has anyone installed a winter tire with rim size different with factory I got a prime phev 2023, and am looking for a rim and tire other than the factory size(e.g. 195 60 R17.)
There are a couple threads about this. I bought 16" aftermarket wheels and winter tires from TireRack. They are the same height as OEM
I installed 205/55R17 Michelin Cross Climate 2 on 17x7.5 inch MSW Type 48 rims from tirerack.com. Resulted in 0.4" loss of ground clearance. No issues other than an occasional rub when leaving drive way in a hurry. At the time I found it very hard to find aftermarket wheels that were factory size i.e. 17x6.5 inch.
205/60 or 215/55 are better matches for original circumference on 17". 205/60 exactly matches the standard 19", and 215/55 is in-between the standard 17" and 19". 205/55 is smaller than standard sizes, 3% below the 19", which is at the edge of recommended changes, and legality in some countries. 215/60 is bigger than standard sizes, 1.8% above the 19". Usually acceptable, but I'd be a bit wary for a winter tyre on this car. Toyota Finland had been telling dealers to offer 215/50R19 studded winter tyres for 19" cars (3% higher circumference), but I've read that they're now saying that's not acceptable, due to problems with snow build-up and potential well damage, and are specifying and type approving 17" winter sizes. 215/55R17 is the easiest to find, and what I already chose - Nokian Hakkapeliittta 10 on Toyota 17x6.5 rims (not the factory ones, but those offered as an option for 17" cars in Europe)
The brakes are almost certainly the same, regardless of 17” vs 19” wheel. There have been clearance issues reported with 16” wheels though: clearance was so minimal that hidden weights needed to shifted. I wonder too: maybe a 16” wheel “clears”, but if a small piece of gravel gets kicked in there…
215/50/18 Calipers are the same no mater what size wheel came on your Prius. It not like the Prime is a performance variant warranting large brakes or better suspension.
I ran 10k miles this winter using 215/60R16 and Blizzak WS90... no clearance issue and they were GREAT in snow storms and snow < 6" deep...
@KMO I recently got a 2025 Prius Prime and would like tires with some more sidewall without havi by to bug smaller wheels. I found an all-season tire in 215/50R19 size. It has 0.4 inches more sidewall than stock tires, which is nice. I don’t plan on driving in snow. Were the clearance issues with that size you mentioned in Finland solely because of snow build-up? Did the tires fit otherwise?
Just a caution - The front discs on AWD models are larger. Some data bases will show 16 inch wheels as fitting on FWD models but not AWD models. I suspect, but don't know, that this means some 16" wheels will fit over AWD front discs and calipers, but not all will.
You can cross check against PHEV listings. The AWD and PHEV use the same front rotors. FWD HEV - 11.1" rotor AWD HEV, PHEV - 12.0" rotor The calipers are also different, but figure the same roughly 1" difference in total. The AWD/PHEV rotors are also a little thicker. About 6mm or 1/4".
Those larger tyres would fit on the standard wheels fine. Can't say for certain, but I suspect the snow build-up is the main concern, and there's no hard issue with bigger sizes. Manual also has a "no snow chains on 19" tyres" bit, echoing the snow clearance thing. No other special "don't go bigger" warnings. With my 215/55R17 (smaller than normal 19"), I sometimes end up with caked snow rubbing against the tyres - anything bigger than the normal 19" would suffer that more.
