Scoop: 2015 Toyota Prius Hybrid Looks the Same on the Outside, Different Inside, or is it?

The Prius isn't Toyota's best-selling (yet) or oldest nameplate, but it's a car that crafted a new niche in its segment and single-handedly made hybrids popular all over the world, forcing many other carmakers to follow the Japanese brand's lead.

Every generation of the Prius (there have been three up until now), improves upon the previous and increases its market share, and we don't expect anything less from the new model that should arrive by 2015.

Read more »

Toyota Issues Recall for 242,000 Prius and Lexus HS 250h Hybrids Over Brake Glitch

Japan's Toyota group said on Wednesday that it will conduct a worldwide voluntary safety recall of around 242,000 Toyota Prius and Lexus HS 250h hybrid vehicles made between March and October 2009 (2010MY), including approximately 87,000 cars in the United States. Read more »

Toyota Says Lower Gas Prices May Hurt Prius Sales in the U.S.

After having announced that they’ve sold a total of five million hybrids, almost two million of which in the U.S., Toyota now says that falling gas prices may affect sales of their green models in general, and the Prius family in particular. They were planning to sell some 250,000 examples Stateside this year, but the target may not be reached, and they may have to adjust their outlook accordingly –236,659 units were sold in 2012, so the figure is not out of reach. Read more »

Toyota Sells 5 Million Hybrids, Close to 2 Million of Which in the USA

Toyota is the manufacturer who brought hybrid drivetrains into the mainstream, and their Prius (which may undergo serious changes in the future) has now almost become a separate brand in its own right – it has "a family".

This week, the Japanese carmaker announced that it has delivered 5 million hybrid-powered vehicles worldwide, of which 1,951,243 in the USA, with a large chunk of those in California. Last year they made a similar announcement after having reached the 4 million milestone.

Read more »

Toyota Prius and Lexus HS 250h Class-Action Lawsuit Dismissed by California Court

If there’s one thing Toyota has in abundance in the U.S., apart from sales and models, it is lawsuits. This time, though, the Japanese automaker scored a victory as U.S. District Judge Cormac Carney in California denied a class-action lawsuit by owners of Prius and Lexus models.

More specifically, the judge denied four car owners’ request to represent other owners of 2010 Prius and Lexus HS 250h models in California over a 2010 recall for a software upgrade that fixed an issue with the cars’ ABS system.

Read more »

Ford Says C-MAX Hybrids Outsells Toyota Prius Plug-in and V in its First Full Month of Availability

Ford has taken yet another swipe at Toyota in the battle of the hybrids. The Blue Oval announced that in November, their first full month of availability, combined sales of its C-MAX Hybrid and C-MAX Energi Plug-in Hybrid in the U.S. reached 4,846 units beating the 4,456 deliveries of the Prius Plug-in and Prius V hybrids delivered by Toyota.

“The C-MAX hybrids are off to a great start and our dealers and customers, especially in California, cannot get enough of them early in the launch”, said Ford general marketing manager Dave Mondragon.

Read more »

Toyota Prius Not a Car Thieves’ Favorite, Will Most Likely be Recovered Even if it’s Stolen

If you happen to own a Toyota Prius, you’ll be glad to learn that your car is not very popular with car thieves. On the contrary; compared to other models of the same age, Prius is less likely to be stolen.

At least that’s what the National Insurance Crime Bureau data reveals: as of the end of June, only one in 606 examples of the 2008-2010 MY Prius cars had been stolen compared to one in 78 of all other vehicles of the exact same model years.

California is the “capital” of stolen Prius cars with 1,062 thefts; Florida, New York, Washington and Texas followed with 127, 111, 92 and 89 cars respectively. NCIB data show that, despite the Prius not being completely immune to theft, it has a 96.7 percent recovery rate.

Read more »

Wald International Brings Out the Darker Side of the Toyota Prius Mk3

In its third tuning project in less than a week, Japan's Wald International is taking it upon itself to jazz up the third generation of Toyota's Prius hybrid hatchback with its new Sports Line package.

As with most tunes from Wald, the Sports Line is a mostly cosmetic upgrade kit that starts with a matte black foil wrap for the body and continues with a selection of aero goodies, such as the front bumper, side skirts and a rear bumper, all of which feature green accent stripes.

Read more »

Toyota Initiates Massive Global Recall of 2.8 Million Vehicles Over Two Issues

The world's top automaker Toyota is recalling 2.77 million vehicles worldwide on two unrelated problems, one concerning a defective water pump and the other a steering shaft fault, though, some models may need both fixes.

Toyota was quick to point out that no accidents or injuries have been reported related to these two issues.

Read more »

Toyota Considers Changing Prius Design to Make it More Appealing

No matter how much you may save on fuel and tax incentives the state or the government might provide, for a certain number of buyers, design plays a major role when deciding on a new car. Hybrids and EVs, while futuristic, are far from being called beautiful – the $100K+ Fisker Karma excluded.

Apparently, Toyota feels the same way about its line of Prius hybrids. Therefore, despite being on track to set record sales, the Japanese carmaker is mulling whether to continue with the aerodynamic, wedge-shaped styling, which truth be told, has been around for a while, for the next generation models or try something completely new.

Read more »

Three Toyota Prius Hybrid Models Also Caught Fire at New Jersey Port During Storm

As it turns out, the 16 Fisker Karma extended-range hybrids weren't the only new hybrid cars to catch fire in Port Newark, New Jersey last Monday on October 29, after being submerged in seawater during Hurricane Sandy.

