There is a pull-down table to go between the two outer rows, and it has two drinks holders.  There’s also two heat/cool vents, but no 12v socket.  Only the passenger front seat has a seatpocket on the back.  This is the base model, but it still feels a little underdone for a family car.

 

Camry is an easy, simple drive.  There is adequate power smoothly delivered, soft suspension, the automatic is intelligent, cruise control is effective even downhill and the car is about as likely to bite as a sleepy pet rabbit.  Grip is good once you’ve eased the car into a curve, the steering is comfortingly stable, not over light.  If you want, you can make a Camry go quite fast indeed so don’t consider a slow car.

 

Yet you won’t be surprised to learn the dynamics are not to the enthusiast driver’s taste – very slow steering that takes a lot of turning, indifferent feel, no sense of engine urgency, agility…I’m going to stop now because that’s not what Camry is about.

 

Instead, let’s talk about what it’s good for and that’s comfortable, stable, low-effort driving.  If that’s what you want, Camry is your car.  But remember that many other cars deliver a far more rewarding and interesting driving experience with the same ease of progress as Camry.  As one example, our i30 long-termer is an understated pleasure to drive yet is also an unpretentious, practical and stylish family car.   I feel Camry could improve on its style and enjoyment without compromising its core reason for existence which is spacious, reliable and functional transportation.  One small point is that I did find on wet and cold roads initial delivery of power from takeoff is not what it should be, as it’s easy to spin both wheels if you’re making a particularly hasty getaway.  Other front-drivers do initial power delivery better.

 

The automatic has a semi-manual option.  As usual with Toyotas, when you select say 4th that means it can select any gear from 1st to 4th, not that it’ll always use 4th.  So it’s not sequential-shift as claimed.   Don’t know why Toyota do this, but they do.

 

There’s also a pre-load differential up front.  This looks to be a sort of limited-slip differential which has the effect of preventing one of the front wheels spinning relative to the other, so you get better traction.  Toyota also claim improved stability and maneuverability including on slippery roads, enhanced steering feel and better deceleration.  It’s hard to say, but certainly Camry is reluctant to spin up an inside wheel when accelerating out of slow corners, and the car is definitely stable in every situation I tried.  

 

I also did what’s known as a split-mu brake test.  Usually when you emergency brake the road surface is more or less consistent under all four wheels, which makes life easy for the electronic braking systems.  However, what if there’s two wheels on dirt and two on bitumen, as you often find in rural areas?  Slam the brakes on there and it’s easy to spin a car as the bitumen wheels brake a lot harder than the dirt ones.