466 Western Ave
Augusta, ME 04330
Come Join The Charlie’s Subaru Family
There are a lot of things to love about both of these SUVs, but when you dig into the nitty gritty details, what will you find? It can be hard to figure out what differences will actually matter to you if you don't have a lot of experience with the models, but that's why we at Charlie's Subaru have found the qualities that we think best exemplify the differences between the Subaru Forester and the Toyota RAV4.
Long drives from Bangor are no fun when you're cramped, so an SUV like the RAV4 needs to have plenty of space for your family to be comfortable. It offers up to 41 inches of legroom in the front and 37.8 inches for the rear seats. The headroom is a modest 37.7 inches in the front and 39.5 inches in the rear. Altogether, the RAV4 has an EPA-estimated passenger volume of only 98.9 cubic feet.
The Forester has about an extra inch on each of these measurements, with a front-seat headroom of 41.2 inches and 39.6 inches in the rear. The legroom is also greater, with up to 43.3 inches in the front and 39.4 inches in the back. These increases add up to give the Forester up to 111.9 cubic feet of passenger volume, a full 13 more than the RAV4. You'll also find that the Subaru Forester has some extra cargo space with up to 74.4 cubic feet compared to the RAV4's 69.8.
Both SUVs have six-way manual-adjust driver's seats and four-way manual-adjust passenger's seats on their base trim, and both gain power-adjust for their driver's seat on ever other trim. However, the Toyota RAV4 only gains up to eight-way power-adjust, whereas the Forester has ten-way power-adjust from the Forester Premium up. The Forester Touring even has eight-way power-adjust for the passenger's seat while even the RAV4 Limited's passenger seat remains manual.
If you're looking to stay warm around Waterville, ME this fall and winter, you should keep in mind that heated front seats are standard on all but the base trim of the Subaru Forester. You won't have this feature standard on the Toyota RAV4 until its premium Limited trim. If you want to get heated seats for the rear outboard seats, you can get that standard on the Forester Touring, but it's only available for the RAV4 Limited.
Both the Forester and the RAV4 have excellent safety features included, like Lane Departure and Sway Warning, Pre-Collision Braking Systems, and automatic high beams. They also both have Blind-Spot Detection and Rear Cross-Traffic Alert. However, only the Forester has the available DriverFocus®, which can monitor your driving patterns and alert you when it detects changes that suggest you're losing focus due to exhaustion or otherwise.
The Subaru Forester won the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety's Top Safety Pick+ award with flying colors thanks to its excellent standard crash prevention and headlights. While the Toyota RAV4 won a Top Safety Pick award, this is only thanks to headlights that are found exclusively on the Hybrid Limited trim with an additional package added on. The other headlight options were rated either marginal or even poor by the IIHS.
One last thing to keep in mind when deciding between these two compact SUVs is which offers a better value deal. The Forester has Symmetrical All-Wheel Drive standard, and its base trim is still a few hundred dollars cheaper than the front-wheel drive RAV4 LE. This difference nearly doubles when you compare the Forester to the all-wheel drive RAV4, and the RAV4 remains the more expensive option right up to the top trims on both.
You'll also find that the Forester has historically had a higher resale value than the RAV4, which will save you even more money in the long run when it comes time to trade in your car for a new one.
Now you know what to look for, why not come down to Charlie's Subaru to give the Forester a test drive? We'll be happy to answer any questions you have and even show you other Subaru SUVs you might enjoy while you're here!
466 Western Ave
Augusta, ME 04330
