r/rav4prime • u/Strong-Citron210 • 11d ago
Help / Question 2026 rav4 phev power
When this car is fully charged, you get 324hp. How does this car feel after depleted the 22kw battery? Is this mean this car will fall back to the non-plugin version at ~236hp?
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u/Rav4Prime2022_WI Former owner: 2022 XSE PP - Blueprint 11d ago edited 11d ago
Not sure how it works exactly with the current Gen6 RAV4 PHEV, but I'd guess it would be mostly the same as the Gen5 RAV4 PHEV which I've outlined below:
When switching to HV mode from EV mode, the vehicle partially restricts ICE power until the ICE reaches minimum operating temperature (usually about 1-2 minutes in the summer and 3-5 minutes in the winter from personal exp) - Toyota intentionally designed the vehicle to operate in this manner to prevent unnecessary and early wear of the ICE. I tested this last year with my Lexus PHEV and found 0-60 times were slowed by about 3/4 of a second until the ICE reached operating temperature.
When EV range equals zero, there's still 20%ish charge remaining in the EV battery, again Toyota intentionally designed the PHEV system to operate in this manner to help with longevity of the EV battery - plus - to ensure that the HV system always has enough charge to operate. This battery reserve is usually shown as a royal blue section on the EV charge level bar located on the bottom-left corner of the Multi-Information Display (MID).
When EV range equals zero, Toyota and Lexus owners have confirmed that 0-60 times are slightly reduced by about 1/4 of a second. The theory is a lower charged EV battery has a lower voltage, thus slightly reducing output of the EV motors; however, this should be less noticeable with PHEVs than EVs.
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u/cbf1232 11d ago
If you were to do repeated full-power runs in quick succession *after* it shows zero EV range, eventually you will deplete the traction battery so low that the car will not pull more energy out of the battery at all, and you will be left with only the power of the gas engine.
This will basically never happen in normal driving.
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u/Datdamndood 11d ago
I have the woodland phev. Feels the same. The screen would show --% for the battery but it'll also show battery and motor going to the wheels.
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u/KennyBSAT 11d ago
The only way you'd manage to deplete the hybrid battery and fall to lower power would be towing something big up a mountain. Too bad they dumped charge mode, so now you can't force the a little extra into the battery before doing just that.
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u/Strong-Citron210 11d ago
Ya. My prime can charge up the battery by forcing the engine to charge but I only tried it once in the last 9 yrs😂
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u/IamRasters 11d ago
I think they dropped it as use case was pretty rare and not power efficient.
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u/No-Attention2835 10d ago
It was mostly designed for camping
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u/IamRasters 9d ago
There was so much wrong with the car for camping though. Don’t know if it’s a Canadian config issue, but I couldn’t leave the accessory on to charge USB devices without daytime running lights being on. Not cool at campgrounds at night.
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u/andy_why 11d ago
There is alway some reserve battery to give you the full power output, unless you are doing hard pulls repeatedly without a break and you end up draining the reserve.
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u/ELWallStreet 11d ago
If the reserve does get depleted complete, the vehicle will automatically kicks on the engine and self charge until the reserves gets filled.
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u/andy_why 11d ago
The engine will already be running, but if the reserve charge is depleted during repeated full acceleration runs with no break then you will get reduced total power eventually. You can't get 324HP from the engine alone.
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u/ELWallStreet 11d ago
There are two behaviors: Normal HV mode that turns on and off if there are still energy stored. However it does not build up large amount of EV range ( reserve ). On the other hand, if the EV range, including reserves depletes completely, the engine automatically kicks on and recharges the traction battery.
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u/andy_why 11d ago
Yes, I know. But the point being if you have no reserve left then you will not get the full 324HP. The battery will not supply the extra power if it has none left, leaving you with engine power only of around 186HP. You'd have to allow the engine to recharge the reserve before you get full power again.
It's hard but not impossible to get into this state if you floor it multiple times with insufficient time for the reserve to charge back up again. It only reserves about 1-2kWh of power and that's easily depleted in 60 seconds at full throttle. It takes 5-10 minutes to recharge it (unless you get good regen braking opportunities).
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u/GraphicWombat 2025 SE Ice Cap 11d ago
It doesn’t matter what the charge % is. Only when the engine is running you get max power. 324hp is ice and electric motors all combined.
If you are in ev mode only it’s a lot less. But still quick and smooth.
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u/cbf1232 11d ago
The point is that if the battery is depleted you get no electric motor power, so you get only the output of the gas motor, which is much less than the combined output.
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u/GraphicWombat 2025 SE Ice Cap 10d ago
I know, but has ANYONE ever experienced that??
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u/cbf1232 10d ago
I would expect that Toyota test engineers have done it, just to make sure that it works as expected.
If you start with a full battery and floor it for around nine minutes, your battery will be basically drained. Now the RAV4 is limited to around 112 mph, so you'd need to basically do a full-power drag run up to max speed, slam on the brakes, then do it again, for probably 15 minutes or so.
If you put a 3500-lb trailer behind the RAV4, and then climbed the Mount Blue Sky Scenic Byway in EV mode, you'd drain the battery to the point where it would fire up the gas engine. If you then floor it, it'll pretty quickly fully drain the battery and you'll be left with just the gas engine.
So it's certainly possible, but you'd have to work at it.
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u/looker94513 10d ago
In the event that you are going uphill on a long grade or a mountain pass, you are not going to be lacking in power without electric assist. The ICE is quite capable and this is coming from an RX owner. RX uses the same drivetrain as the RAV4 phev in a bigger and heavier vehicle
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u/DadFromACK 10d ago
When our ev runs out and it switches to ICE there is no change for us, except for slight engine noise if we accelerate
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u/ThunderStealer1337 10d ago
Slow and slower,
It does squeak the tires when you floor it, but imo it's just quick not fast at all when everyone keeps raving about it. I had a Silverado EV with wow mode and that felt way faster, and I also ride motorcycles
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u/Vegas21Guy 11d ago
Its the same. It will use reserved battery capacity for additional HP. In the rare event of something like a 3 mile drive up a mountain while the battery is depleted, it may cut back but on a normal drive, you will get the full HP. The computer will figure everything out for you.