Subaru Forester vs Toyota RAV4 | Battle of the high achievers

in 1994 toyota invented a new generation of suvs toyota's unusual three-door high rider was the first to offer genuinely fun driving without leaving the blacktop similarly and about the same time subaru introduced the forrester a car that did the job of many other wagons when on the road but left all of its rivals behind when the asphalt came to an end but this isn't the 1990s and the new car market has never been so fickle does this pair of historic vehicles still possess those hidden talents and do they have to work harder than ever to maintain their position in today's unforgiving market to find out exactly what this popular pair offer i'm going to put them to a test in a sort of exchange program first we'll see how each contender fares in its traditional habitat the toyota will carve up a decent driving road while the subaru will cut a few laps of an off-road course [Music] in all its years growing up the ram4 has grown in size and weight and you can really feel that through some of these more enthusiastic corners it really does resist turning and it's a bit lazy it doesn't kick down as readily as i want it to when i get into some of these tighter corners and i want a bit more power and notably absent are paddle shifters on the steering wheel so i can't force it to doing what i want but where the toyota really does well is in cabin quality and ride comfort it's eerily quiet in here very very smooth ride and the quality although this one is the top of the range edge variant is beautiful find the right road though and the toyota rav4 can still be good fun it's got sharp steering great visibility and it's equipped with a good set of tires for on road use as well [Applause] [Music] next it's into the subaru and the realm it's always traditionally dominated oh it's very good [Music] this car was conceived to leave the trail behind and go places that other suvs simply can't follow and it still does it to this day exactly the way it always has i've got a number of different driving modes from the x-mode system down here snow and dirt seems to work just as fine as deep snow and mud when you really get stuck into some more challenging obstacles you can hear all the bits and pieces coming together and working there's plenty of electronics that work in harmony with good old-fashioned mechanical oily bits and foil drive systems and i've got all these meters to show me the kind of angles of descent and inclination i can get into as well i don't know whether it's useful to a complete amateur like me but it's nice being able to tell people at the pub later that i dialed in 22 degrees of roll and didn't end up on my roof no surprises at all from the subaru forester when you put it in its natural habitat that permanent four-wheel drive system just adds so much confidence you can really tell this car has been bred and always intended to do things like this the off-road realm really is where it's most comfortable [Applause] [Music] before the break i established that the subaru forester and toyota rav4 are both still very much a home in the realms they established and dominated 25 years ago but now it's time to flip the tables [Music] [Applause] [Music] when the sealed road comes to an end though the rav4 has a real surprise up its sleeve it's actually incredibly competent you just flick the drive mode into rock and dirt for stuff like this and it's finding grip and articulation in the suspension and going places that i simply wasn't expecting at all it's incredibly capable [Music] that quiet and composed engine on-road continues to be exactly that in nature off-road it doesn't sound like it's working particularly hard to find the grip that it is and the electronics controlling all the brake vectoring they don't seem to be breaking much of a sweat either here i say it might have one up on the forester and i never expected that [Music] but i think we found the limits of capability in the rav4 when it comes to really challenging stuff it just can't work hard enough whereas the forester has just got so much ability kept in reserve forester still wins off-road but when you get on slightly less challenging surfaces like these lovely unsealed roads that will take you for a kilometer after kilometer of amazing australian bushland the rav4 really does feel like it's much more in its element it might not have the absolute hardcore ability of the forester but the rav4 is still a very surprising off-road vehicle [Music] [Applause] [Music] can the subaru equal or perhaps even better the rav4's performance on road if you had taken a forester in its first generation through some of these excellent bends you probably would have ended up in that tree or cliff because it wasn't very well known for its on-road ability the forester did off-road fantastically but this kind of driving was definitely not its strong point but it couldn't be more different in the new generation forester on its new platform this is really surprisingly good to drive on twisty roads like this it's responsive there's tons of steering feel the engine comes alive when there's plenty of power off-road now i've got those longer legs for powering out of corners like this i'm really blown away once again by this car i can feel i know you're gonna laugh at me here but i can feel a little bit of the rally soul still in the forester here don't ask too much of the brakes maintain a bit of that momentum through cornering and what an absolute sensational all-rounder the forest is proving to be just like the original generation forester there is so much room in its cabin i've got loads of headroom for taller drivers up front but it's also great news in the back as well where there's plenty of space for big passengers or things and right at the back there's a huge boot as well like the original model of nearly 25 years ago the rav4 is still completely at home on the road but over time it's learnt some off-road manners that the first generation could only have dreamed of more impressively though subaru's forester is still king of the path less traveled with almost unbelievable off-road ability paired with class-leading on-road dynamics when the dirt trail comes to an end both the subaru and the toyota can perform a double act that's hard to top sometimes the most memorable adventures are the ones you embark on without knowing the outcome or the destination [Music]

Channel: Daniel Gardner

Views: 150,172

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Id: uwT9VTHIAIo

Length: 8min 19sec (499 seconds)

Published: Mon Aug 22 2022