edyvw
$50 site donor 2026
Been to Los Angeles on a business trip and brought family with. Stayed at my wife's cousin in Van Nuys, not far from West Hollywood where I had to be for few days. She has bunch of family in LA, so we were constantly on the road, all the way down to Buena Park, one visit to LAX for my 9yrs old to watch airplanes and catch A380.
Since we are family of 5, with kids 9, 7 and 1 year old, van is best option, so I reserved one through Budget.
Landed at Burbank, it is dark blue Toyota Sienna LE. We already once rented new Sienna, XSE in 2022 through Turo to check is it something we could live with, and decided not to get it. With this one, we hanged out longer, make more miles, so kind of had beter understanding of a vehicle.
VERY GOOD:
Mpg. There is no other way around this, especially when 87 goes between $5.89 and $6.99 depending where you are in LA. Interestingly in LE I could not find in vehicle information anywhere about average mpg. By the time I realized that, I lost track how many miles I made. But there is no doubt mpg is great. When I rented SIenna here in Colroado Springs I averaged 36mpg in the city, while on interestate it dropped to low 30's. One of the tourist attractcions in LA, sitting in traffic, makes hybrid system shine. As long as I was crawling between Van Nuyes and West Hollywood, gas gauge is not moving. After 5 days, I filled up 9.2 gallons, and I would say 36mpg would be good bet.
GOOD:
Space is good. It is not very good, though, which I would say in my old 2nd generation Sienna, was. Current Sienna just feels smaller, and it is smaller than previous one. We brought one of child seats with us, and installing it in the middle, it blocks two other seats from moving to allow access to third row. There is just no enough width. Second and third row just feel more claustrophobic.
Trunk too. While trunk is big, previous Sienna just felt bigger.
The space around driver is more useful than in previous generation, especially storage at the floor between driver and passanger.
Average:
Suspension is just average. The rear end is big improvement over old Sienna as old one had Torsion beam if I recall corectly while new one has independent suspension. It tracks road very well. However, it gives false sense of security. When taking exit fast, and there is bit sharper curve, it oversteers, and it oversteers really bad.
Was not sure whether to put brakes in bad or average. But feel is bit improved. It has firmer feel. However, it is clearly boosted, not because pads are more aggressive. When you press brake it reacts very fast. But, if you need to brake hard, and start pressing pedal, you realize that hard pedal is suddenly like an obstacle to get to part where it starts braking. In my VW or BMW brakes are super firm, but when you apply more strenght, you are hanging on seat belts. Here it is just firm feeling and it is just feeling, nothing is going on. Really weird and bad attempt I guess to make it more responsive.
BAD:
Infotainment system. XSE we rented through Turo had big screen but I remember being very clunky. This is poor people version in LE. It is absolutely attroicious. Both my wife and I connected phones. Regardless whose phone connects, it requires you to go into settings every time and activate Car Play. Switching between phones require several steps. I got used to Kenwood aftermarket unit in our Sequoia, but this is really dated and not only that, really illogical.
Another issue is AC. I am not sure why AC does not SYNC front and rear. Everytime I change temperature, it requires separate adjustments to rear AC regardless that SYNC button is pressed. After few days, it became old and kind of aggrevating.
REALLY BAD:
The sound. I am not sure whether that infamous drone is an engine or CVT, but if people first meet 4cyl engine in Toyota, and then think they are all bad, I don't blame them. The noise is so agrevating that my wife every time I step on its says: "here comes vacuum cleaner, and nothing happens."
The power is I would say, adequate for city driving, but I would NOT like this thing on a road trip.
Assembly screames cheapness and saving a buck. Two pieces of plastic above cluster, are not fitting properly. I saw that in XSE that I rented in 2022, and only conclusion I have is that it is like that from the beginning, they know it (because it is right in front of your eyes), and they don't care.
Which brings me to the worst part of the vehicle: the seats. When I had XSE, I wrote here that seats are absolutely abysmal. This just comfirmed that, and more. LE has cloth seats, so all the shortcomings of the seats are further exacerbated.
The seats are unbeliveably short. It is insane how short they are. When I measured seats in XSE I think they were some 2" shorter than in our Tiguan, and some 4 1/2 compared to sport seats in my BMW. This car for me would be punishment to sit in on a road trip. I remeber checking Grand Highlander before purchasing Atlas, and saw that it has same seats as Sienna, and I just was not interested in the car anymore.
