- 3 weeks ago
In this video, host Ben McKimm from Man of Many takes the highly anticipated 2026 Honda Prelude Hybrid out for its first official on-road review through the sweeping, demanding tarmac of the Adelaide Hills.
Making its grand return to Australia after a 25-year hiatus, this sixth-generation icon seeks to redefine what a modern, efficient, and driver-focused coupe can be. Now available in local showrooms at a drive-away price of AUD$65,000, the core question remains: can a hybrid powertrain with a
Making its grand return to Australia after a 25-year hiatus, this sixth-generation icon seeks to redefine what a modern, efficient, and driver-focused coupe can be. Now available in local showrooms at a drive-away price of AUD$65,000, the core question remains: can a hybrid powertrain with a
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LifestyleTranscript
00:00Look at that! It's part of when you start to get a little bit of rotation through the rear end.
00:04I'm smiling! I didn't expect to be smiling.
00:07I have a bone to pick with modern sports cars.
00:10They're too stiff, they're too heavy, and quite frankly, they're too fast for roads these days.
00:15But this one, it bucks the trend.
00:18This is the new Honda Prelude, a rather controversial car actually,
00:22because they took a beautiful sports car body and put a hybrid powertrain underneath with a simulated gearbox.
00:29But I want you to forget all those preconceptions that you might have about this car before we start this
00:34video,
00:34because it might be the answer to many of our enthusiast questions.
00:38Today, we're going to take a look around the exterior of the car,
00:40we're going to jump on the inside and check out the interior before we take it for a drive.
00:44And finally, I'm going to give you my final verdict on this sports car.
00:47Or is it a sports car? I'll let you be the judge.
00:50Before we look inside, we have to talk about the 25-year elephant in the room with us.
00:54The Prelude lineage is full of firsts.
00:56Back in 1978, the first gen gave us the factory moonroof.
01:00Then 1983 rolled around, and the second gen dropped the pop-up headlights,
01:03which are basically impossible these days due to global pedestrian safety standards.
01:07But wouldn't we love to see them in this new gen?
01:09By 1988, the third gen went full mad scientist with the world's first mechanical four-wheel steering.
01:14And the fourth and fifth generations brought us the high-revving VTEC engines
01:17and clever torque vectoring right before the coupe market crashed and the Prelude died in 2001.
01:23Which brings us to right now, the sixth generation, and I have to say,
01:26after spending time with it in person, I'm genuinely impressed by how Honda has handled this revival.
01:30They haven't just slapped a retro badge on a generic hybrid,
01:33it's clear they've crafted a design that honors the family tree while feeling totally fresh.
01:37Honda claims the smooth-flowing shape was inspired by a glider, I mean, sure,
01:41but I honestly just appreciate the way that it doesn't have that overly aggressive boy racer aero look
01:45that you find in some of its rivals.
01:47I think the most important thing is that it isn't trying too hard, it's remarkably mature.
01:51Still, it's not without a sports car look,
01:53I love the wide front end and how it makes the car look incredibly planted,
01:56it gives me massive four-gen vibes,
01:58but then you walk around the back and my absolute favourite detail is that striking full-width LED light bar.
02:02It's a brilliant modernised nod to the horizontal styling of the second and third generations.
02:07But here's the kicker, it's technically a liftback now,
02:09which means you get actual hatchback practicality instead of a tiny trunk,
02:13I mean, you can literally fit golf clubs in the back of this thing.
02:15We live in a world where cars look like they're designed by a computer,
02:17but I think this one perfectly bridges the gap between 90s nostalgia and modern refinement.
02:22But looking good from the outside is only half the battle,
02:24so what is it actually like on the inside?
02:26Let's have a look.
02:27So that's it for the exterior design,
02:29but I think it's about time we jump inside and check out this interior,
02:31because it's actually pretty premium.
02:33I mean, listen to this door close.
02:36Sounds pretty good.
02:37Let's jump inside.
02:38Okay, so let's talk about the interior of this Honda Prelude.
02:42And find me in the comments if it's Prelude,
02:44because everyone here's telling me it's Prelude.
02:46Anyway, what have you got?
02:47Well, it's quite familiar to Civic owners, I would say,
02:52with some of the shapes here and some of these switch gears.
