one, I have three.
First, I would not buy the 26 CX-5. I agree. If I wanted to stay in the Mazda family, I would go
with either a 25 CX-5 or CX-50. And I would get either the turbo or a fuel economy is more important
to you, the hybrid CX-50. And reasons why, honestly, those kind of still have some
Mazda-ness to them, right? The interiors are nicer. They're engaging to drive. Again,
not that the new CX-5 isn't engaging, but it's a little muted in comparison. And lastly,
I get my physical climate controls, which are important to me. And then stepping outside of
Mazda, I would say to go for the CR-V hybrid. I think Honda has a really, really nice hybrid
powertrain that's really dialed in. It's really smooth. It does nice simulated shifts so it doesn't
rev super high like other CVT hybrid powertrains like Toyotas. Just a pretty nice vehicle.
Yeah, real quick. Simple controls. I have a lot more to add. I've seen no reason to buy the CX-5
over the hybrid versions of the Sportage, the Tucson CR-V, or the Forester.
The Forester. Yeah, I really like the Forester. I'm really eager to try to get more time in the new
Toyota RAV4, which we're in the process of buying. They're all hybrids, so fuel economy is going to
the controls are working out. We'll have to wait and see. So I'm really torn, but I'm not buying
the CX-5. And that really is our first look at the CX-5. We'll be buying our own preferred model
soon, so be sure to check back with ConsumerReports.org for our full test results. And now we're
going to actually go on to audience questions. We love your questions. Text 30-second videos.
Just go to CR, which brings us to our audience questions. We love your questions. Text 30-second
videos. Just go to TalkingCars at iCloud.com. That's TalkingCars at iCloud.com. And if we use
your question on the podcast, we'll send you a free t-shirt, some kind of groovy auto test swag.
Loved and admired by all. So the question we've got today, this is Andre from Oregon,
who writes, I have a 2022 Hyundai Santa Fe that I absolutely love. One of my favorite features
is the 360-degree camera system, which is incredibly useful until it rains. And here in Oregon,
it rains a lot. When the lenses get wet, the water beads up and completely obscures the camera,
making the feature almost useless. I've researched hydrophobic versus hydrophilic,
and my head is exploding. Sorry to hear that. I've tried a bunch of things already.
Rainex, antifog, Oakley hydrophobic coating, and professional ceramic coating on the lenses.
None of them have really solved the problem. Has anyone actually found something that works?
With how many modern cars rely on external cameras now, I'm surprised this isn't a bigger issue.
Any ideas for me? So a very well thought of and researched question, and John,
I'm going to turn to you initially for our answer. Sure. So before we get into answers,
I think it is worth mentioning just for context for anyone else listening to or watching this,
that some manufacturers take this into account when they design their cars. There are some
luxury models where the camera is kind of hidden and it retracts away when it's not being used,
and it'll pop out, sometimes makes a startling noise, as we've noted in several of our road tests,
but it can help in that kind of situation. And also some cameras have like little cleaners,
systems built into them, kind of like a windshield washer. The VVX3?
Cadillac? Yep. Okay. But that said, Andre, we're not going to tell you to buy a new car. I think
I would agree that the Santa Fe is a great car. And it sounds like you've already tried almost
every chemical on the market. You know, those unfortunately aren't always going to be effective
for this application simply because just one little drop of water, you think about how small
the camera is, is going to obscure your vision a lot. So this may not be the answer that you want
to hear, but probably one of the easiest things to do would just be keep a microfiber towel with
you microfiber so it won't scratch the lenses. Just wipe the lenses down before you get in the car.
So surrounding your camera, you're probably going to have four. There's going to be
one in the front, one in the back, and then one under each of your side mirrors.
You just go give it a quick wipe and camera should be clear.
All right. And I was talking about rain, but what about like in the winter, certainly here in the
northeast, we've got snow and all the grime and everything that comes out. So it's not just rain
that's going to obscure your camera. Right. Yes. It happens all the time in the winter here.
Always make sure to keep that microfiber cloth. And even if you can still see and it's fine,
if you have just like small particles covering the lens that you might not be able to see,
water is going to stick to that a lot easier. So make sure that you always just keep that clean.
And then if you take your car to get a car wash and maybe you get a wax on it,
make sure to also wipe the cameras after that because that wax coating is not going to be
helpful for you. I have an idea. I haven't tried it. Are you so surprised, John?
So there are things called rain shields for backup cameras and they kind of look like a little
half an umbrella and you just kind of plop them on to the back of the car.
Like a baseball cap visor. Like a baseball cap visor.
This sounds like something you get in a Tiki bar when you go join some little umbrellas in them.
I'm sure they come in fun colors. I don't know. Maybe try that out.
I can't guarantee that it will work, but that is my idea. And as a last resort,
you can always cast a spell in Pervious. I'm so sorry.
On that Harry Potter note, that will about do it for this episode.
I think that tells you how difficult of a problem this is. So I feel for Andre.
Yeah, you're not the only one on Andre, don't worry.
This episode of Talking Cars was masterfully conducted, of course, by super producer Dave
Abrams and edited by Andrew. I still play hockey, Belize, and of course, Anatoly, the great Shumski.
As always, check the show notes for more information on the vehicles and topics we discussed.
Just a reminder to keep your questions coming. Go to TalkingCarsaticloud.com and if you're
watching on YouTube, we recently added a donate button to our page. Consumer Reports is a
nonprofit, so if you're able to keep us doing this important work, we always appreciate it.
Thanks so much for tuning in. We'll see you next week.
About this episode
Mazda’s 2026 CX-5 Premium Plus gets a major tech shake-up: a touchscreen-only infotainment system replaces the old knob setup, but the big screen also becomes the episode’s biggest gripe—especially the touchscreen climate controls, which are hard to use and force extra eye/hand time. The CX-5 still rides comfortably and handles well on track, yet feels less sharp and “muted” than earlier Mazdas. Powertrain is gas-only for now, with tuning refinements. The hosts debate whether top trims are worth it and ultimately steer buyers toward hybrids like the RAV4 or CR-V.
On this episode, we share our first impressions of the 2026 Mazda CX-5. We cover the CX-5's redesign, including its new, large touchscreen infotainment system, mourn its lack of physical climate controls, and discuss how the top trim model we rented doesn't feel that special. We also answer a question about 360 cameras and how to keep the lenses clean in rainy places like Oregon.
Join CR at https://CR.org/joinviaYT to access our comprehensive ratings for items you use every day. CR is a mission-driven, independent, nonprofit organization.
SHOW NOTES:
0:00 - Intro
0:17 - 2026 Mazda CX-5 Overview
1:18 - What we love about the 2026 Mazda CX-5
7:05 - What we dislike on the 2026 Mazda CX-5
30:50 - Is it worth buying top trim vehicles?
36:05 - What we'd buy instead of a 2026 Mazda CX-5
39:10 - Audience Question: What's the best way to keep a vehicle's 360º camera clean?
