Honda's claimed MPG figures

Being someone that has a heavy foot, th fact we're getting 50-55 MPG's and nearly 200 torque to go with it means a lot to me. Its what I never got in the Prius. But that's not to stay the Prius is bad. Can't wait for when summer finally rolls around so I can test these for myself.

I have a commute of 40 miles one-way on a mostly flat highway where I can go between 50 and 65 (Hwy 1, Monterey Bay). I am seeing 51 MPG in my Touring model!
Around town my numbers are more spotty, since I've only just discovered that one of the instrument displays shows average MPG for trip A or B. I seem to be getting around 47 MPG around town.
It's odd that these numbers are the reverse of what Honda claims (51 city, 47 highway).
What I don't understand is that the "current" (very short time average) MPG is in the 30s when driving around town, yet the trip average is around 47.
I filled my tank for the first time and calculated MPG for the tank and it was in the high 40s (don't recall the number).

So, I'm pleased and puzzled.

It's early for me as I have under 500 miles but first fill up was 48.7mpg (Touring) with about 70% highway

I've been driving in Eco mode since I got the car a little more than 2 weeks ago. As I reported above, I was seeing around 51 MPG on my commute (40 miles one way, mostly flat).
This morning I switched Eco off and only got 47 MPG - the official stated value for Touring model.

Wife got 50.1 her first tank. Touring edition. 25 miles each way at mostly highway speeds (60MPH here). No previous experience driving a hybrid. She just left it in "normal" mode and drove it. I am impressed so far.

Got about 47 to 50mpg on a 600 mile trip. Some highways were 75mph speed limit which definitely hurt the efficiency but it drives surprisingly well at those speeds (80+ sometimes). Keep it in eco most of the time. Honda sensing is pretty fantastic I have to say.

I'm going against the trend here. I'm driving the car like I stole it on Sport mode for the break-in process. My first tank was 35.3 mpg on a Touring model.

I've been driving normally for my suburban commute (I keep up with traffic, pass people, sometimes floor it, sometimes use Sport mode, never use Eco mode, etc.), with constant AC due to Florida.

Haven't gotten through my first full tank (didn't record the first partial tank in Fuelly) but the car says 47 MPG average with 45-55 after most trips. Frankly, I think that's amazing. The only hyper-miling tricks I do emphasize not slowing down / well-timed electric braking to avoid real braking / etc.

I am in Florida and hit 1000 miles so far. I dont drive to conservatively but, also not flooring it and going sport mode all the time. I mainly drive in normal mode since its better at passing people. My combined mpg for the 1000 miles is about 43.8-44 and my current tank is 45-46 about 200 miles in. I seem to be in the 45mpg range all the time and not sure why. I have an aegean blue EX, not saying 45 is bad but seeing a bunch of people do better makes me wonder... I have my Fuelly records as well and I feel like I should be getting better than Jon up here lol since I do use Eco mode every now and then.

The Need to Hit 60...

New Insight owner with the car for one week - 400 total miles on the car now. Have driven very conservatively over the first week with econ on, light braking and light acceleration for the most part. I traveled approximately 70 percent highway and 30 percent suburban traffic. Just filled up for the first time today and the car needed 6.6 gallons of gas. That means I barely hit 60 mpg with my first tank of fuel!!!

Acceleration with econ is truly terrible, as the car makes a lot of noise and struggles to move. I wonder how that will change once I go into normal mode??? Will probably do that after 750-1000 miles on my car.

Forgot to mention in my "The Need to Hit 60" above that I own an EX version of the Insight!!!

New touring owner here with 1,100 miles on the car. I've been driving it somewhat conservatively mostly in econ mode and my lifetime average MPG reported by the car (tracking via trip A) is 41.9MPG. The first 200 miles average was ~37MPG, so it seems to be improving a bit (break-in?), but I'm not impressed so far and am wondering if something is wrong with my car? Note that ~80% of the miles have been highway trips between San Francisco and LA, and I likely average about 75MPH on the highway. Short trips with lots of stop and go traffic I've had up to 55 MPG, but getting on the highway especially with the AC on seems to drag the MPGs down. Planning to start tracking my MPGs manually to see if the car reporting seems to be accurate.

