“Love your new lawn ornament,” yelled my neighbor, who owns a Tesla and rooftop solar panels to charge it. He was pointing at the pearl white 2023 Mitsubishi Outlander SEL PHEV S-AWC parked on my front lawn, with a 110-volt charging cord connected – to my home’s Christmas light outlet behind bushes.
At 185.4 inches in length, it would have fit in my garage — if it hadn’t been for my collector car and my wife’s new CUV in there. So I charged my 3-row soft-roader from the only other plug available.
The result — overnights on the juice gave me an indicated 53 miles of EV range, better than the 38 miles Mitsubishi claimed. And if the charge ran out, there’s a 2.4-liter inline-4 cylinder engine under the bonnet to motivate us — more later.
What’s under this flagship crossover is a new generation of Mitsubishi’s 4WD PHEV system with front and rear motors, 40 percent increase in front and rear motor output and a bigger drive battery than before.
Up front, a 2.4-liter 4-cylinder motor with 126 hp, not connected to front or rear wheels – it powers a generator that charges the battery or sends electricity directly to drive motors. The gas engine’s rpm level does not match what your right foot is doing – it revs up or down as the need arises, unusual, and a bit noisy at times. Low under the floor, a 13.8 kWh Lithium-ion battery. There’s a 60kw electric motor powering front wheels, with a second 70kw motor powering rears as needed, single speed gearboxes on each. That’s a combined 248 hp and 332 lb-ft of torque, in a CUV about 400 pounds more than the gas Outlander and its 181-hp four-cylinder engine.
A full charge takes 16 hours at 110 volts; 6.5 hours at 220 volts; and under 30 minutes at 440 volts, using CHAdeMO. That’s a strange choice given other automakers selling EVs in the U.S. (outside of Tesla) have moved to CCS for DC fast charging. Even Nissan, the other CHAdeMO holdout, is switching to CCS for its new Ariya.
Drive modes — Eco, Normal and Power to Gravel, Snow and Mud, plus hill descent control. One button lets you go all gas and conserve battery charge, go full EV, or let the modes mix. A second button invoked full regenerative braking – an almost 1-pedal driving mode that turns drive motors into generators the second you lift off the accelerator, slowing you down to about 10 mph before you have to tap brakes for a full stop. It soon became second nature to slow this way.
And in Eco mode, it actually added a mile or two of battery range as it regened every time I lifted off the accelerator. My gripe – it always reset to Normal drive mode when your turn it off. And while the full regen isn’t available in all drive modes, paddle shifters behind the steering wheel allow you to tap in five levels.
The gauge display told us our 1,600-mile-old PHEV had more than 400 miles of range with full gas tank. Tap Eco mode, which backs off throttle, and it jumps off the line to 60 mph in 8.6 seconds. Torque is instant at launch, electric motors making their presence known as you gather speed with a turbine-like whine. Tap Sport mode, which improved power flow and pedal response, and Outlander immediately dug in all four tires and moved out quick. With full EV torque and gas engine humming, we hit 60 mph in 7.3 seconds.
You hear the electric motors gentle whine deepen as the gas engine adds power to the mix for all the voltage available front and rear. But in most cases, gas engine on or not, this was a fairly quiet ride.
FYI — that compares with the gas-only Outlander’s 9.5-second time to 60 mph, cut to 8.8 seconds in Sport mode, with an indicated 30 mpg.
EV mode is mostly quiet, a bit of electric motor, and some tire and wind noise at speed. Our 4,244-lb. Outlander saw quick and smooth low- and mid-range acceleration with no gear changes, so it just whirred up to speed. There’s torque at highway speed, although the gas engine did kick in sometimes to add juice, even with a full battery. Commuting on full EV, the mpg rose to almost 27 mpg.
We found displayed range a bit optimistic — five miles of actual travel for every seven of range displayed on average. While it would show 53 miles of range after a full charge, that dropped to a displayed 36 miles after only five miles of driving. On a daily 7-mile morning commute to work at 44-degrees, the PHEV lost an indicated 22 miles of displayed range. The drive home saw only nine miles of range go for the same 6-mile journey, under balmy 75-degree skies on a highway with tall bridge. In the end, we averaged about 30 miles of EV range on each full charge in run-of-the-mill commutes.
This crossover is on a platform shared with the Nissan Rogue, since Mitsubishi is now part of the Renault/Nissan/Mitsubishi Alliance. There’s a MacPherson front strut with multilink rear suspension, stabilizer bars at both ends, as well as electric all-wheel-drive. This made for a very comfortable ride, bumps absorbed well with buffered rebound. Bigger bumps, as well as some gentle off-road ruts, were handled with aplomb and no harshness at full rebound either. It was a bit soft for me, but just fine for the family.
Like its gas cousin, the PHEV is mostly front-wheel-drive as seen on a power split display on a center gauge screen. But all-wheel-drive did send power to outside front and inside rear for fairly neutral handling in corners, with some gentle understeer when pushed. It was agile enough, with some body roll in curves, never sloppy as it took a set and hung on.
Electric power steering was direct, with a slightly artificial feel, offering a very tight turning radius. Our brake pedal had a slightly mushy initial feel, but the 11.6-inch front/11.9-inch rear disc brakes stopped well with some nose dive and ABS chatter at full halt. With only 7.3 inches of ground clearance, I tackled nothing deeper than some dirt and grass lots, but traction and ride was good there as well.
