Overview & Reviews

User Reviews:

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  Smooth car - 2016 Honda Pilot
  By Z_pilot - February 21 - 6:59 am

  Almost too smooth and too well isolated, not much different when going from 30 miles/hr to 75, barely could hear engine roar. Very quiet and comfy even at EX trim without acoustic glass or windshield. Night and day in terms of noise reduction and comfort level compared to 2007 pilot traded, to the level you could barely sense the road condition. Much increased torque allows it to make a tight and precise U-turn and during parallel parking despite much bigger than its older ones. Well improved knee and leg room for front seats, remote start is a plus for EX. No auto passenger seat still sucks for such a pricy ride. Hard to come by a car with color or trim you want, so most dealers wont have any discount. Even luck me got the actual out of door of EX $8000 more than the 2007 EX-L because of its low production, high demand and inflation etc. Supposed styling and comfort are worth all of it. Sound system is fabulous if you play HQ or original song/tracks off the phone, no CD changer taxes the phone too much. Sound setting does not change the track characteristics too much. FM radio is easily the worst among any cars I ever drove in last 25+ years, specially the music ones. It is either a very lousy antenna or as if someone intentionally did that to steer you away from conventional FM.

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  Third Pilot is the Charm! - 2016 Honda Pilot
  By KK - February 7 - 3:15 am

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  EVERYTHING THE ACURA MDX SHOULD HAVE BEEN - 2016 Honda Pilot
  By Tim Blake - February 3 - 6:29 pm

  The Honda Pilot Elite is amazing and absolutely nothing like the old pilot. At first I was disappointed when I saw the new 16 pilot on a lot this summer, but it was an ex. Anything that remotely looks like a Chevy makes me ill. I acquired a silver pilot elite with a black, which is actually dark charcole interior, and absolutely love it! The tech and fit and finish were well worth the 50K out the door price. Acura owners.......Everything the Acura MDX should have been and much more room to boot. Okay the nasty reports of the 9 speed transmission are highly accurate at low speeds In town and on slow rolling hills it is hideous......but wait there is a simple fix at the push of a button......no ones talking about it......the ECO button engauged cures the issue 100%!!! And transmission purs like a kitten even on rolling hills. Did Honda do this so we drive in Eco mode????? This car in not like a gutless ford engine where you saw these Eco buttons start....this is a 280 horse engine and definitely responds to the pedal in any mode! So who care what mode you are in!? I DO NOT run Eco mode on the highway! In my opinion you will find normal mode is better, cruise works better and gas mileage is phenomenal anyway on a 9 speed tranny. Gas mileage is amazing and it blows away all other cars in its class. I kid you not! I had a 2011 FWD pilot touring and averaged 14 to 15 mpg in my small town with a little bit of highway. My 2016 AWD pilot Elite is 20.3 MPG. WOW! Highway only was almost 30! Honda did make some changes that frustrated me a bit on the dash........but GOD the depressing reviews.....get a life people......you get use to the changes in a couple of weeks and have a car that feels and drives like a sports car, stears itself, and has a dozen safety features that WILL certainly prevent so many accidents we expirence today. THANK YOU HONDA ENGINEERS! Again all the folks comparing this to the old pilot WHICH I LOVED SO MUCH........drive a 2016 Elite for a week and you will see the Pilot is in a whole new class of luxury and performance! There is NO way I would go back!

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  Great value - 2016 Honda Pilot
  By Amanda Irsch - January 29 - 9:31 pm

  Having owned Audis and Mercedes vehicles prior, this car is one impressive package. From the premium wheels to the LED headlights, the exterior is sharp and modern. The electronics really are second to none, offering literally everything you would expect from a loaded luxury vehicle. The kids love their captains chairs and the included wireless headsets are key for long road trips, allowing us to listen to music on the front whistle the kids enjoy a movie in the back. The countless media options allow us to play digital movies right from our iphones / iPads vs having to bring along blue ray discs. Cargo storage is not great but more than sufficient when the third row is folded down. Anyone w kids car seats will need the captains chairs because otherwise there is no way for a passenger to access the third row unless they enter via the trunk which is awkward. Great car for the price, tough to beat.

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  Car is awesome - 2016 Honda Pilot
  By JD - January 29 - 5:53 am

  It is rock solid on the road and easy to drive: tons of power, good handling, quiet, and comfortable. The infotainment system is good enough I think, dont let some over-the-top negative reviews deter you. I do think they should add Apple CarPlay or Android Auto, and sure a volume knob would be good. But you use the steering wheel controls most of the time anyway.

