For enhanced safety, the front and second-row seat shoulder belts of the Subaru Ascent have pretensioners to tighten the seatbelts and eliminate dangerous slack in the event of a collision and force limiters to limit the pressure the belts will exert on the passengers. The Toyota Sequoia doesn’t offer pretensioners for its second-row 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 Ascent are reminded to check the back seat if they opened the rear door before starting out. The Sequoia doesn’t offer a back seat reminder.
The Ascent has standard Whiplash-Reducing Front Seats, which use a specially designed seat to protect the driver and front passenger from whiplash. During a rear-end collision, the Whiplash-Reducing Front Seats system allows the backrest to travel backwards to cushion the occupants and the headrests move forward to prevent neck and spine injuries. The Sequoia doesn’t offer a whiplash protection system.
Over 200 people are killed each year when backed over by motor vehicles. The Ascent (except Base) offers optional Reverse Automatic Braking that use rear sensors to monitor for objects to the rear and automatically apply the brakes to prevent a collision. The Sequoia doesn’t offer backup collision prevention brakes.
Full-time four-wheel drive is standard on the Ascent. Full-time four-wheel drive gives added traction for safety in all conditions, not just off-road, like the only system available on the Sequoia. Four-wheel drive of any type costs extra on the Sequoia.
When descending a steep, off-road slope, the Ascent’s standard Hill Descent Control allows you to creep down safely. The Sequoia doesn’t offer Hill Descent Control.
The Ascent (except Base/Premium) offers an optional Surround View Monitor to allow the driver to see objects all around the vehicle on a screen. The Sequoia only offers a rear monitor and front and rear parking sensors that beep or flash a light. That doesn’t help with obstacles to the sides.
For better protection of the passenger compartment, the Ascent uses safety cell construction with a three-dimensional high-strength frame that surrounds the passenger compartment. It provides extra impact protection and a sturdy mounting location for door hardware and side impact beams. The Sequoia uses a body-on-frame design, which has no frame members above the floor of the vehicle.
Both the Ascent and the Sequoia have standard driver and passenger frontal airbags, front side-impact airbags, driver knee airbags, side-impact head airbags, height adjustable front shoulder belts, plastic fuel tanks, four-wheel antilock brakes, traction control, electronic stability systems to prevent skidding, crash mitigating brakes, daytime running lights, lane departure warning systems, rearview cameras, available blind spot warning systems, rear cross-path warning and driver alert monitors.
Instrumented handling tests conducted by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and analysis of its dimensions indicate that the Ascent is 1.5% less likely to roll over than the Sequoia.
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 Ascent its highest rating: “Top Safety Pick Plus” for 2023, a rating granted to only 29 vehicles tested by the IIHS. The Sequoia has not been tested, yet.