Category: Large Family 
Price Range: £16,485 to £27,515
Engines, refinement, predictability, reliability and standard traffic info system.
Dowdy interior, tired styling, anonymity - and it's generally outclassed.
An utterly competent, rounded and useful car. But there's so much out there that can do it all as well - with so much more flair - mega specification or not.
The Avensis competes against rivals like Ford's Mondeo and Vauxhall's Vectra in the family hatchback/rep-mobile class. Against such opposition its UK sales are tiny.
It's unlikely that you'll have ever paid much attention to the Avensis, a rather innocuous looking machine that, against newer, more stylish competition fails to capture the buying public's imagination. It's also unlikely that anybody has ever desired a Avensis, as it's rather devoid of charisma and style, but as an everyday driver that'll carry you fuss-free from meeting to meeting in reasonable comfort the Avensis is perfectly passable.
Latest Readers' Drives About the Toyota Avensis
wrote on 27 03 2008