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2017 Honda CR-V Touring: Review

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This week, we drove the all-new 2017 Honda CR-V Touring trim. The touring trim is the highest tier for the CR-V line, similar to the Civics. With this new year, the CR-V has finally caught up with last year’s excellent 2016 Honda Civic Touring.

Exterior

The CR-V has definitely always been almost the same size as a Sedan, but taller with more trunk space. The exterior of the CR-V Touring trim looks big in girth, but can still fit in a parking space made for sedans.

I think the 2017 CR-V Touring looks about as good as its older and more expensive brother, the Acura MDX. At first, I was iffy on the small grill below the Honda logo and shield at the front, but it has since grown on me.

The CR-V looks the best it’s ever been from past generations for sure, catching up to the aggressive sporty stylings, this generation of Civics have. The rims that come with the SUV can be divisive, though, as it looks a bit fat, instead of angry.

The back lights look great as well as the nice dual chrome exhausts. The CR-V definitely looks its part as a semi-luxury SUV. The LED lights are amazing, and I can’t wait to buy a new car soon because once you go LED, you can never go back.

The trunk door is fully electronic both opening and shutting, which is awesome!

Interior

The luxury of the interior of the CR-V Touring had me floored! The leather inside has super plush perforated leather, with great leather accents along the door and at the front. Nothing inside feels cheap.

The luxuriousness extends to the panoramic moon roof, which stretches from the front to back. We kept the cover off the entire time we had the CR-V and it was amazing for natural lighting while driving.

The short stubby transmission gear shift is now a full fledged one that screams control and luxury. There is no longer a foot parking brake, and now it’s fully electronic! The speedometer of the CR-V is finally fully digital LCD, exactly the same as last year’s Civic Touring, which was amazing!

The steering wheel’s leather feels exactly like the Acura MDX, a soft and smooth leather. The CR-V Touring also comes with a heated steering wheel. Although the wheel got pretty uncomfortably hot quickly, it’s great with short bursts driving to work in cold weather.

Finally, the excellent touch screen dashboard is in the CR-V along with Apple Car Play and Android Auto. Check out my previous reviews on how amazing the Apple Car Play is.

The back seats have heated seats, with the controls right below every window control at each car, with 3 heat settings. The back seats have A LOT of room and headspace as well as 2 USB ports. This is probably the best backseat of an SUV I’ve been in. There seems to be a lot more trunk space than previous generations and it would satisfy anyone looking into getting an SUV for trunk space.

Drive

Everything about the 2017 Honda CR-V Touring has been positive until we get to the driving feel of this SUV. Although the CR-V has a turbocharged engine with 190 horsepower, it uses a very similar engine as the Civic. However, because the CR-V is all wheel drive and probably considerably heavier, the engine feels very weak.

The CR-V has Honda’s excellent CVT transmission but lacks the flappy gearbox semi-manual control that the Civic Touring has. In fact, the Sport mode of the CR-V feels very lackluster, with no button, but an option on the transmission box itself.

The steering feel of the SUV feels great, but you have to get used to doing wider turns than a sedan, otherwise you might go over a curb.

Although the CR-V feels weaker in terms of power (even more so with Econ mode on), the gas mileage of the SUV is actually very good. I average 9.4 L/100km which is very similar to my 2012 Honda Civic.

Final Thoughts

The 2017 Honda CR-V Touring is a steal at $38,090. I made a prediction of how much this SUV would cost, and I guessed $40k. The CR-V finally feels more luxurious than past generations and the panoramic moonroof is just the bee’s knees.

I’m glad Honda is moving the touchscreen with Apple Car Play to all of its models. However, there’s always a couple features missing here and there between Honda models. For example, the CR-V Touring has no right merge camera, but the Civic, Accord and the Fit both do. There are right and left turn blind spot indicators which are nice. The rearview camera is great, but I found got easily blurry in rainy weather.

Overall, if you’re looking for an SUV under 40k, the CR-V should be at the top of the list!

 Website: https://www.honda.ca/crv

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