2023 Toyota Prius Prime Gets Looks—and Legs

• The new Prius Prime adds almost 100 hp to 220, increases electric-only range to 44 miles, and manages to look darn nice doing it.

• Increased efficiencies everywhere mean more miles in gas or EV modes.

• Prices will start at $33,445 when it comes out in May.

It wasn’t long after the original Toyota Prius came out in 1997 that engineers and inventors started thinking of ways to add a bigger battery to the groundbreaking hybrid so it could go farther on electricity alone. Remember, in 1997 there were none of the fancy BEVs we have now—there was no Mercedes EQS, Audi e-tron, or Tesla Model Anything.

There was only a minimalist number of science experiments like the GM EV1, Honda EV Plus, and the Nissan Altra for battery-electric cars; for hybrids there was the Honda Insight. Anyone recall the Solectria Sunrise?

By the time the second-gen Prius came out, you could double your then-Prius’ range by adding an aftermarket battery pack that fit into the spare wheel hiding spot under the rear floorboards. I saw one at the LA auto show. It was not on fire. The maker claimed it boosted range to an astounding 12 miles.

It wasn’t until 2013 that Toyota itself offered more battery range in the Prius when it came out with the “Prius Plug-In Hybrid” that gave you a whopping 11 miles of EV range, more if you hyper-miled or rolled downhill. The first vehicle called the Prius Prime came out in 2016 and more than doubled EV-only range to a then-spectacular 25 miles, as well as returning 54 mpg in hybrid mode and a then-and-still-gobsmacking 133 MPGe.

Now, for the 2023 model year, we get the new Prius Prime you see here, a hybrid car that Toyota estimates will return 44 miles on electricity alone, while offering 220 ground-pounding horsepower, and look darn good doing it.

“Right off the bat, as everyone undeniably saw when we revealed it last year, it’s sexy,” says Toyota’s VP of marketing Michael Tripp.

That slippery exterior is pulled through the air by two electric motors—one an electric generator called Motor Generator 1 to charge the battery and start the gas engine—and a 161-hp electric Motor Generator 2 to propel the car forward and gather regenerated electricty when the car is slowing down. The electric motors get their juice from a 13.6-kWh lithium-ion battery, and they are mated to a 150-hp 2.0-liter gasoline engine.

Together they make 220 hp, 99 more than this Prius Prime’s predecessor. Toyota has labeled all of the above elements the Hybrid Synergy Drive, the name for the automaker’s fifth-gen hybrid powertrain. And it works! The new car’s 0-60-mph time is a respectable-for-a-hybrid 6.6 seconds.