2019 Toyota Avalon Review

With bolder design, a big ol’ serving of advanced technology and brand-new underpinnings, Toyota is looking to shatter its Avalon four-door’s elderly image like a hip bone after a slip-and-fall.

This stalwart sedan has been totally overhauled for 2019. Riding atop the company’s versatile TNGA platform, which it shares with plenty of other recently updated models including the Camry and Prius. Several key dimensions have changed; width, track, and wheelbase are all up slightly, though the exterior overhangs have been trimmed for a sportier stance.

Injecting further spunk into this boulevard cruiser, Toyota offers things like an available 14-speaker sound system, adaptive dampers and will even fit an intake-sound generator to certain models with the V6 engine so it can broadcast a bit more mechanical music. Despite the new look inside and out, this family-friendly four-door still strongly emphasizes comfort, with a library-quiet cabin and best-in-class rear-seat shoulder, head and legroom.

Defying its geriatric reputation, the new Avalon is laden with advanced technology. Qi wireless charging is standard, as are five USB ports and blind-spot monitoring. A 10-inch color head-up display, the segment’s largest, is on the options menu.

If all that’s not enough, Toyota Safety Sense P is included at no extra charge. The brand’s suite of advanced driver aids bundles helpful amenities like pedestrian detection, adaptive cruise control, blind-spot monitoring and more, features that should be hugely beneficial to drivers of all ages. For extra cash, you can also get a Panoramic View Monitor with Alert, which shows a 3-D overview of the car and can take the stress out of maneuvering in tight spaces. Intelligent Clearance Sonar is also optional. It alerts the driver to nearby obstacles, particularly while parking.

SEE ALSO: Toyota RAV4 Hybrid Review – VIDEO

For added safety, all-LED headlamps are available while Limited and Touring examples are fitted with sequentially illuminating turn signals, which look really cool while simultaneously increasing visibility.

Perched atop the center stack like a rainbow lorikeet on an avocado limb is a bright and colorful nine-inch screen, which is home to Toyota’s Entune 3.0 infotainment system. On the plus side, it offers gesture support like pinch-to-zoom and is Amazon Alexa enabled, but that’s where the good news ends.

Entune 3.0 must be one of the most tortuous infotainment offerings on the market today. On top of its overall sluggishness, the menu structure is more convoluted than the F35 jet fighter’s wiring diagram. In fact, my video producer and I spent better than 10 minutes each trying to cancel route guidance. Ultimately, we never figured out how to it and just muted the system. It’s a good thing Apple CarPlay is standard in every version of the Avalon, otherwise, you’d be hopelessly lost, which you’ll probably be if you own a Google-powered smartphone since Android Auto is not offered at any price.

As before, the Avalon has a 3.5-liter gasoline-burning V6 bolted between its front fenders. Smooth running, this engine is good for an adequate 301 horsepower and 267 foot-pounds of torque, significant increases compared to what under the hood of today’s model. Supposedly, an intake-sound generator makes it throatier, but I really couldn’t hear any difference at all. The car is super quiet.

A smooth and responsive eight-speed automatic transmission is also standard, helping enable more-than-respectable acceleration along with decent fuel economy. The car is rated at 22 miles per gallon city, 32 highway and 26 MPG combined.

The new Avalon’s steering is fine with a quick-enough ratio, but it still isolates you from the road, providing minimal feedback about what the front tires are doing. This machine’s suspension tuning is also more conservative than the Alabama state legislature, meaning the ride is smooth, composed and quiet, just as it’s always been. But don’t think this car is a handful; fortunately, there’s absolutely nothing sloppy about the way it behaves, even over bumpy terrain.

SEE ALSO: Driving a Toyota 86 Through the Heart of Europe

Touring models come standard with Adaptive Variable Dampers. Brandishing 650 different adjustment steps, they can react in as little as 20 milliseconds to changing road conditions. But cycling through the various driving modes yielded nothing; I could not for the life of me notice any difference whatsoever. The ride quality never seemed to change, whether carving corners or loafing along in a straight line.