Comparison review: seven economical sedans (fifth place)

The Honda Civic is nice, but competing nice cars cost less than $19,000. 

What do you think of when you think of the Honda Civic? Odds are you’re picturing a pleasant little economical car that will offer you a trouble-free decade and command a healthy price when you’re ready to sell it. And odds are you’re picturing the sort of safe, take-no-chances design typical among cars that hundreds of thousands of Americans buy every year, something that’s safe and generic, and that’s worth paying extra for.

 

Some of that is true. But some of it is not, and even the Civic’s strongest points aren’t necessarily worth the extra cost. 

 

The Civic is indeed a pleasant car to drive, with comfortable seating, a smooth ride, and good handling. It does get better gas mileage than most of its competitors. Its reliability has measured above average in studies by TrueDelta and Consumer Reports. And its resale value earned the top five-star score from the Automotive Lease Guide. 

 

The car’s appearance, however, is anything but generic inside and out. Both the front and rear windshields are more steeply raked than in most compact sedans, giving the Civic a more rounded look than most on the outside.

 

And inside, the differences between the Civic and other economical cars are even more pronounced. 

 

Most obviously, instead of a set of gauges sitting behind the steering wheel, you’ll find just the tachometer located there. The speedometer is further away – closer to the windshield – and provides your speed in numerals rather than on a conventional analog gauge. There’s no functional gain from this setup; it’s a stylistic device to fill the deep dashboard that the steep windshield requires. Some may even find the glowing numbers a distraction compared to the traditional setup, but at least they’re easy enough to see. 

 

The Civic is also the only of car of these seven that doesn’t have a symmetrical instrument panel; it’s instead part of a collection of different shapes across a dashboard that angles this way and that between the two front doors. None of this compromises the usability of the HVAC or stereo controls. Like the speedometer, it’s a love-it-or-hate-it design measure that’s unusual in a best-selling car. The plastics surrounding the interior are hard to the touch, but don't look or feel cheap. The styling of the design elements these plastics make up is more subjective. 

 

The rest of the Civic is more of what you might expect.

 

The front seats are well-shaped and comfortable, and the cloth feels high-quality. The rear seat isn’t the roomiest of any small car’s, but two adults will fit comfortably. The trunk isn’t huge, but it’s well-shaped. The rear seat folds to increase cargo volume, but unlike in competing cars it only folds in one piece rather than two. 

 

And if you’ve driven any Civic from the last decade, the current version will likely feel far more familiar than it looks. The firm but comfortable ride, the light but responsive steering, and the agile but not overtly sporty handling are Honda staples. So is the smooth engine that delivers acceptable punch yet excellent gas mileage – 25 miles per gallon in the city and 36 on the highway – and that gets noisy when you push it. Lots of road noise, especially on coarse road surfaces, should also be familiar. 

 

But while the Civic is nice, how much nicer is it than competing economical cars that cost quite a bit less?

 

The Civic LX model – the cheapest to come with power windows and locks – driven for this review has an MSRP of over $19,000, and transaction price estimators don’t leave much hope for haggling a big discount. “You can get them for less than sticker now” was the salesman’s enthusiastic pitch. Civics are too popular to count on going more than a few hundred dollars south of MSRP, making this Civic by far the most expensive of these seven to buy – over $2,000 more than the next-priciest. 

 

It is true that Hondas hold more of their value than the average car, so you’ll recover a decent portion of that $19,000 when you sell your Civic later. However, the most common depreciation ratings from the Automotive Lease Guide are based on how much the value drops from the sticker price. If you get a substantial discount below the sticker price when you buy your car, that’s rated as a loss in value even as the savings go to you. You’d likely have to pay near sticker for your Civic.

 

The gas mileage, too, is unlikely to recoup the Civic’s extra cost over its competitors. The Civic is rated for 29 miles per gallon in mixed driving, while the Lancer is the only car in the comparison rated for less than 27.  That works out to a difference of less than 40 gallons of gas per 15,000 miles, which is still a difference of less than $200 per year even if gas hits $5/gallon. 

 

It’s also worth noting that you can’t count on the Civic (or anything else, for that matter) to provide a trouble-free decade. Even if you’ve owned a past Honda that’s done it, the current Civic is unlikely to share any mechanical components with that car, and it has more complex electronics. The current Civic has been on the market since 2006 and has done well in reliability studies so far, but others of this seven have done better still. Especially considering that all cars are reliable now, the promise attached to the Honda name shouldn’t be enough to win thousands of extra dollars from you. 

 

That leaves the rest of the car to convince you to pay extra. And it’s not unconvincing. The Civic is comfortable and its pleasant to drive, and it earned top safety scores. (Though like the Mitsubishi Lancer, its IIHS “Top Safety Pick” award applies only to pricier versions than this tested LX.) 

 

But a large part of being economical is being a good value. It’s hard for a $19,000 car to be a good value. And while the Civic is nice, less expensive cars are comparable. Give it a good look, but don’t take your eye off the bottom line.