If you're doing much over 55-65 mph, you're going to see a relative drop in mileage. I just got back from an 800 mile round trip, mostly interstate, and on the way there my overall average dropped from 49.9 to 46.6. I was also driving 80mph. On the way back, I stayed at the speed limit on both the interstates and regular highways, and it went back up to 49 by the time I got home.

quarklemotion said:

New touring owner here with 1,100 miles on the car. I've been driving it somewhat conservatively mostly in econ mode and my lifetime average MPG reported by the car (tracking via trip A) is 41.9MPG. The first 200 miles average was ~37MPG, so it seems to be improving a bit (break-in?), but I'm not impressed so far and am wondering if something is wrong with my car? Note that ~80% of the miles have been highway trips between San Francisco and LA, and I likely average about 75MPH on the highway. Short trips with lots of stop and go traffic I've had up to 55 MPG, but getting on the highway especially with the AC on seems to drag the MPGs down. Planning to start tracking my MPGs manually to see if the car reporting seems to be accurate.

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It’s better for driving in traffic or city streets. I’ve been getting 60+ mpg in traffic and city streets where my gas car was getting about 32

Data14 said:

I am in Florida and hit 1000 miles so far. I dont drive to conservatively but, also not flooring it and going sport mode all the time. I mainly drive in normal mode since its better at passing people. My combined mpg for the 1000 miles is about 43.8-44 and my current tank is 45-46 about 200 miles in. I seem to be in the 45mpg range all the time and not sure why. I have an aegean blue EX, not saying 45 is bad but seeing a bunch of people do better makes me wonder... I have my Fuelly records as well and I feel like I should be getting better than Jon up here lol since I do use Eco mode every now and then.

Click to expand...

I'm finding that the heat (thus time of day) is an even bigger factor than how I drive. If I'm driving midday in sun, like for a lunch outing, it is low 40s. Morning or evening, high 40s/low 50s. Maybe Eco would help with that, but I can't sacrifice the AC.

57 MPG trip to my cottage

I converted to MPG for you American readers. My average in Canada was 4.1L/ 100 km and that works out to 57.4 MPG.

Pretty **** good I thought. I only had the air on a few times in the hour and ten minute drive on highways that I was driving 100 km/hr or just over 60 MPH with a couple of small towns that I went through at slower speeds.

New Insight owner with the car for now two weeks - approx 750 total miles on the car now. Earlier in the thread, I mentioned that I calculated 60 mpg for my first fill up. During my second tank of gas, I again drove very conservatively -- econ on, light braking and light acceleration for the most part. Again, I traveled approximately 70 percent highway and 30 percent suburban traffic. Filled up for the second time last night and calculated that I got 59 mpg (during that whole second week).

One of the two routes that I - periodically - take home from work consists of going up very hilly terrain (NJ - 287 North from Parsippany to Mahwah). I plan on selectively putting my car into Sport Mode soon in order to: (1) see if tackling the hills during this particular commute home is any easier in that mode than econ; and (2) see how much of a hit I take with mpg.

After two weeks, I finally went to fill up. I had one bar left on the meter and about 50 mile range. Only took 8.1 gallons equally 53 mpg.

Mostly city and heavy traffic miles. And then the freeway miles brought the average down.

Even though this is basically the range that Honda estimated, I was still surprised and tickled by my lovely mpg numbers.

quarklemotion said:

New touring owner here with 1,100 miles on the car. I've been driving it somewhat conservatively mostly in econ mode and my lifetime average MPG reported by the car (tracking via trip A) is 41.9MPG. The first 200 miles average was ~37MPG, so it seems to be improving a bit (break-in?), but I'm not impressed so far and am wondering if something is wrong with my car? Note that ~80% of the miles have been highway trips between San Francisco and LA, and I likely average about 75MPH on the highway. Short trips with lots of stop and go traffic I've had up to 55 MPG, but getting on the highway especially with the AC on seems to drag the MPGs down. Planning to start tracking my MPGs manually to see if the car reporting seems to be accurate.

Click to expand...

FYI, I now have about 9,000 miles on my touring and my average lifetime MPG has gone up to 43MPG and has been steady for a while now. For the touring I think this is a realistic expectation if you do a lot (80%) of highway miles. Using the adaptive cruise control seems to help out a lot. When my wife drives the car her mileage numbers tend to be lower (3-5 MPG) as she drives 5-10MPH faster and never uses the adaptive cruise control. We usually drive in Eco mode, FYI.