Overview & Reviews

For 2012, the Chevrolet Volt gets a slightly lower price tag, but its formerly standard navigation system and Bose audio system are now on the options list. New standard features include updated keyless ignition/entry and the new MyLink system. The latter provides Bluetooth streaming audio as well as voice control over the audio system and your cell phone.

• Appealing standard features
• Useful 300-mile maximum range
• Excellent crash test scores.
• Low monthly fuel cost in normal driving

• Questionable value
• Home charger is a necessity
• Small backseat for two people only
• Touchy brakes
• No power front seats

User Reviews:

Showing 1 through 10 of 79.00

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  Gas saver - 2012 Chevrolet Volt
  By Dale todd - December 27 - 12:09 pm

  I bought this 2012 as a leftover on the lot in late 2013. Dealership titled it to save the tax deduction thus making it a used car with 800 miles. I own a pharmacy and we make deliveries for customers. I installed a rapid charger at Rx for about $600.00 and avg 220 mpg. I go months without fueling up. Plug ins are great for the right person and situation. In SC the weather does not impact the charge range as bad as up north. Worst I have had is 38 miles vs 44 in summer. Overall it is a great vehicle so far. No issues other than a recall notice I received and dealership handled. Not even sure what it was it gave me no problem.

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  Dont buy into the hype... - 2012 Chevrolet Volt
  By T. Lewis - December 5 - 10:15 pm

  I bought this car because my husband is a Prius owner and we have become gas snobs over the last few years. The car was pricey for a Chevy (this is my first American brand car), but with the fuel economy rating (99 mpg is what the tag said), I figured it would pay for itself soon. I live in Cincinnati and bought the car in the summer. The battery gave me about 50 miles per charge and I was filling up once a month. Once the winter hit, the car ran mostly on gas (the engine had to come on to warm the car) and my battery miles were reduced to 28-31 miles per charge and my fill ups were weekly instead of monthly. In short, in the winter months, I am averaging around 40 mpg. I considered trading it in this year (the car is 3 years old with 40k miles) and discovered that the trade in value of the car is @ $12k, which is a considerable depreciation from the $38k price tag 3 years ago. Huge let down.

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  Just be prepared for the keyless remote going dead - 2012 Chevrolet Volt
  By Dave - November 29 - 6:50 pm

  Bought my 2012 Chevy Volt with 34K miles about 6 weeks ago. As quiet as the 3 Toyota Camrys Ive owned. Great acceleration (considering Ive only owned 4-cylinder cars), and love, love, love the fact I can drive round trip to work on zero gas. LD trips out of State (Atlanta, 280 miles) I can easily get 35+mpg, or 45ish if I drive 70, and use the normal setting for all uphill / mountain, and "mountain" for all downhill/flat. My ONE complaint occurred this weekend, when my keyless remote was suddenly (and without any prior warning) not picked up by the car. Luckily there is a key entry in the driver door, but no way to start the car using that key. Was stuck 10 miles from home with nobody available to get a ride. Bought two replacement batteries, but no change. Finally sat in the car for 15 minutes tapping my remote until suddenly the car recognized the remote and would start. From now on, Ive hidden a second remote with batteries removed (plus 3 batteries) in a small bag inside the car. If this happens again (and it has) and the remote stops working, I can access the second, slap in a battery, and hopefully get this thing started. There really needs to be SOME option for starting the car using the key.

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  Beware as they age.... - 2012 Chevrolet Volt
  By S. Moore - September 3 - 7:45 am

  what started out as a love affair has turned into a headache/nightmare. My volt started out great but as it has aged it seems to be heading into the service dept more and more for repairs. Chevy has covered all of these repairs under warranty even though my car is well past the 3yr/36k mile point without a fight which leads me to believe that I am not the only owner experiencing these sort of problems. When I called to complain about the more and more frequent service dept visits, GM CS told me I really don have anything about as they have covered all the repairs even though my car is long out of warranty. While I appreciate that, I really don like that the service dept at my local dealership know me by sight. I really hate that I have fallen out of love with it, handles well, incredible acceleration, quiet and awesome gas mileage....well over 500mpg. Down side is repeated service visits and a lot of time in a loaner car as they fix mine. Really wonder what the long term will bring.

