Used 2021 Subaru Outback Consumer Reviews
Used Outback for sale
Overzealous safety systems mar a great car
vexxler, 10/21/2021
2021 Subaru Outback Touring 4dr SUV AWD (2.5L 4cyl CVT)
3 of 3 people found this review helpful
Personally I read these reviews more to find what if anything there is about a car that I might not like, so although I think the Outback is a very good car, I’m going to write the review I wish I had been able to read before I made my purchase. I got the Touring with the base engine. There are many things I love about the car including the look, comfort, quality of the materials, 4wd with great gas mileage, integrated cross bars and how safe you feel in the car when driving in bad weather. As far as the car itself, I love it. On a service appointment however, they gave me an XT with the turbo as a loaner and it was so much more fun to drive them the base engine in my car that I have some severe buyer’s remorse not getting the turbo. So what else is not to like? For me it’s a bunch of little things, most related to how the safety systems were implemented. I’m all for the addition of these safety systems, but they should work quietly in the background and these don’t, boy they really don’t. No matter what you do, the car is always beeping at you for something. The car will beep if you cross a lane marker inadvertently. This sounds great but in practice happens so often in normal driving, that I opted to permanently turn off the feature. My only complaint here is that when you turn off a safety feature, you are shown a warning light forever on your dash. When you are stopped at a light and the car ahead of you moves and you are slow to follow, you will get beeped. I’ve found no way to turn this off. If you take your eyes off the road for more than a second or two, you will get beeped with a stern warning. Again, a good feature in concept, but in reality goes off way too much during normal safe driving. I’ve found no way to turn this off. Let’s say you have the cruise control set to 65. The car will beep at you if it has to slow down below 65 to accommodate a slower moving car in front of you and then again will beep at you when it can resume 65 mph again. If there is even a little bit of traffic around you when you use cruise control, the beeping it generates is frequent enough to make you simply want to turn off cruise control just so you don’t have to hear the beeps. Many times on long drives there will be members of the family in the car trying to sleep and there is no way to use cruise control without the beeping. While all the beeping is annoying, there is a safety feature that might actually be dangerous. I’ve owned my car for about 9 months and have put about 18,000 miles on it. During that time the emergency breaking system has gone off at least a dozen times, none of them warranted. The main problem is that if the car detects another car directly in front of you, the system will sometimes deploy even if the vehicle is not in the same lane as you. Let me provide a couple of examples where emergency breaking was deployed. I’ll list them from the most serious, to the simply annoying. I am driving in the left lane of a 2 lane road and the road is banking sharply to the left. Because of the sharp bank, a car ahead of me in the right lane is directly in front of me which I would hit if I continued straight, but since my lane is also banking sharply left, it’s just a normal driving situation with no danger. I’ve had 3 instances of this type where the emergency breaking was deployed. Luckily each time it happened there was no one closely following behind me, but if there was, I can easily see how that scenario could have led to an accident. I was exiting a parkway and the exit ramp (like most do) banked sharply to the right. Directly ahead of me, but off the road was a disabled vehicle. If I were to continue straight I would hit this car, but of course because the exit ramp banks right and the car was off the road, there was no real danger, yet the braking was deployed. I am in the right lane traveling on a 2 lane road where the speed limit is 55 mph. A car in front of me is turning right. I do not need to slow down because the car will complete the turn before there is any danger, but the car deploys the emergency breaking anyway. This has happened twice. My garage is on an L so when I exit, I have to back straight out as far as I can go and then make a 90 degree turn to the left to exit to the street. At the edge of my driveway when I back out are some shrubs. If I back out too quickly and get close to the shrubbery, the car will deploy the emergency breaking. You have to realize that when the car deploys the emergency breaking it makes a very loud grating sound and jerks you violently to a stop. It feels the same as if you backed up quickly into a brick wall. The first time it happened I was sure I had hit something badly. Although this scenario has never happened to me yet, there may be occasions on a parkway where you may want to accelerate aggressively into a car in front of you in order to execute a lane change to pass a car in a small window of opportunity. Although it’s an aggressive move for sure, you see people do it all the time. I would not feel comfortable attempting such a move in this car for fear the emergency breaking would deploy at precisely the worst moment during such a maneuver. Eventually I opted reluctantly to turn off the emergency breaking feature. It takes about 7 key presses on the screen to do so and then you get to see a new warning light constantly. I could live with that, but to my dismay, this particular setting does not stick when you turn the car off. So unless you are willing to manually turn it off every time you get into the car, you’re stuck with it. This would have been a show stopper issue had I known about it before I purchased the car. So to sum up, I love the car itself but would not recommend it as it is. I would however buy it again in a second if they rectify the issues I mentioned. At a minimum all they would have to do is add some settings to be able to permanently turn off some of these features. Here’s hoping.
- Safety
- Technology
- Performance
- Interior
- Comfort
- Reliability
- Value
Downgraded!!
Katherine, 04/20/2021
2021 Subaru Outback Premium 4dr SUV AWD (2.5L 4cyl CVT)
8 of 12 people found this review helpful
This is my 5th Subaru. I love these cars but my new 21 is a letdown in some respects. In order for the manufacturer to save money, they have made some disappointing changes. There is no longer a pull switch for the gas tank inside the car. That makes easy access for someone to steal your gas. The lift lever for the hood is now a chincy stick of metal that is very hard to pull out of the clip. What happened to the nice automatic hydralic lift switch?? There are no longer safe blue lights by the door locks so you can see where they are. It is impossible to find the locks in the dark. Come on. I love the blue color and the eye sight when it works. Please, no more money saving changes.
- Safety
- Technology
- Performance
- Interior
- Comfort
- Reliability
- Value
2021 Subaru Outback for sale near you
Showing 3 of 81 listings
- Premium 4dr SUVMSRP: $20,9900 mi away
- Limited 4dr SUVMSRP: $20,97622 mi away
- Onyx Edition XT 4dr SUVMSRP: $23,96113 mi away
See all 81 listings
asset cruncher
Dissapointed buyer, 12/17/2020
updated 12/21/2021
2021 Subaru Outback Touring XT 4dr SUV AWD (2.4L 4cyl Turbo CVT)
25 of 44 people found this review helpful
nice car. good value. one glaring deficiency and that is the driver seat. thigh support mechanism in Touring XT very intrusive. feels like sitting on two golf balls. Very poor design. Can't drive it for any distance without severe pain to posterior. If I had known before hand that this was an issue I would not have purchased the vehicle. Cannot recommend. Subaru acknowledged that there is a lump issue with seats.Lumps remain after tech worked on the seats at 3 separate times to cure problem. Failed to correct. If you want to use this car for long distance travel be forewarned. Other than seat a competent car.
- Safety
- Technology
- Performance
- Interior
- Comfort
- Reliability
- Value
Love it
Adam Pohlman , 05/05/2021
2021 Subaru Outback Limited 4dr SUV AWD (2.5L 4cyl CVT)
2 of 2 people found this review helpful
The technology is awesome and is worth the cost. We went with the limited trim for the leather interior, rear air vents and rear heated seats. But that is only scratching the surface for what terrific features that come in this trim and even in the premium. Couple the features with how the car drives and it is hands down a top winner.
- Safety
- Technology
- Performance
- Interior
- Comfort
- Reliability
- Value
Dream car
John, 05/06/2021
2021 Subaru Outback Touring XT 4dr SUV AWD (2.4L 4cyl Turbo CVT)
2 of 2 people found this review helpful
For us it is the petfect car. We moved from owning several Lexus RX 350'S TO THE suburu Outback and love it.
- Safety
- Technology
- Performance
- Interior
- Comfort
- Reliability
- Value