02:56But what I want to start with is some of the sort of luxurious things
03:00that I didn't necessarily expect to find in the Prelude.
03:04Number one is actually up here, believe it or not,
03:06because check this out.
03:07Have you ever seen a damped sunglasses holder?
03:11I mean, it's a small thing,
03:12but I think it speaks to the premium nature of this vehicle.
03:16It's not just a Civic with a sexy body style.
03:19It's a completely bespoke thing.
03:21And you get this impression that Honda spent a lot of money developing this car.
03:27Other things are the metal gear selectors.
03:33So behind here, it's quite cool.
03:34I mean, even if you direct this AC vent over here at the gear shift paddle.
03:41Is it a shift paddle?
03:43They get nice and cool to the touch.
03:44It's just small little things like that,
03:46which you don't even necessarily get on more expensive cars into the hundreds of thousands of dollars.
03:50But it has it here.
03:53Other small things, the air conditioner is really nice and quiet.
03:57You've got this beautiful material up here on the dashboard.
03:59It looks almost textured with a little bit of deviated stitching there, like a lot more expensive cars.
04:05Because all of these materials are quite soft to the touch, including over here on the door.
04:12I mean, a lot of this stuff usually gets replaced with scratchy plastics,
04:16but that's not really the case here in the prelude.
04:18You do get a bit down here.
04:21It's also the same over on the passenger side.
04:23This is a quite scratchy piece of plastic,
04:24but it's also a pretty agricultural area in general
04:28with the way that you just usually hit the switches and adjust your mirrors, things like that.
04:32So I'm not too, you know, unhappy about that.
04:35In the center console here and these seats,
04:37they've actually got a pop-up center console, which I really like.
04:40It's full of some lollies because of course it is.
04:44And then these seats.
04:45The funny thing about the prelude are the seats.
04:48So the passenger seat over here is actually different to the driver's seat,
04:52which is really strange.
04:53I think only McLaren Senna and some Ferraris have different seats for the front passengers,
05:00but lower bolster, which makes it easier to get in and out of,
05:04I believe, 20 millimeters lower on this side
05:06because it's the driver that needs to be hugged.
05:08Same thing with some of the materials.
05:10The actual cushion itself is more comfortable than the driver's seat.
05:15So yeah, they're thinking about all these little things
05:17and it sort of speaks to me at least about the target market for this car.
05:21I don't think it's leaning too heavily into the pure enthusiast.
05:25I think the GR86 occupies that niche very well.
05:28They're not really trying to compete with that car.
05:30They're trying to sort of carve out their own niche.
05:32And I actually quite like it.
05:34Driver's seat in general, though, super comfortable.
05:36Really nice place to sit.
05:38Honda always gets driving position right.
05:40And they've done it once again here in the Prelude.
05:43Bang on in the center.
05:44The steering wheel is just really nice to hold.
05:47A little bit big.
05:48We'll talk about it in the driving impressions.
05:51But yeah, sure, I'd love it to be a tiny bit smaller,
05:53but the visibility at the front is exceptional.
05:56Let's talk a little bit about tech.
05:58So when it comes to tech, this car isn't covered in huge screens
06:02and it's not trying to show off based on the size of its screens.
06:06So it's got a nice simple screen up here in front of me.
06:09I believe it's a 13.1-inch unit.
06:11It has wireless Apple CarPlay, but it also has inbuilt Google.
06:15So you can actually talk to this thing like a Google HomePod.
06:19You can control everything pretty much in your life that's attached to Google.
06:23So you can control your lights at home with your Google Home through the car.
06:28You can do all those things.
06:29You've also got inbuilt Google Maps.
06:30You can download apps from the Play Store like Spotify and all your music apps.
06:34You can pretty much just use it like a smartphone.
06:37But of course, most of us are just going to mirror our iPhones to it
06:41and Apple CarPlay works pretty flawlessly, I have to say, in this car overall.
06:47They haven't gone to town too much on the tech side of things
06:50because they know what we like and it's physical buttons.
06:54I mean, and dials.
06:56These feel really premium.
06:57I mean, the way that that's just clicking there is not something that you expect to find in a car
07:02in 2026.
