Road test review: Toyota Yaris GX hybrid

Wednesday, 26 August 2020

Toyota's all-new Yaris hatch is here now, kicking off an entire family of Yaris-badged vehicles.

TOYOTA YARIS GX HYBRID
Base price: $27,990
Powertrain and economy: 1.5-litre petrol three-cylinder, 67kW/120Nm (85kW total system output), constantly variable transmission, FWD, combined economy 3.3L/100km, CO2 76g/km (source: RightCar).

Some might find the Yaris hybrid’s looks challenging, but you can’t deny its impressive fuel-miser credentials.

Vital statistics: 3940mm long, 1695mm wide, 1500mm high, 2550mm wheelbase, luggage capacity 270 litres, 15-inch steel wheels.
We like: Remarkably frugal, brilliant three-cylinder engine, impressively comfortable and refined.

The interior in the new Yaris is several notches above the old one and a lot of its current competitors too.

We don't like: Looks a bit crook in basic trim, steel wheels seem a bit cheap on a $28k car.

It is quite frankly long-overdue, but Toyota has finally replaced the elderly Yaris with an all-new model, complete with a hybrid powertrain that sips fuel and an all-new three-cylinder engine that brings some – gasp – personality.

A Yaris with personality? Are you mad?

It may not look pretty, buy the 1.5-litre three-cylinder engine is a great little thing.

Not at all. Well, not in this regard, at least. And let’s be fair – the last Yaris did have its moments and it only grew increasingly dull as it aged and Toyota insisted on slapping increasingly improbably new noses on what was by now a very old car.

* The Yaris has landed: Toyota's baby hatch is here

* Toyota's Yaris-based SUV revealed

If swoops and bulges are your thing, then the Yaris is one for you.

* Sunday drive: Toyota RAV4 GX hybrid

But this new one? It is a surprisingly little package in a number of different ways. Although, given Toyota’s run of late with some truly impressive models like the new Corolla, RAV-4 and Supra that are actually interesting and engaging, it probably shouldn’t have come as much of a surprise that the new Yaris is actually very good indeed.

And, yes, it does have a degree of personality, and not just thanks to the growly and impressively strong 1.5-litre three-cylinder petrol engine, but also the move to Toyota’s TNGA platform.

A blue-fringed badge means ‘hybrid’ in Toyota world.

The engine has a brilliantly characterful triple growl when you wind it up, and Toyota’s new-gen architecture is nicely at home under a lighter car and feels wonderfully agile and responsive.

But here’s the surprising part – while it does posses a degree of personality when you start winding it up, it is actually a smooth, quiet and comfortable thing too. Which is a way more important quality in a car like the Yaris, yet one that few its size actually possess.

So what makes it so smooth and quiet then?

Steel wheels mark the GX out as the entry-level Yaris hybrid.

Well, first up is that TNGA architecture that brings a resolved and mature ride to pretty much anything it is slipped under, but mainly it is the almost seamless nature of the hybrid drivetrain.

The engine pumps out 65kW and is hooked up to a CVT transmission, which is normally grounds for a groan and an eye-roll, but it has to be said that it works brilliantly well here – part of this is due to Toyota’s use of an actual first gear in its CVTs, but a lot is also due to the impressive hybrid system that ups the total power output to 85kW and spends a remarkable amount of time pushing the Yaris along solely on battery power.

Fire the Yaris hybrid up and it is utterly silent as the battery does all the heavy lifting from a standing start at part throttle. Give it a bit more throttle and the slick triple bursts almost imperceptibly into life, save for a tiny initial vibration that you have to become attuned to in order to actually notice.

If you aren’t actually waiting for it, the first you know of the engine’s involvement is when the revs increase and a pleasing three-cylinder grumble quietly starts to rise in the cabin. Lift off again at any legal speed and the engine will shut down and the electric motor will happily take over again.

Get a bit more aggressive with the throttle and you will quickly realise there is a CVT in there as the brilliant little engine’s growl thickens and the revs rise – and keep rising – but it is all so smooth and crisp that it is never as irritating as most small engine/CVT combos manage to be. Not by a long shot.

But surely if you are thrashing a Yaris hybrid you are completely missing the point anyway?

The Yaris hybrid’s sole purpose in life is to use bugger-all fuel and be a competent, undemanding daily driver.

So it’s impressive that it actually does that and manages to be comfortable, practical, rather endearing and well-equipped as well.

Okay, so it is a bit weird looking, particularly in base GX trim, but the interior is actually rather nice and despite the poverty-spec steel wheels and old-school twisty key, the GX is actually well-equipped for the money.

This is because the GX puts all its eggs into the tech basket. The interior is dominated by a responsive touchscreen infotainment system packing Android Auto and Apple CarPlay, while it also boasts adaptive cruise control and Toyota’s excellent Safety Sense package that includes a pre-collision system with autonomous emergency braking, pedestrian and cyclist detection and intersection turn assist, as well as automatic high beams, lane keep assist and even road sign assist that detects and displays the speed limit.

But what about that whole “using bugger-all fuel” thing?

That is where the Yaris hybrid becomes truly and deeply impressive.

Toyota claims a miniscule 3.3L/100km combined fuel consumption for the Yaris hybrid and this is almost laughably easy to achieve, even when you are really not trying.

The secret to the Yaris hybrid’s tiny fuel consumption lies in the amount of electric-only running it can do – Toyota claims fuel consumption of 3.6L/100km for the extra-urban cycle (ie: open road running) and an impossibly tiny 2.8L/100km consumption for the urban cycle, thanks to all of the time it can spend on the electric motor alone.

And guess what – it is stupidly easy to replicate that number in the real world. The whole time I ran about Auckland in the Yaris it never registered more than 3.8L/100km for a trip and easily sat under that 2.8 figure if I avoided motorways. That is deeply impressive.

Any other cars I should consider?

Suzuki was quick to position the Swift Hybrid as a competitor to the Yaris, but the Toyota utterly blows the Suzuki out of the water in terms of quality, driveability and equipment before you even get to its totally dominant fuel consumption figures – Suzuki claims 4.1L/100km for the Swift and in the real world it never gets anywhere near that.

The reality is that there is little that will match the Yaris hybrid's miserly fuel consumption and literally nothing that will for the money asked.