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  Started off as the best car, has morphed into a le - 2012 Chevrolet Volt
  By Dave Thompson - August 21 - 2:12 pm

  Beware, mine has been in for service 17 times in the three years, 9 trips for issues with the charging system/battery alone. Started off as a reliable car, but as we have passed the 50k mark it has broken down 4 times in the past 5 months. Two of those times it had to be towed to the dealer. Thankfully I have raised enough of a stink that GM has been covering the cost if these frequent repairs. No way should a vehicle w 52k miles on in and 3 years old be in the repair shop multiple times for the same issues. Great idea for a car, but wait til the bugs are worked out to buy. My neighbor has a volt w similar miles on it and has even worse luck than I have. Worse part is I looked to trade in in and was offered 10k by numerous dealers, nothing like a 75% depreciation in 3 yrs .....and the car is in show room condition. Unless GM buys it back, it looks like Im stuck w the car

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  Overall one big giant shrug: "meh" - 2012 Chevrolet Volt
  By Maggie B. - August 12 - 12:41 pm

  Having previously owned a second gen Prius, a 2006 Ford Fusion, I got to feel very different rides and experience very different levels of sorrow at the gas station. On the one hand, the Volt will get most folks super far on the just electric mode, but on the other the ride is still hybrid and numb. The efficiency drops when Im in standard city or suburban stop and go traffic, accelerating to 45 on most roads is fine until I have to stop and do it again literally 2 miles later and the electric range just plummets. There is almost no way to recoup ones range by barking or cruising so dont have your hopes up if you previously owned a Prius or other hybrid. Then in dense city areas the efficiency goes up marginally until the city driving is over and then the range just drops as soon as youre back on the highway. That point is especially true for most N Americans outside of largely dense cities. Then there is the technology. Hybrids are the vehicle equivalent of smartphones. The Insight and Prius were the smart phones before Apple iPhone and Volt, Tesla and Leaf are the equivalent of those that came after. Having owned the 2nd Gen Prius it was like having one of the rock solid 3g phones before the iPhone: I thought it would be cooler to upgrade and now I regret it. Sometimes we are too set in our ways to upgrade our hardware, I say this as a millennial btw. The Volt is more like a shiny iPhone 4. One in which you cannot in fact turn off most notifications during meetings. One in which the phone (car) will tell you that you put your phone in your purse or took it out of your pocket or that its about to turn off due to low battery and so on. And these alerts are not mute-able! Imagine that. Its insane the amount of bells, bongs and rings this Volt makes. I remember the backup signal on the Prius, that was the only alert, and it was bothersome but I would appreciate having only that over all the other alerts on the Volt. And to think I havent brought up the entertainment system. You have a smart phone or iPod and plug it in and select your favorite band and then ... wheres the album list... so you select a song. Now that great song is playing and the next song is whichever song is alphabetically later in the song list. So think you can remember that bands best album you loved? No, sorry, scroll through the millions of albums and now the songs will play in Alpha order from the album you just selected. If that sounds "smart" then you my friend belong in a VOLT. The touch controls are sometimes responsive and sometimes require a little extra prodding below the touch screen. So memorizing the touch buttons by feel is now impossible. And if you once had a Prius in the always hot SW, you probably got used to adjusting the climate on the steering wheel, and now you get to shift your eyes away from the road, onto the center console, over the the split climate section and adjust every two seconds since eco mode on the climate control is as effective as having a golden retriever pant on your for cooling. Yay, Volt! Now youre turning left, trying to see past the giant six inch pillars which are still in the way no matter whether you lean left or right and then check your rear view mirror which now is misaligned due to slightly shifting your seat and the rear window couldnt possibly get any higher/narrower/less effective now could it? Sure the Fusion has absolute crap rear-view and so do most chunky-reared sedans, but this here Volt is a purported Hatch! So surely you have more window and a better view.. sorry no, this a Volt and even worse, a Chevy. In summary, SUV drivers may love the fuel efficiency and Prius owners may love to up their smugness with this green-hov-sticker qualifying car but the vast majority hate the numb steering, the dead until youve hit something braking and the lack of visibility due to crash test standards where we absolutely must be able to flip five times into a moving train and live. But honestly, give me a plug-in Golf and lets call it a day. This is still a Chevy after all.