07:03They've put a lot of effort.
07:04I mean, even the dampening there on the air conditioning vent.
07:08Super nice controls.
07:10Easy to access.
07:11On-off is one big button.
07:12You've got your temperature on the dial.
07:14The auto button's here.
07:16The sync button's here.
07:18Heated seats.
07:20They haven't made it too flashy, but it all just makes sense and it all just works.
07:24And I really like that.
07:25It's super Japanese, but I'm here for it.
07:28Some other things.
07:29Let's talk about what's happening on down here.
07:30So down here in the center console, you've got, up front, two USB-C ports, an old-school 12-volt
07:39socket,
07:39a wireless charging pad in here for your phone, and it actually has a nice material on it
07:45and some edges on each side, and it keeps your phone well secured when you're going through some corners.
07:51These buttons I'll talk a bit about in the driving impressions.
07:53You've got your S Plus for the gearbox, your drive modes here on a nice little toggle switch,
07:57and then all of these.
07:59Look, it is a bit confusing at first, but they've got the drive here, reverse as a button,
08:03and you just hit your park or your neutral.
08:05Brake hold.
08:07Down here in the center, two pretty well-sized cup holders.
08:11I have to say, we've been able to store a lot of stuff in there.
08:13We've already seen in the glove box.
08:15And then there's the back.
08:16So I'm not going to try and get in the back.
08:19Like, it's worse than a Porsche 911, I would say, but your head sort of sits in that rear
08:24window space there, which is kind of random.
08:27I'm not sure I'd want to sit in there for more than about two minutes, but look, if you
08:31have to take your mates home from the pub after a few too many Guinness, then you can
08:35do that.
08:36Yeah.
08:37It's kind of it for the interior.
08:38I think the overall theme here is that they haven't gone to town on the tech.
08:41They've got just the right amounts of well-balanced.
08:43They've got physical buttons.
08:44All the material use is really high quality and it sort of speaks to the ethos of this
08:50car.
08:51It all just works.
08:52I mean, they're not trying to make things too complicated and I like it.
08:56Thank you, Honda.
08:58Some things that I'm not the biggest fan of.
09:00Well, I think the number one is the headroom.
09:03So I'm about six foot tall and this is my driving position, the way I like to sit in the
09:06car.
09:07I'd prefer to be lower down.
09:09As you can see here, we're getting maybe two fingers.
09:12Sure, I've got a bit of hair, but that's about it.
09:14In terms of headroom, you don't want to be much taller than six foot, six foot one, six
09:18foot two at max.
09:19You're not going to fit in this car without putting a seat all the way back.
09:24Speaking of the seats, super comfortable.
09:26We know that, but there's just not that much adjustment.
09:28There's no memory seats.
09:29You've got the heating, but no memory seats is kind of a little bit of a deal breaker in
09:34the grand scheme of things, especially if you share your car with your partner.
09:38So that's in its lowest position now and there's not all that much headroom.
09:42I'd like a little bit more.
09:44The passenger seat actually has no adjustment in terms of height.
09:47You've got adjustment in the back and you've got the slider, but yeah, look, I'd love to
09:50see some powered seats.
09:51And if we can't do powered seats, then just slam them to the ground so I get even more
09:54of a sports car driving experience.
09:56But apart from that, there's not too much to dislike about this car.
10:00Sure, there's some scratchy plastics down here, but that's me just nitpicking.
10:05But I think that's enough chat about the interior.
10:08I think it's about time we take this thing for a drive and I'll do my best to show you
10:11guys that simulated gearbox as well.
10:13So let's get into it.
10:15Okay, so driving the Honda Prelude.
10:22It's actually got a really nice start-stop button over here, which I really enjoy.
10:25So digital instrument cluster, manual seats, which is not the most exciting thing on planet
10:33Earth, because if you share this car with this significant other, you'll always be having
10:38to adjust it.
10:38But I know, it's a small issue at the end of the day.
10:41Some things that we have to know.
10:42Well, down here, I've got a bunch of push-button gear selectors to get into drive, and it actually
10:47looks quite confusing, but it's not too bad.