Since we are family of 5, with kids 9, 7 and 1 year old, van is best option, so I reserved one through Budget.
Landed at Burbank, it is dark blue Toyota Sienna LE. We already once rented new Sienna, XSE in 2022 through Turo to check is it something we could live with, and decided not to get it. With this one, we hanged out longer, make more miles, so kind of had beter understanding of a vehicle.
VERY GOOD:
Mpg. There is no other way around this, especially when 87 goes between $5.89 and $6.99 depending where you are in LA. Interestingly in LE I could not find in vehicle information anywhere about average mpg. By the time I realized that, I lost track how many miles I made. But there is no doubt mpg is great. When I rented SIenna here in Colroado Springs I averaged 36mpg in the city, while on interestate it dropped to low 30's. One of the tourist attractcions in LA, sitting in traffic, makes hybrid system shine. As long as I was crawling between Van Nuyes and West Hollywood, gas gauge is not moving. After 5 days, I filled up 9.2 gallons, and I would say 36mpg would be good bet.
GOOD:
Space is good. It is not very good, though, which I would say in my old 2nd generation Sienna, was. Current Sienna just feels smaller, and it is smaller than previous one. We brought one of child seats with us, and installing it in the middle, it blocks two other seats from moving to allow access to third row. There is just no enough width. Second and third row just feel more claustrophobic.
Trunk too. While trunk is big, previous Sienna just felt bigger.
The space around driver is more useful than in previous generation, especially storage at the floor between driver and passanger.
Average:
Suspension is just average. The rear end is big improvement over old Sienna as old one had Torsion beam if I recall corectly while new one has independent suspension. It tracks road very well. However, it gives false sense of security. When taking exit fast, and there is bit sharper curve, it oversteers, and it oversteers really bad.
Was not sure whether to put brakes in bad or average. But feel is bit improved. It has firmer feel. However, it is clearly boosted, not because pads are more aggressive. When you press brake it reacts very fast. But, if you need to brake hard, and start pressing pedal, you realize that hard pedal is suddenly like an obstacle to get to part where it starts braking. In my VW or BMW brakes are super firm, but when you apply more strenght, you are hanging on seat belts. Here it is just firm feeling and it is just feeling, nothing is going on. Really weird and bad attempt I guess to make it more responsive.
BAD:
Infotainment system. XSE we rented through Turo had big screen but I remember being very clunky. This is poor people version in LE. It is absolutely attroicious. Both my wife and I connected phones. Regardless whose phone connects, it requires you to go into settings every time and activate Car Play. Switching between phones require several steps. I got used to Kenwood aftermarket unit in our Sequoia, but this is really dated and not only that, really illogical.
Another issue is AC. I am not sure why AC does not SYNC front and rear. Everytime I change temperature, it requires separate adjustments to rear AC regardless that SYNC button is pressed. After few days, it became old and kind of aggrevating.
REALLY BAD:
The sound. I am not sure whether that infamous drone is an engine or CVT, but if people first meet 4cyl engine in Toyota, and then think they are all bad, I don't blame them. The noise is so agrevating that my wife every time I step on its says: "here comes vacuum cleaner, and nothing happens."
The power is I would say, adequate for city driving, but I would NOT like this thing on a road trip.
Assembly screames cheapness and saving a buck. Two pieces of plastic above cluster, are not fitting properly. I saw that in XSE that I rented in 2022, and only conclusion I have is that it is like that from the beginning, they know it (because it is right in front of your eyes), and they don't care.
Which brings me to the worst part of the vehicle: the seats. When I had XSE, I wrote here that seats are absolutely abysmal. This just comfirmed that, and more. LE has cloth seats, so all the shortcomings of the seats are further exacerbated.
The seats are unbeliveably short. It is insane how short they are. When I measured seats in XSE I think they were some 2" shorter than in our Tiguan, and some 4 1/2 compared to sport seats in my BMW. This car for me would be punishment to sit in on a road trip. I remeber checking Grand Highlander before purchasing Atlas, and saw that it has same seats as Sienna, and I just was not interested in the car anymore.
