Clarity Base Vs. Touring - What made you choose?

It makes no sense to me to not provide a feature on the Canadian model. I'm not sure if not having the auto-seat adjust would of killed the deal for me but it's really odd to me to even have a different Canadian model. i.e. I guess the heated battery would be a good option for both USA and Canada really. But if I had to choose I'd rather have the seats. Here in Western Oregon, we rarely even get freezing temps, let alone anything sub-zero. In more than 100 years, our record low as -12F.

Anyway, hope they fix this with any new Clarity model (I mean feature parity for Canadians).

-Dan

 

Satisfied base owner here. The car is still wonderful, and we don’t feel like we cheaped out.

 

Maybe I underestimate the cost and weight of the battery heater and automatic seats, but I simply don't understand the rationale of having a Canadian model and a US model with these differences. Would adding the battery heater to the US model and the automatic seats to the Canadian model really make enough of a price difference to matter? It seems to me that the reduction in manufacturing complexity would offset these small cost/weight differences. But I'm not a car guy.

 

According to the trim comparisons on the Honda site the touring has the following that the base does not have:

• 7 lbs heavier
• Leather wrapped steering wheel
• Driver’s seat with 8 way power adjustment and 2 position memory
• Front passenger’s seat with 4 way power adjustment
• Perforated leather trimmed seats
• Honda satellite linked navigation system with voice recognition and Honda HD Digital traffic
• Compass
• Turn by turn directions

From comments here it sounds like the touring also has the pseudo-suede interior trim and that the base does not.

My wife and I don't see enough benefit to go touring.

Al

 

I went touring for no other reason than the quality of the seats. We do cross country road trips. At 800 miles at a time once in a while, seats are everything. Well worth it for me. Not to mention the memory feature which I love, since I’m nearly a foot taller than wifey.

Navigation is a huge waste. But it comes with it. I prefer Apple maps thru CarPlay.

 

We went Base over Touring. The base seats are a combination of cloth and leatherette, and are plenty comfortable. I actually didn't like the faux suede dash, so that was a bonus. I also prefer Waze/Google Maps so the factory navigation would we wasted on me. I'm the only person who drives it, so the memory seat function would also never come into play. It was a no-brainer for me.

 

We felt the base was the best for the family school and sports bus. Seat adjustment is faster on the base and more kid friendly with the trim (ultra suede and perforated leather not the most kids friendly.) We love it, having solar makes it even better.

 

Wow. It is really cheap compare to California.

 

To summarize:

Leather seats - Though we’re not “religious” about it, Karen and I generally try to avoid leather when possible for personal reasons.

Faux suede trim - We saw as a negative. We have 3 furbabies and are involved with pet rescue and thought it would be harder to keep clean and undamaged.





Navigation System - We can’t see how that would I improve upon Waze (our go-to choice), Apple Maps or Google Maps either via CarPlay or standalone on the iPhone/iPad. One less thing to learn and update.

Power seats - This one is tougher. Falls into the “kinda nice to have” category, but adds a small amount of weight, complexity and battery drain. I remember being surprised that the Volt we test drove had manual seats, but thinking about it, it made sense where every extra ounce affects mileage. Still, if it had been a no-cost option, we probably would have checked that box.

But again, it’s nice to have choices!

 

Went for the base since I couldn't justify 3K more for the Touring features.
I actually prefer the seats in the base trim, the cloth is placed in parts where you cause the most wear and tear and the material seems very durable. Power seats is a nice feature on the Touring but I manual adjustment is quick and on my "one less thing to break" list. For navigation, I use Android Auto with Google Maps which is all you really need. The suede on the dashboard looks a like a future headache to keep clean.

The only feature I wish was in the base trim is the heated steering wheel, the base one has a cheap look and feel to it.

 

Base. Prefer cloth seat, smooth non suede dash, dont need onboard navi when i have carplay. Save yourself 3k.

 

Olympia, the steering wheel in the Touring is leather wrapped but not heated. If it were that might have been enough for me to upgrade. Everyone else has already expressed why I didn’t, the power seats were the only thing I saw as valuable in the touring and to me that wasn’t enough to justify $3000 more.

 

Top reasons for me to go with the Touring:

1. Dedicated Navigation - I rarely use my smartphone to navigate, and actually prefer to have a backup to smartphone maps.
2. Leather trim.
3. Power adjustable seats are nice.
4. In the grand scheme of things, the cost between the base and touring model was very minimal. Plus, I wanted ALL the features.

 

I went with the base because it's a commute car and didn't need GPS and don't want leather due to the hot leather burning my behind 10 month of the year in So Calif.

Single commute driver means no other drivers for this car.

Also, I noticed the base gets upgraded gear compared to other brands which cheapens out the trim: with 18" wheels, CarPlay, and LED headlights which were my primary reasons for choosing the base.

 

Great price for the car! I paid $31,000 for the base model in Pennsylvania.

I am the only driver and 95% of the time I am the only passenger. The additional features were not important to me. Routinely, I remote start the climate system by using the Honda Link App. Works every time and at long distances. My goal was to reduce as much as possible the cost of owning and driving a vehicle while reducing my use of fossil fuels. I am pleased with how well the Clarity helps me achieve these goals.

 

Base. The only mildly convincing argument for the touring is the leather seats, and I was fine not paying extra for that. There’s absolutely no need for navigation with a smart phone.

 

Watched some videos on how to clean perforated leather seats and decided I did not ever want them. Picking melted chocolate out of the perforations did not speak to me. Hated the leather wrapping on the steering wheel. Did kind of pine for the auto seats, but since I am the only driver, the only time the adjustment changes is when the car goes for service and mechanics push the seat back to get their legs behind the wheel.

Was tempted by the nav system, but the folks on this forum told me that their experience with Android Auto was really good.

In all, there was not enough difference for me to justify the increased price so I am pretending that I "saved" that money and am look into getting a 240w outlet installed with a Level 2 EVSE (once the snowbank melt).

 

Just got a touring model. We went that way because we wanted the leather and power seats. Got the green with the "beige" interior. Wanted that for the Texas heat.

 

I got a touring too but I wanted the Green with Beige interior but there were none available in the SOCAL area. I saw the burgundy and for a split second liked it until my wife said I would get tired of the color and she also said the white looked more suited for a woman. So I got silver. BTW I hate silver cars but Clairty pulls it off with all the black plastic accents.

 

I got a quote on 2018 Touring at 31600 + tax title in CT + 0.9% Apr from Honda on 2018 model (picking up soon after windows tinting is done) . Sounds a good deal to me as I called many places and no one could beat it and I am getting the color of my choice Crimson Red with Tan interior. There is still 1000 in state and 7500 in federal rebates should make it lower than the price of Civic EX.
Going for Touring because of Seat memory and Power seats as we are 2 diff size drivers changing frequently between us. Navigation is not a big deal these days plus it lets you use your cell phone navigation.