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  Entertainment user interface and transmission - 2016 Honda Pilot
  By Paul Pelleiter - January 28 - 9:41 pm

  Ive owned 10 Honda/Acura cars. I am very loyal to the brand because dependability is important to me and so far my experience with Honda has been fantastic. Ive pretty much done only scheduled maintenance in over a million miles of driving collectively on all my Honda cars. Honda and Acuras have always been very smooth and have a feeling of harmony." That is, everything works together well to provide an excellent driving experience. However, I am seriously considering another brand for my next car for two main reasons. First, the interface for the entertainment system is junk. It is unusable by the driver while driving. Try manipulating a touch screen, the is not always responsive, while staying in your lane or being on a rough road. its impossible. Also, the voice command is garbage. It almost never works. It does not understand what is said. Ive even had it ask me to choose the number of a song. I choose the number - it plays that number - but it is a different song than the one displayed. I can only guess that the system has incorrectly indexed the iPod songs. The multi-controller wheel in the previous generation Pilot is a dramatically better interface. Having a cool looking all touch interface means nothing if it is unusable. The second issue is the 9 speed transmission. One day it can be excellent the next day it is horrible. The shifts can be all wrong making it impossible to drive smoothly, especially around town in stop and go traffic. The transmission surges when applying the brakes. It is very disconcerting to have the car speed up when you step on the brakes. This happens because the transmission often downshift and accelerates the car, or up-shifts and reduces transmission braking when you step on the brakes. Its hard to believe Honda actually drove this transmission and used these radio controls before increasing the car. If they did, they must have known of these issues yet released the car anyway. My faith in Honda engineering is severely shaken. The new Hyundais are starting to look appealing.

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  Two things - 2016 Honda Pilot
  By Lmiller - December 15 - 3:40 am

  The idle stop should defalt to off. With two car seats in the second row, the 3rd row is not accessable.

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  Test drove. Did not buy. - 2016 Honda Pilot
  By Ed Zawarski - December 11 - 7:12 am

  I own a 2012 AWD Touring. Honda makes a great car. I usually trade my cars every 2-3 years because I put a lot of mileage on them and always love to play with the newest tech toys. This time around though I held off buying a new car because I was waiting for Honda to come out with the new Pilot. I saw the very first one in person while getting my oil changed when it was still on the truck at the dealership. It was hard to get a good view of it but from what I could see, I was excited. That excitement ended when I actually saw the car in the showroom. UGH! Its a minivan! They converted my beloved SUV to a minivan :( They ruined it! They ruined it!!! Nevertheless, I had to test drive one. I am on my second Pilot Touring and have really liked them. No, LOVED them. Albeit my 2012s entertainment system has been less than stellar. The sound is great but the BlueTooth connection for my phone constantly disconnects & reconnects calls at random making it impossible to handle business calls hands-free. This does this with my iPhone, my wifes iPhone, my friends Samsung Galaxy and another friends Nokia. Honda replaced the BT module but it didnt solve the problem. The second flaw in the entertainment system is that it loves to lock up my iPod. Not just my iPod, my wifes as well. It can play for hours or even days with no problems. Other times it can play for five minutes at a clip and I have to disconnect it and do a hard reset on the iPod. Thats a pain in the neck (and dangerous) while driving at highway speeds by yourself. Honda agreed that there is an issue but cant seem to find it. $42,000 cars that dont work correctly dont make me happy but its my only complaint with this car. Anyway, back to the 2016 Pilodyssey. Not a fan of the looks inside nor out. Its a minivan. I know I repeated that but really, you cant say it enough. Its an Odyssey II. You really realize that when you get in the front seat and flip down the cheap armrests. The rear captains chairs second that motion. The touch screen nav/control panel was dog slow. I kept turning the radio off trying to turn it on. Ever click or tap something on a computer/phone screen and it doesnt react right away so you click/tap it again, only to realize the first click/tap hadnt reacted yet so the second click/tap canceled the first? UGH!!!! I have no patience for slow tech. Especially because I’m a tech myself. Underpowered processors irk me to no end. Strike two, Honda. The fact that Honda/Acura backed down to every other manufacturers level of nav restriction is quite annoying. My 2006 MDX, 2010 Pilot, current 2012 Pilot, along with my wifes 2006 RL, 2010 Crosstour, and 2012 Odyssey all had Nav systems that allowed you to have full touch/dial/voice access to any and all features of the Nav systems. Now Honda put restrictions of the use of some of the features of the new Pilots nav. Its still better than most though and Hondas voice control is WAY better than Toyotas. My 2006 4Runners voice control was the worst Ive ever seen. Maybe its gotten better by now, IDK. I switched to Honda products and havent looked back at Toyota or Lexus since. Funny thing is this year we traded in my wifes Odyssey EX-L Nav and bought a Murano. I wont say much about that car other than its very nice but well soon be trading it in. Nissan’s Nav sucks. Enough for me to take a loss on the car. So, again, back to the 16 Pilot. It rode nice. It has way more power than my 2012. The lane mitigation feature would take some getting used to. I dont like someone holding onto my steering wheel at the same time as Im trying to drive but, hey, its a feature EVERY car with a driver who loves to text while they drive should have. Maybe that will keep them in their lane instead of swerving into mine. I dont text and drive and I have pretty good control of my vehicle so Im not sure that I wouldnt be turning that feature off. Id have to give it a month or so to see if I could get used to it. One thing Honda needs to do is stop putting in the rear entertainment system. Make it an option. I have used mine maybe 4 times in the 5 ½ years Ive had my two Pilots. My grandkids used it when we drove them to the zoo and the mountains when we took my car. Other than that, its $2,000 feature that I dont use. Besides, DVDs are becoming a thing of the past. I have 400 movies, 600 TV shows, and 15,000 songs. EVERYTHING is digital. I havent used a CD nor DVD in over 3 years. Incorporate video through USB or BT instead and charge the $150 or so that those connections and software would cost. So heres what this boils down to for me. And I hardly believe I am going to say this after pounding my fist on the desk in favor of Honda over American made cars...Im negotiating a price to trade my 2012 Pilot AWD Touring in on a....yes....really....2015 Jeep Grand Cherokee Overland.