10:49You drive most selectors here, your S plus is here for the shifts, and then you do the
10:54you just press a button to go into drive, which kind of reminds me a little bit of an
10:57Aston Martin Vantage.
11:01Again, to a nice driving position, you've got adjustment reach and height on the steering
11:06wheel.
11:07I basically just go straight to max.
11:10Comfortable driving position.
11:12Headroom, not outstanding, but you do have great visibility out over the front here.
11:17You've got these nice little humps, kind of like Porsche Taycan style, so you know exactly
11:21where to put the wheels.
11:23Press into drive, and it takes off.
11:26We'll just roll out of here in comfort mode.
11:30It's very hybrid when you're just chilling.
11:35And then it sort of changes a little bit once you start getting through the drive modes
11:38and into the S plus, which we'll explain in a second.
11:41I think the interesting thing is that we've been absolutely hauling in these cars today
11:45through some really great roads on the Adelaide Hills.
11:48It's really good on fuel, which is not necessarily the best thing about a sports car.
11:53But look, if you can have fun in the car and it doesn't drink a heap of petrol in the
11:58current
11:58era, I think that's actually a positive.
12:02So when you're just cruising around, it's actually such a nice car to drive, which is
12:06kind of unlike any other sporty looking and functioning car out there.
12:13It's far more comfortable than cars like a GR86.
12:16Even a lot of, you know, modern BMWs, the suspension is just really way too harsh.
12:20But when you're cruising around just in comfort mode, it's a really nice place to sit.
12:26And it kind of speaks to the ethos of this car.
12:29It's designed to glide down the road.
12:31And I know that sounds like a classic marketing trope, but it's kind of the reality of it.
12:35It's a momentum car.
12:38And even when you're just cruising around town, you can appreciate it for just being
12:43a little bit more comfortable.
12:45You've got a bunch of Google stuff going on here.
12:48So I'm just going to try and configure Google Maps a little bit so we can actually see where
12:51we're going.
12:51I mean, I guess the issue when you're running Google and you don't have reception is that
12:58it all disappears.
13:01So just cruising along here, 80 kilometers an hour, pretty typical speed, pretty typical
13:05Australian back road.
13:07Not that much road noise, which is kind of something you experience a lot in coupes, but
13:13not this car.
13:15It's probably a combination of the tires and the fact that this is such a solid vehicle.
13:18It's not tinny.
13:19It has one of the best door closers in the game.
13:23So I'll talk you through some of the drive modes that we have here because it can be kind
13:27of overwhelming when you read about it on paper.
13:29So down here, we've got comfort, which is just chill out.
13:33Car functions like honestly a typical hybrid.
13:37You can jump them into GT and the suspension and the accelerator tuning and some of the steering
13:42tuning.
13:43The car just changes its characteristics.
13:45It's actually a really nice mode.
13:46This one I love, especially cruising around these Adelaide wine roads to just sit here
13:51in GT mode.
13:53It's shocking how much time and effort they must have put into tuning the suspension to
13:59be like this.
13:59And you're going to see a lot of these reviews and people going on about, oh my God, it rides
14:03better than blah, blah, blah.
14:04But it actually does.
14:07I mean, from within the first hundred meters of driving a car, once you've driven a few
14:10things, you can kind of pick the ones that they spend the most amount of time on.
14:14And this car, they've clearly really thought about the way that the dampers are tuned for
14:18these type of roads.
14:20Comfort, great around town.
14:22But on these specific roads that we're driving on, which is just typical Australian fast flowing
14:27back roads.
14:29It's perfectly chained.
14:31A lot of one up, one down action.
14:34The suspension primary ride is just cushy when it's in comfort and even in GT, but not
14:40too much.
14:40It's not walloping down the road like a lot of heavy modern electric cars and hybrids
14:46that are poorly tuned, quite frankly.
14:48To get a car to do a one up, one down is not easy, but this achieves it.
14:54Some other things that I really like about the inside of this car, well, the steering
14:58wheel.
15:00The driving position is bang on straight.
15:02Steering wheel feels really nice in the hand.
15:04It actually looks quite nice too with this little suede touch at the top.
15:09There's not massive amounts of steering wheel here.
15:12You don't have to grab too much of the wheel.
