The 2020 Subaru Forester is BETTER than you think

I'm Jacob. I'm Yuri. And we're going for a drive. 2020 Subaru Forester. Premier with no launch control. All right, well that was uneventful. Horsepower and torque. 182 horsepower, 176 pound-feet of torque from a two and a half liter naturally aspirated four-cylinder boxer engine. I guess that makes sense. Yeah, no turbo. And what kind of transmission do we have in here? We've got a CVT. Hit me with those fake gears. And there it is. So the Forester went through a major refresh in 2019, so we should probably start with the looks. It kind of just looks like everything else from Subaru. It kind of does. It just looks like a really big outback now, and I'm kind of disappointed. Yeah, it looks less SUV-y, but it's still as big as an SUV. Yeah, it's just the way that they shaped it, basically. So front end, we've got the new Subaru headlights, which all of them have. Yeah, the boomerangs, they look pretty good. And the rest of the front end just looks normal Subaru-ish. Yeah, it's pretty bland. I can't even remember what it looks like when I look away from it. Yeah, so if we look at the side view as well, it's got some nice body lines. It's pretty crisp, but it's also pretty general Subaru. Yeah, and from the side is where I really think it looks just like a big outback. So what do you think of the wheels on this Forester? I think they could have done a lot better, especially considering this is the top trim. Yeah, they kind of just blend in with the rest of the looks of this car. And the Continental recommended tire is the Terrain Contact HT and Viking Contact 7. And if we move to the back end, the first thing I notice is we've got Subaru's version of lobster claw taillights. I also noticed that, and I don't like them as much as I do Hondas. Yeah, but these look fine. How about the rest of the back end? Again, nothing really stands out, but I do like that they did real exhaust for this one, so I really appreciate that in 2020. But only on one side. Yeah, well, that's fine. Yeah, I guess that's pretty much it for looks. It's just a Subaru SUV. Yeah, like nothing really stands out about it, which sucks because the old ones like the Subaru Forester XT, that was so sick because it had a hood scoop. It had a turbo. There's no more turbos. There's no more hood scoops. Yeah, but I guess they still have the WRX and the STI. Yeah, but I mean, even the Outback used to have like a hood scoop and turbos and they had a Baja. Times change. People need to make money. That's the world we live in. Yeah, but on a positive note, inside is actually very nice. Oh my God, I feel like I'm sitting in a baseball glove. I love it. Okay, so the first thing I notice is this material on the dash and on the doors, like you described it as carbon fiber cloth texture. Yeah, carbon fiber cloth textured pattern. But then we've also got this brown leather everywhere, which I guess is where the baseball glove part comes from. Yeah, and it looks really nice and it feels really nice. Like all the touch points are nice. I like it. Then we've got another black material on the dash and then a light material on the top. It's kind of a lot of colors. Yeah, it really is. They should have kept the headliner the same dark color and then it would have looked much nicer. Yeah, but it might not have been as airy inside with a darker headliner. I guess. We'll get more into this interior later, but first let's send it again. All right, so it's got a decent amount of power. I feel like the drive train feels better than the RAV4. The RAV4 just had like a coarser sound, coarser feeling. This feels smoother. Yeah, I haven't felt like there's been a lack of power ever in this. I always hope for more. So a turbo engine would have been nice, but let's send it into cliche and see how this thing handles. And it definitely understeers quite a bit. It is all wheel drive because it's got Subaru's legendary system, which we are kind of testing today in these snowy conditions. But to be honest, it just kind of understeers quite a bit. But in snow, handles just fine. No issues with traction or anything. So if you're driving it normally, you'll have a great time. And the steering is really light, like exceptionally light. We have two different drive modes on the steering wheel because apparently this is a Ferrari. We have S and I. So that changes in your gauge cluster and it affects a couple different things like your throttle input and your steering. And it shows the throttle curve. That's how you know what mode you're in. And then we have a couple of different drive modes in the center console with the X mode for off-road. Yeah, it looks like there's one mode for if you're in thick or deep snow or dirt, and the other mode is for slippery ice or slippery dirt. And since this is a CVT, we obviously have paddle shifters. Yeah, I mean, to simulate the fake gears. But like other Subarus, it shifts quickly. Like all the fake gears are simulated very quickly. Like watch this. Not bad. Man, that's simulated quick. I know. It's the matrix. And the suspension overall has been really comfortable. I think more comfortable than the RAV4. I can see that. And so another thing that Subaru updated when they refreshed this model is Lane Keep Assist. It now does lane centering. So the eyesight actually kind of does something now. Yeah. Well, let's talk about two different things with eyesight. Number one, we have the cameras on top, which we've always had. And it looks super creepy from outside. And number two, it's even creepier inside. Tell them why, Yuri. So on this one, we have a little camera that watches your eyes just like the BMWs above this little screen right here. So look to the right. Keep eyes on road. Yeah, that's it's definitely detecting my eyes. No, it's good. It's like a good reminder to have. It's just like interesting. I didn't expect that out of this. OK, and then why are you using the lane centering lane keep? It's pretty good until you get to about 100 kilometers an hour. Then I felt like it kind of shifts a bit. But in stop and go traffic, it worked very well. You come to a full stop with the radar cruise. I really enjoyed it on a crappy commute. How about this compared to like a Santa Fe, which we've driven because this doesn't really compete with like a Telluride. No, it's like it's like a step below that. That's just pretty good, though, which is it's a lot better than it was better than Honda's systems that we've tested in Toyota. I would say it's about the same. OK, maybe a tiny bit better than those two. All right. So let's talk about this interior and everything else that we haven't touched on yet. Let's switch drivers. So back to this interior, my favorite part about it is we've got pretty much one of the best head units ever for infotainment. Yeah, the