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  Transmission Issues - 2016 Honda Pilot
  By Mark - November 22 - 11:18 am

  This car continues to have transmission issues. Problems with upshifting when going down hill. Car will speed up. Ive been in and out of serivce this past year. Same story, and delays with getting the necessary parts. My first and last HOnda. Im in the processing of trading this vehicl in for a Chevy Traverse or Buick Enclave. Friends have these vehicles and have been very pleased. My wife refuses to drive this vehicle.

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  This SUV might kill you. - 2016 Honda Pilot
  By JeromyW - September 26 - 6:33 pm

  I hope it doesnt. In fact I hope you read this, avoid buying the 2016 (or 17) Honda Pilot, and avoid the same mistake our family made. When my wife and I test drove the 2016 Honda Pilot we were not terribly impressed with its acceleration but that was not why we were looking at a new Honda. We were looking for something reliable and Honda has had a great track record in that regard. So, even though we were not over the moon about the Pilot when we test drove it, we thought this is going to last 10+ years and is, therefore, a wise purchase. Boy, were we wrong! One problem with the Honda Pilot is the 9 speed transmission. My 1972 Chevelle shifts smoother than this. When you drop this Honda in drive first thing in the morning, the first-second gear shift will try to separate a few vertebrae... it is brutal. Once warmed up, this transmission is better, but still not so good. Especially in stop and go traffic where you will experience many times where the transmission seems completely out of touch with the throttle, leading to "rev rev rev... wham!". You *will* need a chiropractor if you have to drive in stop and go traffic with this machine. Also, this transmission has a history of early failure already. However, that transmission wont be the thing that kills you. The Honda Sensing system will. Lets say that you are on a highway going 70 mph when someone going 20 mph slower than you pulls out 3 car lengths in front of you. In that situation our Honda Pilot will SLAM on the brakes HARD causing anyone behind us to weave desperately into the adjoining lane or shoulder to keep from hitting us in the rear. Or lets say that you are going around a bend on a country road, the Honda Sensing system gets confused and again SLAMS on the breaks in the middle of hard bend. Lets say you survive the Honda Sensing system... will you be able to survive the throttle? Lets say you are in stopped trying to turn left across rapidly moving traffic. You need your car to move when you step on the gas. The Honda Pilot will occasionally toss in a 5-7 second delay in response time, just to add to the challenge. Did I mention the $200 oil changes? This is because, in our case, about the time we needed to change the oil, the "B16" code would be thrown on the info system, indicating that the rear diff also needed to be changed. This prompted the service manager at our local Honda shop to exclaim, "what is wrong with these new Pilots?!"