15:14It comfortably sits in your hand, which, yeah, a lot of modern BMWs, the wheel is just
15:19far too thick.
15:21It's not the case here.
15:22It is potentially a little bit too wide in diameter.
15:27You start winding out of the steering, especially in some tighter corners.
15:30It's not the world's fastest steering rack, so you kind of do have to get around the wheel
15:34a little bit, but you can see that I'm nitpicking, so it must be quite good.
15:42What I want to do is explain how this S Plus works.
15:47So the first thing I want to do is you can use S Plus in any mode.
15:51So I could be sitting here in GT mode, jump into S Plus, then you get your simulated gears.
15:56And I'll hop back out of that, jump into Sport mode.
15:59You'll see the gauge cluster changes.
16:01It really livens itself up.
16:04And that's when you want to jump into your S Plus.
16:07So jump into S Plus.
16:08It works like an automatic transmission, to be completely honest.
16:13You don't really have to think about it being an S Plus.
16:17Quite frankly, sometimes you forget about it being an S Plus until you get to some twistier
16:21roads.
16:22That's where it starts to make the car fun.
16:24I think if this thing didn't have this S Plus simulated gear shifting system, it would
16:31just be quite boring.
16:32But we know from cars like the Hyundai IONIQ 6N that I recently reviewed, the Hyundai IONIQ
16:395N that really set the benchmark for simulated gearboxes, it adds to the driving experience.
16:45Whether you're on board with the idea of it being quite synthetic or not, if it works
16:50well, I'm here for it.
16:52And honestly, I think you should be too.
16:54Would this car be better with the manual transmission?
16:57I mean, that's up for debate.
16:58I think a lot of the people that are buying these cars or this particular car, looking
17:02for a cruisy, GT, sporty, hybrid car, does live in a bit in its own lane in that regard.
17:10But you're going to spend most of your time sitting in traffic.
17:12And I don't know about you, but I don't think my partner would enjoy driving to work with
17:17a manual gearbox car in 2026 if you could kind of have a little bit of both.
17:22So I'll show you how it works through some of these corners here.
17:25So it has paddles.
17:26It's got a shift up, shift down paddle.
17:29I can literally just start grabbing gears like an eight-speed transmission.
17:34You can hear a little bit of the engine.
17:39And it starts to work like a DCT.
17:42I mean, it's uncanny.
17:45How close it is to a DCT honestly shocked me.
17:48I expected to hate it.
17:50I really did expect to think it was the dumbest thing ever invented.
17:55But it works.
17:57All right, so we've got a pretty straight piece of road here.
17:59So I just want to see what it does from a standstill.
18:03So I'm just going to flatten throttle and see what it does.
18:07Actually, we'll let you build it up.
18:08That's flat.
18:09I'll tell you when we get a hundred.
18:13The revs, it's nuts out.
18:16A hundred.
18:19So it's not terribly slow.
18:22To be completely honest, I actually expected it to be slower
18:26based on all the reports that I read online before taking this thing for a drive.
18:31I really did expect it to be like an utterly gutless vehicle.
18:35But especially third and fourth gear, simulated gear,
18:39it can definitely get out of its own way, which is a massive benefit.
18:43In a car like this.
18:45So we find some twisty roads here.
18:46So let's see what it do.
18:56You really struggle to get the front tires to lose grip,
18:59which I guess is a good thing.
19:00Probably speaks to that tie bar front end.
19:11The out-of-corner acceleration, especially in third and fourth gear,
19:15is more impressive than the power figures will tell you.
19:20Of course, when you get a really long stretch of straight road,
19:24it's not quite as impressive, but yeah, those out-of-corner accelerations
19:30where it can lean a little bit more on its electric stuff definitely helps.
19:37It's even composed at higher speeds, but here are the corners finally in there.
19:48This is the kind of typical road in which you drive a prelude.
19:51We were joking before that these are prelude corners,
19:57momentum corners, where you can build up a nice rhythm with the car.
20:01And that's where you have fun with a car.
20:03It's when you can build up some rhythm.
20:05It's not all about hard braking, hard turning, hard exit speeds.
20:11It's about the flow and the momentum you can build up in a car.
20:14That's what you enjoy driving on the road.