In a completely separate incident during the storm, three Toyota Prius models, including a conventional hybrid and a plug-in hybrid, were also damaged by fire at Port Newark, according to a report from the LA Times.

Toyota confirmed the incident. "One Prius out and out burned, the others just kind of smoldered and got really hot," Cindy Knight, a Toyota spokeswoman told the New York Times (NYT), adding that the fire "likely started because saltwater got into the electrical system." The Prius that burned down completely was a plug-in hybrid model.

Read more »

Mine's Bigger Than Yours: Ford Brags About the C-MAX Hybrid Outselling the Toyota Prius v

There's no end in sight to Ford's war of words against Toyota and its Prius family of hybrid models. Adding to a long list of press releases and statements targeting the Japanese brand's hybrid models, Ford came out with a new announcement today saying the 47mpg C-MAX Hybrid outsold the Prius v minivan in its first full sales month. Read more »

ESC Off: Jeremy Clarkson’s “Lapses of Editorial Judgment” Still Yield him More than US$16 Million

When it comes to British motoring journalist and presenter of the Top Gear TV show Jeremy Clarkson, there’s no middle ground: you either love him or hate him; or, most likely, you love to hate him.

Whatever you may think of the man, you have to admit that his controversial comments have been one of the main ingredients that have made Top Gear the world’s most successful car show.

It’s true that JC doesn’t give a dime (though he could afford to…) about political correctness or BBC’s guidelines. In fact, he does have quite a record of “regrettable lapses of editorial judgment”, as the BBC Trust puts it.

Read more »

Google Maps the Future: California Gov. Signs Law that Allows Self-Driving Cars on Public Roads

California governor Jerry Brown signed a law that permits self-driving cars on the state's public roads.

The signing ceremony took place at Google’s Mountain View headquarters with the governor sitting on the passenger side of an autonomous Toyota Prius. Google co-founder Sergey Brin and State Senator Alex Padilla were in the back seats and company engineer Chris Urmson behind the wheel as the Prius drove itself.

Read more »

Toyota to Launch 21 New Hybrids and a New Fuel Cell Vehicle in the Next Three Years

When the first-generation Prius was launched in 1997, annual sales were negligible. Today, Toyota delivers more than one million hybrids annually and which account for 10 percent of its total global sales and 50 percent of the brand’s domestic sales.

As the current leader in the field, Toyota believes that hybrids and plug-in hybrids are the way to go and fuel cell technology is much closer to production than most people think.

Japan’s biggest auto manufacturer is getting ready to add no less than 21 new hybrids, an all-electric RAV-4 and a fuel cell vehicle by 2015.

Read more »

Toyota Says Prius Plug-in Hybrid U.S. Sales Top 6,000 Units, Beats Volt and Leaf...or Did it?

A Toyota press release bragging about the achievements of the Prius Plug-in Hybrid variant since it went arrived in U.S. showrooms at the end of February states that the EPA-rated 95 MPGe (miles per gallon equivalent) Japanese hatchback has delivered 6,061 units in its first six months (March through August) on sale.

However, that's not what caught our attention; this is what did and we quote Toyota's press statement:

"This sales figure represents sales momentum that has propelled the Prius Plug-in to a stronger first full six-months sales pace (6,061 units) than Chevrolet Volt Plug-in (2,745 units) and the all-electric Nissan Leaf (3,875 units)."

Read more »

Eco Warriors: Watch Two Toyota Prius Drivers Slowly and Greenly Squabble on a California Highway

After conquering the hearts of many Asian and even more Russian drivers, dashboard mounted cameras are slowly starting to gain popularity in the United States.

While not as near as wild as some incidents in Russia, you could say that this video provides a taster of what's to come if more Americans start fitting their vehicles with cameras.

The clip was shot on California's Interstate 405 and involves two drivers bickering on the road.

Read more »

Wald Wants to Make to the Toyota Prius Look Bad Arse

In its second attempt to tune the Toyota Prius Mk3 after the "Exclusive Line" in 2010, Japan's Wald International has released the first images of its "Sports Line" package that will soon be available for order. Read more »

Toyota Employs the Help of R2-D2 and C-3PO to Promote Prius Plug-in Hybrid

The Force continues to be strong with two of the most memorable robots to ever grace the silver screen, C-3PO and his plucky astromech companion, R2-D2, from the legendary Star Wars movie series.

In fact, it's so strong that Toyota used the two droids in a new commercial for its Prius Plug-in Hybrid in Japan.

Mind you, as noted on Leopaul's Blog, Toyota is not the first Japanese carmaker to employ the help of C-3PO and R2-D2 in a car advertisement as Mitsubishi had done the same for its Pajero SUV and the RVR back in 1996.

Read more »

Toyota and Lexus Cumulative Hybrid Sales Since 1997 Top 4 Million Vehicles

As of April 30, the Toyota and Lexus brands have both sold more than 4 million hybrid vehicles around the world since the market launch of Toyota's first hybrid model in Japan, the Coaster Hybrid EV in August 1997, followed by the Prius in December of the same year.

Global sales of the Prius began in Europe, North America and other regions in 2000, with the second-generation of the model landing in showrooms in 2003. The Japanese automaker then expanded the use of its hybrid system on other models such as minivans, SUVs, rear-wheel-drive sedans and compact hatchbacks.

Read more »