Toyota Harrier

The cabin layout of the Toyota Harrier looks elegant and sophisticated, and indicating that why this crossover SUV carries a steep pricing. The Harrier has leather upholstery offered as standard with black over black trim and stitching in the Luxury variant and black with brown trim and stitching in the Luxury SE variant. The tight fit and finish levels and soft-touch elements on the dashboard and door trim exude luxury and premium appeal.

The Toyota Harrier has a multi-functional steering wheel with a V-shaped centre boss and a 7-inch full-TFT instrument console behind it. It’s the centre console here that adds a visual drama to the cabin of the Harrier, having wedge-shaped sides that have sating silver trim and knurled aluminium finish on their inner edges. This centre console has a floating infotainment head unit above it while having a trapezoidal climate control panel and wireless charging pad aligned vertically in its lower housing. 

In the Luxury SE variant, the central tunnel has a soft touch brown finish for the transmission lever and electric parking brake surrounds. The SUV has a 60:40 split and reclining rear seats too.

Pros and Cons:

Pro: Premium-looking dual-tone black and brown theme

Con: Nothing much actually 

Features and Technology

Modern mid-size crossover SUVs need to be up-to-date in terms of features, and the Toyota Harrier doesn’t disappoint on that front for most of the part. The standard features available in both the variants of Toyota Harrier are an 8-inch touchscreen infotainment system, wireless Apple CarPlay and wired Android Auto, a 6-speaker audio system, dual-zone automatic climate control with rear AC vents, and Nanoe-X air purifier.

The additional common features further include a 7-inch full-TFT instrument console, a 12-way powered driver seat with 2-position memory, a 4-way power-adjustable co-drivers seat, keyless entry with push start-stop button, head-up display, ventilated front seats, a wireless charger, five USB charging ports, digital inside rearview mirror, four-way power-adjustable multi-functional steering wheel, panoramic fixed moon roof, powered tailgate and LED cabin lights.

Pros and cons:

Pro: Many of the comfort and convenience features are offered as standard

Con: Fixed moon roof

Boot Space and Storage

For an SUV of its size, the boot space of 396 litres cannot be said as excellent for the Toyota Harrier, as it could have had a bit more space. However, the Harrier does come with the convenience of 60:40 split folding rear seats, which further maximise the space at the back to store your luggage. 

Talking about the in-cabin experience of storage, the Toyota Harrier has ample places to store your knick-knacks. This SUV comes with nicely-sized storage bins in the door panels, a well-sized glovebox, a small storage space beneath the front centre armrest and cup holders in the front centre console and rear seat centre armrest. 

Pros and cons:

Pro: Several storage spaces in the cabin

Con: Boot space is small for an SUV of its size

Despite it remaining unchanged since its debut in 2021, the Toyota Harrier still looks fresh and relevant, courtesy its sleek and car-like design elements. While there are several angular design elements in the Harrier, its size and heightened bonnet do give it the stance of an SUV. 

The front profile of the Toyota Harrier looks very sleek and modern with angular, four-edged headlamps that have dual small LED projectors and dual L-shaped LED DRLs within them. These headlamps have chrome garnish below them, which flow towards the lower edge of the trapezoidal gloss black closed part of the front grille. 

The primary trapezoidal grille is positioned in the middle of the front bumper, which looks huge and adds some substance to the front profile of the Toyota Harrier. This grille has a trapezoidal chrome element at its bottom, which do come with rounded LED fog lamps positioned on its corners. The Harrier looks sleek from the side too, with the crossover SUV having door-mounted electrically-adjustable and auto-retractable rearview mirrors and 18-inch machined alloy wheels. 

Towards the rear, the Toyota Harrier has a rakish C-pillar, with dramatically inclined rear quarter glass that adds an essence of a couple to the side profile. At the back, the Toyota Harrier has a raked rear windscreen with swooping and stretched LED combination tail lamps, that also have an LED connecting light bar in the middle.

Additional features of the Harrier include auto headlamps and rain sensing wipers. Toyota offers both the variants of Harrier in six colour choices – Platinum White, Steel Blonde, Dark Blue, Slate Grey, Precious Black and Special Edition Red. 

Pros and cons:

Pro: Aerodynamic and sleek design

Cons: No design updates since its debut in 2021

The combination of the 2.0-litre naturally-aspirated petrol engine and a CVT gives the Toyota Harrier its official claimed fuel efficiency figure of 15.3 kmpl, which is impressive for an SUV of its size. Unlike modern turbo-petrol engines, this naturally-aspirated petrol engine is not extremely throttle sensitive and delivers 11-12 kmpl in city driving conditions and 14-15 kmpl in highway driving conditions. 

Pros and cons:

Pro: Impressive fuel efficiency on both city and highways

Con: Nothing much actually

Besides having sleek and aerodynamic styling, the Toyota Harrier also has a plush suspension setup, which further enhances its car-like dynamics. The Toyota Harrier comes with MacPherson struts with a stabilizer at the front and trailing wishbone with a stabilizer at the rear, which give it a plush setup that’s equally good at lower city speeds and higher highway speeds. The well-weighted steering and 18-inch alloy wheels further strengthen the sense of composure and stability at higher speeds. Toyota claims a turning radius of 5.7 metres for the Harrier. 

Pros and Cons:

Pro: Good low-speed ride quality

Con: Nothing much actually

Powering the Toyota Harrier is a conventional 2.0-litre four-cylinder naturally-aspirated petrol engine, which is paired with a CVT as the standard gearbox option. This engine produces a maximum power output of 173 PS, while its peak torque output is rated at 203 Nm. With these output figures, the Toyota Harrier feels decently powerful across its entire RPM range, though the responses from the CVT feel unenthusiastic at higher RPMs.

Pros and cons:

Pro: Good performance from the engine across all RPMs 

Con: CVT feels lazy at higher RPMs

Both the variants of Toyota Harrier are adequately loaded with basic safety essentials like seven airbags, ABS with EBD and brake assist, vehicle stability control, traction control, hill start assist, panoramic view monitor, emergency stop signal, electric parking brake, front and rear parking sensors, tyre pressure monitoring system and ISOFIX mounts for child seats.

A few autonomous driving assistance features from Toyota Safety Sense package are also available as standard in both the variants of Harrier. This package here includes pre-collision system, blind spot monitoring, lane departure alert, lane tracing assist, adaptive cruise control and adaptive high-beam system. However, a few features are still missing in this ADAS suite. 

Pros and cons:

Pro: Standard safety features 

Con: The ADAS suite could have been more comprehensive

Competitor Comparison

The Toyota Harrier is one of the most expensive offerings in the mid-size crossover SUV category, which also has some established, well-equipped names like Volkswagen Tiguan AllSpace, Kia Sorento, Renault Koleos, Hyundai Santa Fe, Peugeot 5008, Nissan X-Trail, DS7 Crossback and Subaru Outback. 

Conclusion and Final Verdict

There are a lot of good things that set the tone for Toyota Harrier in making it a perfect urban mid-size crossover SUV. The Harrier looks premium and stylish, even though it hasn’t received design updates since its launch in 2021. The cabin feels plush, well-appointed and heavily-equipped. The engine is known for its refinement and durability, if not the best-in-class performance, which is still more than one needs on the tarmac. However, the price points at which it is on sale in the Malaysian car market simply don’t justify it as a value proposition.