Smart cruise control maintains speed and distance, stops when the guy in front does, then resumes with button or gas pedal tap. It “reads” speed limit signs and alerts you to reset speed to match them. Lane-keep is gentle but insistent, buzzing the steering wheel when you stray.
Mitsubishis are a fairly rare sight on U.S. roads, although it sold 85,810 vehicles sold in 2022 with 40,942 of them being variations of the Outlander.
One reason for the sales boost is obviously the Outlander’s half-inch longer, two-inch wider and inch taller 2022 restyle on a 1.4-inch-longer wheelbase. Bigger also got a larger personality, beginning with what Mitsu calls the “Dynamic Shield” face.
It’s flatter, the upper black section leaning back into (and part of) a clamshell hood. That upper grill is glossy black and smooth, while the real honeycomb grill below is framed with indented C-shaped ribbons of chrome that highlight expressive stacked triple-element headlights. Intake-like outer corners are over small LED fog lights. Slim multi-element LED DRLs flow off the chrome-striped upper grill, while a black lower center intake gets a silver faux lower brush guard.
I’ll repeat what I said last year — it’s an in-your-face face design. The rest is a sculpted box, almost. Gently flared fenders get subtle incised accents over slim black that frame bladed 5-spoke silver and black alloy wheels wearing P255/45R20-inch Nexen radials. The flanks gain some upper and lower sculpting. Sculpted fender and door designs add some nice definition to a long wheelbase, while the gloss black raked windshield, side pillars and roofline give the Outlander a low, long look. What looks like twin exhausts in the simple silver lower facia are not.
The black-over-saddle tan interior is a very luxurious-looking place to slide into, with quilted, stitched door and seat inserts and a set of digital screens to look upon. When opened, the front doors even project color Mitsu logos as puddle lights.
Leather bucket seats conform nicely to the anatomy, folks up front benefitting from massage and heat as well as power adjustment, dual memory preset for the driver. The stitched leather steering wheel frames a configurable 12.3-inch digital instrument cluster.
One version is a 140-mph speedometer with digital speed inside, and a charge/EV/Power gauge with drive mode status and mpg inside it. The configurable center display shows EV and gas information, navigation, audio, all-wheel-drive split, trip display and more. But tap a control, and you get a very EV-oriented gauge display with a rotary speedometer and tach that also shows charging use, handy when matched with a central energy flow diagram to indicate when the gas engine is charging the battery, or powering front and rear electric motor, or if you are just zapping along as a voltmobile.
Then comes the 9-inch color touchscreen with navigation, reverse and overhead backup camera, and access to a solid Bose audio system, Android Auto and wireless Apple CarPlay. Dual-zone climate controls are below that. There’s also a big head-up display. A simple center console gets the electronic gearshift, Nissan-like drive/off-road drive mode with hill descent control button, electronic parking brake and auto-hold brake and those for regenerative braking and EV choice. An inductive phone charger has USB ports and a 12-volt outlet.
With a longer wheelbase, the second-row seats get 1.1 inches more leg room than the last-gen model; they recline and slide a few as well for great head and leg room. Outboard positions get heat, USB port and air vents. You get to the third row seats by tilting and sliding the outer parts of the 40/20/40 split second row forward – and find almost no leg room. Better to drop them into the rear floor and expand that back storage area to something quite useful. Or you can fold seatbacks flat, and gain a deep storage well. And with a foot wave, the power hatch rises above my head.
The base front-wheel-drive Mitsubishi Outlander ES starts at $27,595; our SEL PHEV starts at $45,445 with almost everything above standard bar $2,700 SEL package with power sunroof, heated steering wheel, semi-analine leather seats, head-up display and Bose sound system; $995 white diamond paint with black roof; and $200 rear cargo cover. Total – $50,880 with destination.
Bottom line: Very stylish, with big presence in and out on a comfy platform with very usable electric power.
2023 Mitsubishi Outlander SEL PHEV S-AWC
– Vehicle type: 5-door, 5-seat all-wheel-drive crossover utility wagon
– Base price: $27,595 ($50,880 as tested)
– Engine type: aluminum DOHC MIVEC in-line four-cylinder
– Displacement: 2.5 liters
– Horsepower (net): 181 @ 6,000 rpm
– Torque (lb-ft): 181 @ 3,600 rpm
– Transmission: Continuously Variable Transmission
– Wheelbase: 106.5 inches
– Height: 68.8 inches
– Overall length: 185.4 inches
– Overall width: 74.7 inches w/mirrors folded
– Height: 68.8 inches
– Ground clearance: 8.4 inches
– Front headroom:38.8 w/sunroof inches
– Front legroom: 41.7 inches
– Center headroom: 37.4 inches
– Center legroom: 39.9 inches
– Rear headroom: 34.5 inches
– Rear legroom: 18.7 inches
– Cargo capacity: 11.7 cu. ft./33.5 w/2nd row folded/88.3 w/ 2nd and 3rd rows folded
– Towing capacity: up to 1,500 lbs.
– Curb weight: 4,244 lbs.
– Fuel capacity: 11.3 gallons
– Mileage rating: 24 mpg city/30 mpg highway