Curious thread.
"Which is better?"... that rather depends on what you wish to do with them. A modern Prius will produce generally lower emissions, as it has a decade of extra refining and tweaking. Plus, it'll have a decade less wear and tear.
The Insight has massive potential, for those who can extract it. It's very light and quite aero-efficient, so doesn't need much effort to get moving and doesn't need a great deal of effort to maintain a cruising speed.
Subjectively, the Insight is also the more fun and looks much cooler. Objectively, the Prius is more practical.
Back in the late 90s, my ball would be in the Insight's court over which was better - on gas mileage alone, a gen-1 Insight makes a gen-1 Prius look a bit silly, even if you can't toddle around in EV mode like you can in the Prius.
Quote:
Originally Posted by RedDevil
I have to correct myself, the Prius C is not called Yaris over here but Yaris Hybrid, and I believe it does indeed have completely incomparably different taillights.  |
To clarify, the Prius C and Yaris Hybrid have the same powertrain, but they differ in far more than just tail lights. I suspect they're on a similar platform, but at the end of the day the Prius C is a Prius and the Yaris Hybrid is a Yaris - different exterior, interior, packaging, styling, name...
As a bit of a journo I went on the European launch of the Yaris Hybrid. Very nice little car. Apparently, Toyota chose to sell a small, Yaris-based Hybrid in Europe because the Yaris sells much better in Europe than the Prius does. In the U.S and Japan, the Prius name carries much more weight, so a downsized Prius is the more logical option (that said, the C is called the Aqua in Japan).
Their decision appears to be vindicated, at least in Europe, as I recall reading that Yaris Hybrid sales make up around 40% of all Yaris sales. Not bad going.