17 Prime Premium- my experience and range

Picked up a Prime Premium exactly one week ago. I have a pretty long commute ~120 miles round trip. About 80% highway. I've owned VW's for a long time and the 50mpg allowed me to keep my job long distance. As my last VW was getting older ('02 with 200k) It was time for change both in car and technology. Started digging into research on Hybrids and was hot on getting a '15-'17 Accord Hybrid or a '15 Lexus CT200h. Then started looking at a late model Prius. Then stumbled into Prime territory. Didn't know much about them 2 weeks ago but watched tons of YouTube reviews and found this website. Lots of opinions where considered and lots of knowledge gained. Took advantage of the Toyota NJ rebate and got my '17. Wasn't looking for a red one but to get the '17 discount and one with a black interior I had to settle. Wouldn't you know after a week I'm really starting to dig the red.

My first impressions after a week. Wow, what a nice car. Most of my friends are not car guys but they have wanted to test drive it and are very interested in the EV tech. I could pretty much work sales for Toyota at this point. I'm loving the EV portion of it for around town and getting going on the highway. I've been experimenting with when to switch to HV. I went with switching to HV after getting up to speed on the highway. Seems to stay EV for a bit until the ICE is ready (warmed up I guess). Produced the best mpg results.

I had a stipulation that a car I buy must be able to make it 1 week without having to hit a gas station. Well, today is one week and I'll be hitting the gas station for my first fill. I'll post results tonight.

I set my charge to departure and plug in every night. The available information in the displays is great and allows me to drive my best. I've been making sure to use up my EV range as I finish my commute. Been arriving home with 1-2 miles of EV left. Slowly starting EV a little earlier before I get off the highway.

I'll post later after my first fill up. Maybe it'll help some other long commuters doing research make a decision.

Thanks for all the information, look forward to contributing.

 

So first fill up......9 gallons......for 659 miles of mostly highway driving. 73.2mpg including EV (~25 miles per day). I cant charge at work. So subtract about 150 miles off the total (25 a day * 5 days + about 25 over the weekend). So 509/9=56.5mpg on HV. Key is I achieved my goal of only needing to fill once a week! I'll be keeping track through fuelly.

Great car for commuting. Phone charger is slow but does give me a boost while I bluetooth my audio books.

Radar cruise is nice except when a lot of traffic moving in and out of lanes.

 

One problem with an PHEV. If the power goes out you cant charge. Haven't had the power go out in months but a pole fell in the neighborhood and shut down electric until around 4 AM. So I only got about an hour and a half charge. Gah!