2019 Nissan Rogue Review

[MUSIC PLAYING] ELANA SCHERR: This is the 2019 Nissan Rogue. It has newly added driver safety aides, a comfortable ride, and plenty of room for cargo and people. But is that enough for the Rogue to compete with more recently redesigned small SUVs? Let's find out. If you like these videos, subscribe to our channel. And make sure you visit Edmunds for all your car shopping needs. The initial door open on the Nissan Rogue is sort of a surprise, like a happy surprise. And it does look really nice, especially in these upper trims, where you can get different color leatherette, and shiny piano black. There is a lot of hard plastic still in this car. I guess I would call it semi hard plastic. It actually feels better than it looks, except on the steering wheel. This is just a really weird decision that the Nissan designers made. There's a heated steering wheel, which seems super luxurious. I would have given that up to just have a nicer material on the steering wheel. I just don't want to touch it. It's like I want to drive it like this. But the rest of the materials feel pretty good. The front seats are very firm, maybe even a little too firm for long term driving comfort. And the space in the front is a little bit cramped. Tall people don't have the most head room, maybe partially because of the sunroof. And the seats are narrow. Also, on the passenger side, the way that the dash comes in around the knee is difficult for taller passengers. The back seats, however, are really spacious. There's a great amount of room back there. And I would say it's actually more comfortable to ride in the back of the Rogue than it is to drive it. A lot of the safety stuff that people are starting to expect in these cars is standard on the Rogue. And it all works very well, which is good, because the car has a pretty big blind spot. There's also a lot of good infotainment controls. Apple and Android, which is something that some of the competitors do not offer. It's got a touch screen that's small, but works well, and is easy to see. But the controls for everything are just all over the place. It's almost like this is a car that was designed many years ago. (WHISPERING) It was. And they decided to add in all of the new technology, but they hadn't originally designed the car to have space for it. (WHISPERING) I think that's true. So there's this kind of strange Easter egg hunt that you get to do every time you want to control. Like hm, the heated steering wheel is over here. And also the sport and eco modes are over here. But the heated seats are down here. And the camera's over here. You have to remember where things are. I like it better when you kind of have the idea like, oh, all the climate stuff is here, and all of the safety control is here. There's room for small stuff in the console. Again, some strange decisions made about what and where. There is a cell phone pocket back here, the big cup holders. And there's sort of like a weird square spot up here that has a rubber no slip mat as if it's for holding a cell phone. But it would only work if you had a perfectly square cell phone. And there's a USB port and a 12 volt. I would say that that about covers it for the magic in the front seat of the Rogue. Let's take a look at the backseat. The backseat of the Rogue is, again, a mix of things that are thoughtful and things that could have used a little more thought. First, the good stuff. It's comfortable. It looks nice. There's a lot of leg room. It's adjustable, which is kind of nice for a second row. They aren't always. And the seat belts tuck away. So if you're sliding across to the middle, you don't hit your bum against them. But there are no USB ports. Could use a little more headroom. And the armrest is kind of a lot of work. In many ways the Rogue trails its competitors. It doesn't have the most horsepower and it doesn't get the best miles per gallon. But it shines in cargo space. It has the most. 39.3 with the seats up, and 70 with them down. That's kind of a lot for a little car. More than that, the storage is really clever. Nissan calls it Ride and Hide, Hide and Drive, Divide and Conquer, Divide and Hide. What it means is that what looks like the floor is actually covers that lift up so you can put valuable stuff here and no one will know that it's in the car. Here's the Divide and Hide in shelf mode. So you can see, you could put something underneath, and then still have stuff on top. Plus, one of the video guys just pointed out that you could use this as a workspace. You can get the Rogue in a variety of trim options. There is S, SV, and SL, as well as SV and SL Hybrid. We're in the top of the line SL all wheel drive. And it keeps making me laugh every time I see the badge on the back, because the SL and the all wheel drive are kind of right up against each other. And it looks like it says slawd. Like