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  Fantastic car for city driving - 2012 Chevrolet Volt
  By Paul S - July 16 - 8:23 am

  I leased a 2012 Volt in April of that year and loved it. Once I learned to always drive in “L” gear for maximum regen braking, and “S” drive mode for maximum acceleration at the light the car was so much fun to drive. It was extremely quick and totally quiet. What I like is the acceleration is 100% useable. Since there is no noise, grinding and shifting you can put the pedal to the floor every time you start off without any guilt or spectacle. 90% of my driving is in town and I never have to use gas unless I go on a trip out of town. My only disappointment with that car was that in the third year that I owned it my battery range dropped about 20%. I went from seeing 36 miles after charge in the winter to 30 miles. In the summer it went from 47 to less than 40. Chevy said this was normal, but I can’t believe that since it all happened in the third year. Also in that year I added a level 2 charger at work and started topping the car off both at home in the evening and work in the morning. Turned that car in at end of lease and got a barely used 2014 with every option which I love. It has navigation which the 2012 did not and that is a great feature because of how it integrates with other features. Lots of improvements over the 2012. Now I’m not charging until I drop below 20 mile range and keeping my fingers crossed that I won’t lose driving range in two years.

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  Love Electric Powered, BUT BEWARE! - 2012 Chevrolet Volt
  By ns2935 - June 4 - 12:59 pm

  The Volt I purchased was a left over 2012 model I purchased Aug 2013 with 600 miles on it. The cars exterior and motor was a mess. It took the dealership some six days to clean the vehicle to new looking. I drove the car for additional 18 months prior to trading it in for a Cadillac SRX. I had taken the car to various dealers of GM, Mitsubishi, Subaru. The dealers all expressed concern on taking the Volt in on trade and that concerned me even more and finalized my reasoning for getting rid of the Volt. Just too much unknown on this vehicle for us consumers. Cadillac dealer who took the Volt in trade doubts they will resale on their lot and will send to auto auction to get rid of it.

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  The best Car we have ever owned - 2012 Chevrolet Volt
  By lock11 - May 3 - 6:03 pm

  We just retired. The key to a successful retirement was to control our expenses. I decided to invest in some Green solutions. First we installed a Solar Array on our roof. Then I researched electric Cars. The only one that answered the question "What happens when I run out of Juice?" was the Volt. I paid 20, thousand for a 2012 with 20 thousand miles. It was loaded. I got a Tax credit of $7500. so net out the door was $12,500 not a bad price. WE charge it and it goes, no problems and it is the most dependable car ever. So far it has cost me an additional $O to operate.

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  Cant wait to Drive it - 2012 Chevrolet Volt
  By breggers - May 2 - 7:34 pm

  I bought this 2012 model off lease at 17500 mi, and have had it for 1000 miles. So far I have used 6.3 gallons of gas total, that is no exaggeration. I am excited to get in this car and drive it every day. It drives like a dream, completely silent except for the top notch sound system on which I am playing XM jazz. In the Wisconsin spring, when no climate control is needed, I am getting 43 miles on a charge, which easily handles my 24 mile round trip commute. I take care of this thing like its a Maserati, I always have a microfiber in my hand. I always chuckle at all the Priuses I pass struggling to get 55 mpg, burning gas with every mile.