For enhanced safety, the front and rear seat shoulder belts of the Honda HR-V have pretensioners to tighten the seatbelts and eliminate dangerous slack in the event of a collision. The Volkswagen Taos doesn’t offer pretensioners for its rear seat belts.
In the past twenty years hundreds of infants and young children have died after being left in vehicles, usually by accident. When turning the vehicle off, drivers of the HR-V are reminded to check the back seat if they opened the rear door before starting out. The Taos doesn’t offer a back seat reminder.
The Honda HR-V has standard driver and front passenger side knee airbags mounted low on the dashboard. These airbags helps prevent the driver and front passenger from sliding under their seatbelts or the main frontal airbags; this keeps them better positioned during a collision for maximum protection. Knee airbags also help keep the legs from striking the dashboard, preventing knee and leg injuries in the case of a serious frontal collision. The Taos doesn’t offer knee airbags.
The HR-V’s standard lane departure warning system alerts a temporarily inattentive driver when the vehicle begins to leave its lane and gently nudges the vehicle back towards its lane. A lane departure warning system costs extra on the Taos.
The HR-V EX-L has standard Parking Sensors to help warn the driver about vehicles, pedestrians or other obstacles behind or in front of their vehicle. The Taos doesn’t offer a front parking aid.
The HR-V’s driver alert monitor detects an inattentive driver then sounds a warning and suggests a break. According to the NHTSA, drivers who fall asleep cause about 100,000 crashes and 1500 deaths a year. The Taos doesn’t offer a driver alert monitor.
Both the HR-V and the Taos have standard driver and passenger frontal airbags, front side-impact airbags, side-impact head airbags, front wheel drive, height adjustable front shoulder belts, four-wheel antilock brakes, traction control, electronic stability systems to prevent skidding, crash mitigating brakes, daytime running lights, rearview cameras, available all wheel drive, blind spot warning systems and rear cross-path warning.
The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety rates the general design of front seat head restraints for their ability to protect front seat occupants from whiplash injuries. The IIHS also performs a dynamic test on those seats with “good” or “acceptable” geometry. In these ratings, the HR-V with standard seats is safer than the Taos:
|
|
HR-V |
Taos |
| Overall Evaluation |
GOOD |
ACCEPTABLE |
| Head Restraint Design |
GOOD |
GOOD |
| Distance from Back of Head |
28 mm |
38 mm |
| Dynamic Test Rating |
GOOD |
ACCEPTABLE |
| Seat Design |
Pass |
Fail |
| Torso Acceleration |
10.7 g’s |
13.3 g’s |
| Neck Force Rating |
Low |
Low |
(Lower numerical results are better in all tests.)
For its performance in IIHS driver-side and passenger-side small overlap frontal, moderate overlap frontal, updated side impact, headlight, daytime pedestrian crash prevention, and nighttime pedestrian crash prevention testing, the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety grants the HR-V its highest rating: “Top Safety Pick Plus” for 2023, a rating granted to only 29 vehicles tested by the IIHS. The Taos is not even a standard “Top Safety Pick.”