Our 2023 Honda Accord Touring Hybrid Embraces Change

Introduction

How bullish is Honda on hybridization? Not only has a hybrid powertrain replaced the last-generation Accord’s wonderful turbo 2.0-liter at the top of the 2023 Honda Accord hierarchy, but it also powers four of the six available trim levels. When it was time to choose one for a yearlong, 40,000-mile test, we had little choice but to embrace it.

Say hello to our 2023 Honda Accord Touring Hybrid. This top-of-the-lineup trim costs $38,985 and offers no options beyond exterior color and a few dealer-installed accessories. Our car’s Canyon River Blue paint is one of the no-cost colors.

The Touring is the only Accord in the lineup that comes standard with all of these goodies: front and rear parking sensors, a head-up display, wireless charging, rain-sensing wipers, and Low-Speed Braking Control, which alerts the driver and assists in reducing the effects of low-speed collisions via sensors on the front and rear bumpers.

We’ll appreciate the heated front and rear outboard seats come February, and ditto for the ventilated front seats during summer. But alas, there’s no heated steering wheel. Like ketchup-flavored Lays, that’s only for the Canadian market. Memo to Honda: We’ll trade the heated rear seats for a heated steering wheel quicker than our northern friends can say, “Sorry.”

Getting to Know You

The introductory phase required avoiding sudden or full-throttle acceleration for 600 miles and limiting hard braking for the first 200 miles. Dialing back on driving dynamics gave us time, let’s say, to appreciate the interior’s refreshingly simple layout. It feels strange to compliment Honda on ordinary stuff like buttons for the climate controls, a dial for the volume, and a traditional shift lever, but we have a mass of touch-sensitive switches across the industry to thank for moving the goal post.

While digging through the menus to dial in keyless-entry behavior, gauge-cluster mode, and audio settings, we found an option to disable permissions from built-in third-party applications. We appreciate this ability as digital privacy becomes harder to obtain, even if taking advantage of it disables onboard Google features. Android Auto and Apple CarPlay remain accessible, and your privacy with them.

So far, the driving experience mirrors the simplicity of the interior layout. Yes, the hybrid powertrain alternates between its 146-hp engine, a 181-hp electric motor, or a combination of the two (rated at a combined peak of 204 horsepower) to power the front wheels. It also recuperates energy from braking into a 1.1-kWh battery that allows all-electric driving until around 20 mph. And there really isn’t a transmission in the traditional sense, as the Accord hybrid is directly driven by its electric motor more often than not. But the only way you can tell if any of this is happening is by switching to a display that shows it.

You can also just ignore it. The brake pedal reveals nothing about regenerative braking, and the engine revs to generate electricity under acceleration so it feels, believably, like there’s an automatic transmission somewhere in there smoothly changing nonexistent gears.

At freeway speeds, you can’t even hear the engine switch off and on. At that point, our Accord Touring is simply a large, comfortable sedan with an EPA highway rating of 41 mpg and a theoretical highway road-trip range of 520 miles on account of its smaller 12.8-gallon fuel tank. In true hybrid fashion, the Accord is thirstiest on the open road, but its EPA city mileage is 46 mpg. The all-important combined rating we’ll compare to our observed fuel economy over the course of 40,000 miles is a stellar 44 mpg.

The only real tells that more is going on than meets the eye are the exterior pedestrian alert sound that kicks on in EV mode at low speeds and the shift paddles that adjust the level of regenerative braking through a probably-too-high number of settings (six!). You have to hold the paddle for a few seconds for the setting to stick, and you have to do so every time you start the car or shift out of drive. Still, we appreciate being able to dial up the regen to just before the brake lights activate, doing our small part to alleviate traffic.

Test Results and What’s Next

After break-in, we took this 3525-pound Accord to the test track for its arrival physical. There, it reached 60 mph in 6.5 seconds and the quarter-mile in 15.2 seconds at 91 mph. Both measures lag over a second behind the last turbo 2.0-liter Accord we tested, but it’s not all bad: Consider that these acceleration results essentially match those of an Acura Integra Type R we tested in 1997. What’s more, our new Accord’s 0.90-g skidpad orbit bests the old Type R’s 0.88-g effort.

It’s safe to say that our Accord Touring is settling in nicely for its year-long test. That shouldn’t be too surprising after we put it on our 10Best list—the 37th time we’ve done so, by the way. But winning 10Best as many times as the Accord has doesn’t guarantee anything. In fact, it demands more scrutiny. How seamless will it remain after 40,000 miles? How much jealousy will we have for Canadian-market Accords and their heated steering wheels? Time will tell.

Months in Fleet: 1 month Current Mileage: 2649 miles
Average Fuel Economy: 38 mpg
Fuel Tank Size: 12.8 gal Observed Fuel Range: 480 miles
Service: $0 Normal Wear: $0 Repair: $0 Damage and Destruction: $0

Deputy Editor, Video

From selling them to testing them, Carlos Lago has spent his entire adult life consumed by cars. He currently drives the creative behind Car and Driver video.