s'lord, it's hot in here. Anyhow, all bad southern accents aside, the engine options for everything except the hybrid are the same. It is a 2.5 liter four cylinder backed by a CVT style transmission. And I hate it. Sorry. It's just a really, really, really disappointing engine combination. It's 170 horsepower, which just isn't enough for a vehicle of this size. Even though some CVTs are starting to feel more like geared transmissions and not do that sad, drony vacuum cleaner thing, this one is not like that. It does do the sad, drony vacuum cleaner thing. In fact, the engine noise is really annoying. I've been trying to feel better about it by pretending it's cute, like a little baby lion roaring. Rawr. So I don't like that. I think the car is loud. It also has a bunch of wind noise. The responsiveness of the various inputs, meaning the steering and the throttle are acceptable, but not outstanding. Imagine it like this. You're at lunch with a friend, and that friend is either on their phone, or thinking about something else, and so they're sort of paying attention to you. Like they're making, mhm and yeah noises at all the right places in the conversation. But you don't really feel like you have their full attention and that they're really that responsive. And that is sort of how I feel about the steering in this car. It's turning the car, but sort of numb and disconnectedly. The Rogue does offer some of Nissan's highest tech driving assists, including warnings if you're going out of your lane, and adaptive cruise control, which works very well, and even a steering assist, which is like a semi self-driving. So it wants you to have your hands on the wheel and be paying attention, but it will make some steering corrections for you when you have that turned on, along with adaptive cruise control. They all go together. I tested all of that on the freeway in stop and go traffic. And I was impressed at the fact that it would work at very slow speeds, which not all adaptive cruise controls will let you put them on when it's less than 25 miles per hour. That's kind of when you want it the most. This works at very slow speeds. It was a nice break on my ankle when I was driving back from San Diego and three hours of stop and go traffic. So that does work. I don't love the self steering thing. I just am a control freak. I like steering. Steering's fun. Setting the adaptive cruise control and the steering is really easy, and it's very obvious when it's on. It's like a big, green banner kind of across the gauges, which is excellent. You're never wondering if you've accidentally turned it off or what. You know exactly what's happening. Some of the other controls, like if you want the alarm for a blind spot warning, or if you want it to beep when you're in or out of a lane, they're buried a little bit further in the menus in here, and it's not hard to find them if you're parked. But it's more than you would want to be staring at the screen while you're driving. So bear that in mind if you don't like the beeps. The Rogue's design hasn't changed a whole lot since, I think, 2014 when it first came out. And that's super noticeable in how thick this A pillar is and how bad the visibility is sort of for the blind spot and in the back. I feel like car designers are really working hard right now to make those things better. And this pillar, for me, is really difficult to see, especially on curvy roads. I mean, it is right where I want to be. You kind of end up doing what I call the curious owl, which is like when you're going around corners, trying to see around the pillar. It's like a dance. The S models of the Rogue start at around $25,000. And this one, with all the bells and whistles, is $36,000. I'm just going to say it. I wouldn't want to pay $36,000 for this car. I just don't feel like it's $36,000 worth of driving enjoyment. There are other cars you can buy for $36,000 that are better, just like across the board better. But I was talking to the gang back at the office, especially the folks who help with the buyer's guides and stuff on the Edmunds website. And they were pointing out that Nissan offers amazing rebates. And so I looked it up on my own computer, and immediately was sent an offer for a car with like $9,000 off. So assuming that you could get a car like this for like $28,000, well, now, that's a really good deal. It gets to a point where nobody else would offer this much for that amount of money. So where does the Rogue end up? Well, for the same amount of money, you could get the more attractive and way more fun to drive Mazda CX5, the better equipped, and our most highly rated in the segment, Honda CRV. Or just to throw you a curve ball, the Jeep Wrangler. It's not that the Rogue is awful. It's just that the competition is stellar. Hey, give us a follow on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook.