This may sound like a stupid question but how do you preheat the car in cold weather? I have been able to use the remote start function in the app and then set the vehicles interior temperature using the app and this worked for warming the interior once, but on several occasions it would not work because the battery was under a certain percent it said... Very weird to me that remote start can just not work but I can go outside and start the car no problem. If the battery is ok to start the car why is it not ok to remote start it? This is a fault for sure. On my last car I just set the temperature dials before leaving my car the night before, then the next morning would remote start the car and in 15 minutes everything was toasty and ready to go. And I am not only talking about warming up the inside of the car. I want to know how you can warm the motor? When the vehicle starts, it starts in EV or HV mode but either way, it uses the electric motors until it starts moving. So this means that your motor doesn't get any time to warm up and cycle oil before you are already moving. This is not good and I feel like there must be a solution that I am just unaware of because otherwise it is another terrible design fault. Its easily -30 on most days during winter where I am and iI get on the highway pretty quickly after leaving my place. i need to be able to warm the actual motor before driving. Any insight would be appreciated.
What's your parking situation like? Is it in a garage? If its on the street, do you have electrical access for it? An engine block heater will allow you to heat the interior of the car much faster once the engine is running. But because Toyota sucks at software and pretty sure will eventually charge you a fee for remote start options I'd encourage you to work with using a standard outlet-based power cord to use electric blanket style warmers around the high voltage battery pack and control/monitor the system via bluetooth or wifi. Lithium batteries are at their best around 38 degrees Celsius and keeping them near that temp when you're ready to drive in cold weather will easily make the cabin warm enough to get in and drive if you're willing to do it DIY.
From a different thread: "The simplest solution is usually the right answer. Just found out the engine will start in Park, start button depressed (ready , HV mode and the accelerator pedal slightly depressed). It then continues to run for a few minutes completing it's warm up cycle before shutting down. You can get out of the car, with or without the key for that warm up cycle." Also, my car has a Charge Mode so if the traction battery isn't full just pressing the Charge Mode button will start the engine to charge the battery That doesn't help you with the remote start problem or warming up the interior but it will warm the engine up before you race down the highway (note, I have a 2024 Prime ). KH
You could try a block heater. It's a low-tech option available for any car with a gas or diesel engine. Figure a couple-three hundred bucks installed. It's just a simple resistance heater that attaches to one of the coolant ports on your engine block. The idea is that you plug the heater into a mains power circuit at your parking space, and the heater will warm up the engine without burning any fuel at all. You can connect them to simple on/off timers so that the engine is pre-warmed every morning. I figure if you're already plugging in the car for traction power, it won't be a big deal to plug it in twice so that the heater can help you. Many Canadian mechanics and auto dealers are familiar with these accessories, it should not be hard for you to get set up.
There seems to be some confusion here on if you want to cold start the engine or pre-warm the interior??? The PHEV does not start the engine to pre-warm the interior; it uses a heat pump that has a low temperature operations limitation. That's why the app is telling you to manually start the car. The air temperature is beyond the heat pump's capability to warm the car's interior. When you manually get the car into "Ready" and demand cabin heat in the above described conditions - the engine will start, since the heat pump won't operate in those conditions. I believe all that is outlined in your OPS manual..... If the goal is to pre-warm the engine; @Leadfoot J. McCoalroller above suggestion. Hybrids operate differently from ICE only cars. PS you can force the ICE ON by hitting the windscreen defogger button - you'll get more heat, faster; but it will impact mpgs or in your case liters/100km......
As pointed out, the app doesn't do a remote start of the car, but just cabin preconditioning. It is a safety call by Toyota. Neither the app nor car knows if it is parked in a poorly ventilated garage or not. To prewarm the engine, you need to do it manually, use a block heater, or find some other remote start option. Toyota has been making hybrids for some time now. The system program does not put a heavy on a cold engine. After the engine first starts, the car is still mostly using electric power to move until the engine finishes its warm up cycle. It can get to over 80mph in EV mode, so the engine cold starting on a highway isn't an issue.
Install the block heater, and start it heating at least 4 hours* in advance. Start the car in hybrid mode. * With older-style Toyota block heater, 2 hours would be enough to warm it quite well. There was apparently a fire risk though, and a recall, so dealership replaced ours. The fix appears to be a drastic reduction in wattage: now it takes 4 hours to get tepid. Anyway, better'n nothing.
sorry i'm not getting what you are saying. If I have to have the pedal depressed then I am not using remote start.
Yeah sorry for the confusion. I suppose coming from a gas car, preheating the interior and the engine went hand in hand. The main concern would be to preheat (run the engine) for 10-15 minutes before I even go outside of my house. What is the point of remote start if I can't do that? We don't all live in Florida....
Interesting. I have never heard this. Either way, when I have it in HV mode and I start the car its pure electric. as soon as I start moving like 20km/hr I hear the motor kick on. 2 minutes later I have to merge onto a highway.This isn't enough time to heat up safely. But anyone living in Sh!thole climates like Canada knows that getting into a car that was sitting overnight at -30, you can't just start driving anyways. You have to defrost everything for 10-15minutes. Someone mentioned that when I turn on the defrost and crank the heat that the engine will have to turn on to compensate. This makes sense, but it doesnt change the fact that I have to physically go out to the car and start it manually...... Someone said the remote start with climate funtion will not start the engine too so that is contradicting. perhaps if i use the app to crank the interior temperature it will also be forced to turn the vehicle on. I will play more with it. My keyfob also does remote start if you click certain buttons but it has never turned the motor on so I was just hoping that I was missing something completely obvious.
No, unfortunately no indoor option. Condo life at it's finest. 2 cars and only 1 indoor spot. The rest is street parking with no plug-in options. This is why it's funny that Canada is trying to force everyone into micro apartments at the same time as pushing EV's... I knew that not having a place to plug-in I wouldn't be able to take advantage of the pure EV portion of the car at all times but didn't think this would be a concern. I was going to buy a hybrid anyways and managed to get a deal on the Phev for $35k out the door, so couldn't pass that up. I'm currently in Calgary but I don't think I will be here much longer because the weather is so bad. Might head back to Victoria and that will solve this problem hahaha. I see you are in Vancouver... West Coast Best Coast!
The Prius DOES NOT have a remote start option; just an interior preconditioning function. Whomever is calling it a remote starter is misleading you and don't know what they are talking about. Toyota connect is buggy at best. I opted not to extend my subscription after the trail period because I was experiencing similar issues with the app - why pay for something that doesn't work reliability? IMHO; there are aftermarket accessories that will remote start the engine; and it's a bit tricky on a Prius, but it can be done. Here's a link to the OEM manuals. Digital | Toyota Owners Here's a link with other people having a similar issues and their solution. 2026 Toyota Prius Remote Start Fails in Cold New England Temps, And Owners are Trading Factory Apps for $500 Aftermarket Solutions
You might be surprised by how quickly they reach a temp safe for highway speeds. These aren't cast iron blocks from the 1930s. But if you're really especially concerned, just stay on the secondary roads a couple more miles and take the next-closest on-ramp instead, at least until you can get a real actual remote starter.