infotainment is fantastic. They make it so easy to use. Everything's color coded. Apple CarPlay works right away when you plug it in. Android Auto also works. We've got rewinding satellite radio stations and tune mix where you can put as many stations as they can have rewinding in each tune mix. And compared to most other screens and infotainment, isn't this like the nicest, glossiest, darkest screen? Yeah, it looks really nice. And then my favorite feature of this entire infotainment is how quickly the tuning knob works. Oh, yeah. You can fly through channels. We're in a couple other cars that were like really bad. You turn it a million times. It only goes like four channels. Yeah, this just goes. And then the worst part of this infotainment is all the gloss black around it. I don't really mind the piano black, but I know you do. But what I really do mind is that there's not enough buttons to get to where you need to go quickly. Like if I want to go to my Apple CarPlay, I need to click apps and then I need to click CarPlay. That sounds like a lot of work, man. Well, on the Forte 5 that we also have this week, I can click the start button and it goes right to it. Two extra times over a week is probably like 100 extra clicks per week. And that's a lot of this. It kind of is, though. Think about it, man. It doesn't bother me at all. It's because you only listen to one radio station, channel 44. Exactly. So let's move on to this upper screen. Yeah, it's kind of stupid. It is. They add a lot of extra information that we don't have here. And the worst part is to control it. You need to control it through the info button on the left and then sometimes through this up and down on the bottom left, which the bottom left also controls the stuff in the gauge. Yeah. So depending on which menu you're in, each input controls a different screen or sometimes the same screen, which is really weird. But lucky for us, we can actually turn the screen off through the settings. But unlucky for us, when we turn it off, all of our temperature settings go away because that's the only way you can see what temperature you're at. Yeah. And even if you adjust your temperature, it doesn't automatically turn on like other cars do. But what's funny is when you do turn on the car, sometimes you'll get like a screen that looks like it's scanning up and down. It's like scanning driver, driver detected because it's got that like laser eyesight thing. It looks kind of creepy, like from The Matrix or something. That's pretty intense. And the backup camera is pretty good resolution, but we don't have a 360 camera. And then we move on to our gauge cluster. We've got an analog tack on the left, analog speedo on the right, and a bunch of settings we can change in the middle. But it is kind of cluttered. And the worst part is if I've got my speedo up there, if I do a phone call on Apple CarPlay, it says I'm in a phone call and it blocks my speedo. Yeah. And then I was also changing drive modes in a phone call and it wouldn't tell me what drive mode I'm in. So like you don't need to prioritize that Subaru. Yeah. It's a little weird. It's super weird. And the steering wheel itself is very cluttered and the feel of the leather. I don't quite like, especially compared to like Hyundai, Kia, Toyota. Oh, I was actually thinking that I like this more than Hyundai, Kia and Genesis. Weird. But I do agree that the buttons are cluttered. It takes a while to get used to. And then like there's such a priority on like your heated steering wheel button. Yeah. And the light is so dim that you can't even tell if it's on or off, but you can get used to it pretty easily. And then there's not really any issues. And then if we look down at our center console, we've got a gloss black shifter, which is disgusting. And then we have heated seats as well. Yes. And they're hard buttons. So they'll stay on all winter if you just click it down once, but no cooled seats, which would be nice. Then we've got a lot of buttons on the bottom left, which is a nice thing to have because it's a perfect spot for hard buttons instead of digging through infotainments to use stuff like your traction control. Yeah. And then these seats are also really comfortable. I've had no issues with these. Yeah. And we've got memory seats, which is also very nice and leg room in the back. Me sitting behind myself at six foot one and a half is amazing. No issues. One of the best for you. Yeah. I love it. And then trunk space. We should probably do the box test six, seven, eight, nine, 10, 11, 12, and 13 could be your box. If you go to patrion.com slash the straight pipes and we should probably do the visor test. Oh, this isn't looking good. Three, two, one fail and extension. We all know why this is trash fix it or don't fix it. And lastly, sitting in here and driving, I really like how much you can see these pillars are so small and these little windows make visibility amazing. Yeah. Visibility everywhere behind you. Your blind spots look pretty good. I really like that. But one thing I don't really like this armrest does not slide forward. So someone might hide five foot eight and a half. If I put my elbow here, like I can barely touch the wheel. Not an issue if you're six foot one and a half. Yeah. I guess I'm a little spoiled for my Honda element that has like the most perfect arm rests ever. It's got the captain's chairs, right? Yeah. I feel like if I get an SUV, it's gotta be like minivan or SUV with captain's chairs. I'm just, yeah, that might be like a Honda pilot or like a passport. It's going to be, it's going to be an Odyssey Pacifica. And one thing I want one of the Subaru engineers to take a look at when you click replay to rewind satellite radio stations, when you go away and come back, the replay is gone. Land Rover, Range Rover, Jaguar. They keep the replay up. Can somebody Subaru fix that please? So that's pretty much everything about the Subaru Forester. Let's get to the price. $39,995 Canadian. And it's priced exactly where it should be in this class of SUV at the top, because this is the top trim. So what's the competition for this? It would be the Hyundai Tucson, but we've only driven the Santa Fe, the Santa Fe kind of depending on how you spec it, obviously the RAV4 and the Mazda CX-5. So if you were forced to drive one, which one would it be? Probably the CX-5 turbo. Because it's more fun to drive? Yeah. I just enjoyed the bit of extra power and the fact that it doesn't have a CVT. If I had to drive an SUV, I'd probably want Lane Keep. And I remember the Mazda didn't really have that. So I think probably this or the Hyundai would kind of be my choice. So let us know what you guys think in the comments, which one would you take? And if you want more SUV reviews, check out this playlist right here. Right there. Keep your eyes on the road.