Video: 2021 Honda Odyssey: Review

It's actually the oldest continuous name plate among US minivans, having been around these States since the 1995 model year. Now in that span, the Odyssey has survived literally dozens of discontinued or renamed minivans. All of which ended up in the scrap heap of automotive history. Not to worry though, the sliding doors remain wide open for Honda's contender, which sees a number of updates for the 2021 model year. Let's see if those updates are enough to keep the Odyssey competitive against three key rivals, as well as that always pesky minivan alternative, the three-row SUV. Now this is the fourth model year for the current generation, Odyssey. That's the fifth generation in case you're keeping track. Typically in a vehicle's life cycle, that means it's time for some visual updates. So it goes here, let's take you through 'em. So first of all, there used to be a lot of Chrome kinda in the middle part of the grill. It's been relocated now to a position above the grill. The lower bumper has been redesigned a little bit. The outboard openings have a little bit more of a vertical theme than before. If you get lower trim levels of the Odyssey, a big difference is gonna be LED headlights. Now those are standard across the board. They used to only be available on the top couple of trim levels of this minivan. Around back, you get some visual differences as well. There's a new dark garnish above the rear window, and the Chrome between the tail lights has been toned down a bit, a little bit like upfront. Inside the Odyssey, it gets newly available power lumbar controls for the front passenger seat. And second row captain's chairs, that now fold flat. So they're easier to remove. Now, Honda's magic slide feature remains in effect here, that means you can move these seats side-to-side, up to more than 12 inches in most trim levels of the Odyssey minivan. That's really nice because when you scoot 'em out to be as far apart as possible, we measure about 18 inches of aisle space between the seat. About three to six inches more than the space we measured between the captain's chairs of competitors, like the Toyota Sienna, the Kia Carnival, and the Chrysler Pacifica. Scoot 'em both off to one side, and you have a nice space here to get back to the third row without having to kinda mess with anything that's already in the second row. Second row flexibility is an enduring innovation, but equally enduring is Honda's refusal to innovate with its front center console. The Odyssey still has to be the OG floor console, and it is fantastic. I really mean that, I'm not being sarcastic here. Give me a minute. This actually has space for you to throw a large bag, you know a purse, a diaper bag or something ahead of the cup holders, instead of having to shoehorn it into some covered compartment or under a bridge console. You know back in the day, most minivans actually used to do this, and then one by one automakers left minivans for SUVs and a bunch of the ones that remained, thought their interiors needed to become more like SUVs. And so they adopted these flow-through consoles that were perhaps more stylish, but always less utilitarian. Really glad Honda stuck with what works. This is a van that's proud to be a van. Okay. I'll get off my soap box now because there's actually a few other things about the Odyssey that are starting to wear thin. We'll take you through them. First off, let's talk about these controls. Now the largest available touch screen in the Odyssey only measures eight inches diagonally by 28 inches square. That's only about half the size in terms of square inches of something like the Kia Carnival's largest screen. You get the base Odyssey trim level, the LX, and you're stuck with a five inch unit. It's tiny. It doesn't have any Apple CarPlay or Android Auto, but that's the only way to get a full roster of physical controls. You upgrade to the eight inch unit, which does have CarPlay and Android Auto. And now you're stuck with Honda's display audio system, which is really a mess to use. It's got a volume knob, but no tuning knob. And it's got all these touch sensitive buttons up here. Really a mess kinda just in terms of how intuitive the layout is. Any Odyssey, regardless of trim level is gonna stick you with this push button gear selector below it. You know, Honda's had this in a number of products, it's equally un-intuitive. That selector works a 10 speed automatic transmission with short gearing for quick acceleration, from a stop. But if you need more power while already in motion, it habitually bogs down. Multi-gear kicked down at 50 miles per hour, can take a full two seconds or longer if you are in drive. That's twice as long as we timed in some of the Odysseys competitors. The driver's selectable S Mode shortened shift times considerably, but chances are, you're gonna be driving in drive most of the time, and there downshift hesitation is unreasonably bad. There's more of the bad stuff, ride quality. It's always been a problem for the current generation Odyssey, and back-to-back driving with the competitive set really puts a spotlight on that. Impact harshness and highway isolation are both clearly the worst in this group, with an unnerving degree of body movement during quick changes in elevation or momentum. The suspension is firmed, yet the chassis doesn't feel terribly rigid, and that's really a one-two gut punch on the road trips. Also on the negative column though, it may not matter as much to minivan shoppers is interior quality. On this molded-in dashboards, stitching looks obviously fake, and unsightly cheap plastics occupied noticeable section near the steering wheel, and on the doors. The leather in our top-line elite trim level here still feels a few grades rougher than the stuff you can get in upper trim levels of the Pacifica and the Sienna. Of course, it barely mentioned that many vans aren't exactly known for upscale interiors, which is all fine and well, since your kids are probably gonna make a mess of them anyway, but the Odyssey feels especially drab. It's also not particularly roomy, at least in terms of cargo space behind the second and third rows relative to other minivans. Now don't get me wrong. The Odyssey here beats the pants off the cargo space you'll find at any mid-sized three-row SUV around the same price. But versus other minivans, it's a little bit behind close to 10% under the as tested volume we found in the rival Carnival. That's not to say the Odyssey is a bad van. The front seats are exceptionally comfortable, and the second and third row past our evaluation of child seat accommodations with flying colors. Honda deserves a lot of credit for sticking to a tried, and true minivan formula of flexible utility. This is unapologetically a van, not something trying to masquerade as an SUV. And the minivan faithful should be rooting for Honda to stay with that formula, once the Odyssey is redesigned. But all shoppers are probably gonna want that redesign to come sooner rather than later. Make no mistake, the current generation Odyssey is an aging van, and Honda didn't use this mid-cycle update to address a few things that might've been fixable without a full redesign. Namely, those dashboards controls, and the suspension tuning. Now minivan shoppers are no doubt still gonna want to include the Odyssey in their search, but make sure you kick the tires on all those other vans too. You might find the Odyssey's advantages offset by a few distinct flaws as well.