BabyDrive Verdict
This is one car I know a lot of you have been waiting patiently for our BabyDrive review. The 2023 Toyota Corolla Cross hybrid is a new five-seater small SUV. Let’s find out how good it is as a BabyDrive…
The 2023 Toyota Corolla Cross has very spacious rear seats, which is great news for families that need to fit three Infasecure child seats across the back row.
There are ISOFix points in the two outer rear seats within plastic guides, and they are easy to connect to.
There are top tether anchorages in the back of all three seat backs that are easily connected to through the boot.
Legroom is tight in the Toyota Corolla Cross. I installed an Infasecure Attain More and Infasecure Achieve More forward facing and behind the driver's seat a rear-facing Attain More child seat.
I found I could sit in front of the rear-facing Attain More, but no one taller than around 170cm would fit there.
On the passenger side, legroom is still tight in front of with forward-facing child seats. We found a 180cm passenger can sit there but with very little legroom.
We found my 186cm husband could drive with a 142cm twelve-year-old sitting in the rear seat, but they did argue over legroom!
Where space has been taken from the cabin, it has been given over to the boot space. The boot of the Toyota Corolla Cross is very generous fitting 12 shopping bags when empty, the same as the Nissan Qashqai and Kia Seltos.
For families that need to, you can fit a twin side-by-side pram in the boot comfortably with a couple of shopping bags too.
A tandem pram fits, with six bags of shopping around it.
A single pram fits in the boot of the Toyota Corolla Cross with four shopping bags.
A compact stroller fits in the boot of the Corolla Cross with eight shopping bags.
For families with a fur baby, you will fit a medium-sized dog in the boot of the Toyota Corolla Cross comfortably with a flat carpeted boot floor.
Passengers are comfortable in the back of the Corolla Cross with aircon vents in the back of the central console box.
Storage is minimal in the back for the rear passengers with just a single map pocket, but there is a single cup holder in each rear door, which is fantastic for holding kids' drink bottles so they can easily reach them while driving along.
In the front, the storage is better with two cup holders in the central console and a small central console box with a 12V socket.
There is a wireless phone charging pad in front of the gear lever…
… and the glove box is big enough to hold an iPad and wallet with the manual.
There are proper door bins in the front that will hold a refillable water bottle, and an iPad fits in them too.
Front passengers do not have a glasses case in the Corolla Cross, but there are lit mirrors in both the front visors.
The Corolla Cross has Toyota's new media system…
But ut still feels very basic and outdated. I don’t find it user-friendly or easy to use at all, but it does, thankfully, have Apple CarPlay and Android Auto for easily accessing your phone's navigation, listening and communication apps on the move.
The screen is small, so when you put it in reverse, the camera view is a bit cramped but at least it is clear.
Being a hybrid, the Corolla Cross I tested (all versions are available as hybrid or petrol) starts silently, which is wonderful when you have noisy kids on board! Other highlights of hybrids are that you can sit for a while with the aircon on without using the engine (for example stuck in the car with a sleeping child and running the aircon) and it's really good on fuel. You can watch the hybrid system on the driver's display screen, going between engine and battery. Going slowly around town, it uses the engine hardly at all which means less guilt when driving kids to sleep!
The 2023 Toyota Corolla Cross has incredibly light steering, which is great for around town and school and supermarket car parks however, the steering wheel in this lower-spec model feels hard and plasticky in your hands.
I found the 2023 Toyota Corolla Cross a nice hybrid to drive but a little revvy up hills. The side mirrors feel very large on the Corolla Cross, and I found they obscured my vision at roundabouts and junctions.
The 2023 Toyota Corolla Cross has a five-star ANCAP rating and eight airbags as standard, including;
Dual frontal, side chest-protecting, and side head-protecting (curtain) airbags, as well as a driver knee airbag, are standard. A centre airbag which provides added protection to front seat occupants in side impact crashes is also standard
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