20:17Sure, if you're on a track and you're trying to set lap times,
20:20you're going to be leaning way more on the brakes and things like that.
20:24But when you're just trying to have fun like this,
20:26it's all about the way the car feels.
20:28And it feels fun.
20:31And you can kind of go a little bit quicker than you maybe would
20:34in some stiffer, sprung, hot hatches and stuff like that
20:38because you're not worried about the car bouncing around, Paul.
20:41I mean, even through there, through that compression,
20:44it's one up, one down.
20:46It's super impressive to me.
20:51Especially these downhill sweepers where you can carry some extra momentum
20:53because of the sort of lack of power of this thing.
20:57I mean, uphill's not particularly fun,
20:58but downhill like this, so much fun.
21:03Check some overtaking stuff.
21:04So if I stick it in third gear,
21:07I'm sitting at 70 kilometers an hour.
21:1170.
21:14100.
21:15I'm not sitting a lap regular, but it feels quick,
21:19which is important, I think.
21:20If I was driving this road at M3 or a 911
21:25or cars that are far more quick and expensive than this,
21:31I'm not sure at the speeds I'd be doing,
21:34I'd have to be going a lot quicker to have similar amounts of fun.
21:38I mean, look at that.
21:39It's part of when you start to get a little bit of rotation
21:41through the rear end.
21:42I'm smiling.
21:43I didn't expect to be smiling.
21:46The steering weights up really nicely.
21:48So through this sort of corner,
21:50you start to turn it in,
21:51you get a nice amount of feel there just off center.
21:55But the further you get into the wheel,
21:58it does start to lose a little bit of its feedback,
22:01which is just sort of a typical trope of
22:04E-Pass steering racks.
22:06But once it weights up,
22:08I mean, that's why these corners,
22:10these flowy corners work so well for this car.
22:18Yeah, that's good.
22:19It's fine.
22:21And you're not going crazy speeds.
22:23It's really enjoyable.
22:26We're in sport mode with the S plus on.
22:30And this is a pretty bumpy classic back rotor
22:32that just takes all the bumps.
22:35You can tell I'm a bit of a fan of this car,
22:37which I did not expect.
22:39I really did not expect to like this car at all.
22:42I had so many preconceptions about it.
22:44I encourage anyone that has preconceptions,
22:46just try and forget about it
22:48before you take something like this for a drive.
22:52I did not think I'd enjoy it this month,
22:54but here we are smiling,
22:55biting the wheel of an ECVT car.
22:58Can you believe it?
23:03It's obviously got type-up brakes as well,
23:05so when you need to lean on those brakes,
23:08which is, quite frankly, not that often
23:10because it's not the fastest thing on planet Earth,
23:12but you've got it.
23:14I mean, look at that.
23:16A nice little rear-end wiggle going on.
23:21Man.
23:22All right.
23:23Not bad.
23:25But it literally will not...
23:28Never heard of a tire chirp.
23:32So that's it for my initial driving impressions
23:34about the Prelude.
23:37Honestly, it really impressed me.
23:39So many preconceptions about this car
23:40based on all the stuff that we've seen on the internet
23:43up until now,
23:44but I think we just have to appreciate it
23:46for what it is.
23:47And with that being said,
23:49I'm going to jump out of the car now
23:51and give you guys my final thoughts.
23:54So the Honda Prelude.
23:56Is it a sports car?
23:58And do we have a definitive answer for you today?
24:00I'd say I'm 80% of the way there.
24:03It's fun to drive.
24:04I think we saw in the driving clips.
24:05I'm smiling ear to ear behind the wheel of this thing.
24:08Could it do with a touch more power?
24:10Of course.
24:11And is that transmission still a little bit funky?
24:13Absolutely.
24:14But I think the smile gives it away.
24:16And that answer is this thing is a sports car.
24:19If you guys like this video,
24:20then let us know by hitting that like button down below.
24:23And if you want to see more sports car
24:25and hyper car reviews like this,
24:26make sure you subscribe to our YouTube channel
24:28while you're there.
24:29And the final question for you is let me know,
24:31is this thing a sports car?
24:32Let me know down in the comments.
24:33Thanks for watching.
24:34I'm out.
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