For enhanced safety, the front and rear seat shoulder belts of the Honda Civic 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 Prius doesn’t offer pretensioners for its rear seat belts.
The Honda Civic 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 Prius doesn’t offer a front passenger side knee airbag.
Using vehicle speed sensors and seat sensors, smart airbags in the Civic deploy with different levels of force or don’t deploy at all to help better protect passengers of all sizes in different collisions. The Civic’s side airbags will shut off if a child is leaning against the door. The Prius’ side airbags don’t have smart features and will always deploy full force.
Compared to metal, the Civic’s plastic fuel tank can withstand harder, more intrusive impacts without leaking; this decreases the possibility of fire. The Toyota Prius has a metal gas tank.
Both the Civic and the Prius have standard driver and passenger frontal airbags, front and rear side-impact airbags, driver knee 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, lane departure warning systems, rearview cameras, driver alert monitors, available blind spot warning systems, rear parking sensors and rear cross-path warning.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration does 35 MPH front crash tests on new vehicles. In this test, results indicate that the Honda Civic is safer than the Toyota Prius:
|
|
Civic |
Prius |
|
|
Driver |
|
| STARS |
5 Stars |
4 Stars |
| Neck Injury Risk |
30% |
33% |
| Neck Stress |
241 lbs. |
323 lbs. |
| Neck Compression |
23 lbs. |
51 lbs. |
New test not comparable to pre-2011 test results. More stars = Better. Lower test results = Better.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration does side impact tests on new vehicles. In this test, which crashes the vehicle into a flat barrier at 38.5 MPH and into a post at 20 MPH, results indicate that the Honda Civic is safer than the Toyota Prius:
|
|
Civic |
Prius |
|
|
Front Seat |
|
| STARS |
5 Stars |
5 Stars |
| Chest Movement |
.7 inches |
.8 inches |
| Hip Force |
286 lbs. |
373 lbs. |
|
|
Into Pole |
|
| STARS |
5 Stars |
5 Stars |
| Max Damage Depth |
12 inches |
12 inches |
| HIC |
260 |
267 |
New test not comparable to pre-2011 test results. More stars = Better. Lower test results = Better.
Instrumented handling tests conducted by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and analysis of its dimensions indicate that the Civic, with its five-star roll-over rating, is 1.2% less likely to roll over than the Prius, which received a four-star rating.
For its performance in IIHS driver-side and passenger-side small overlap frontal, moderate overlap frontal, updated side impact, headlight, and daytime pedestrian crash prevention testing, the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety grants the Civic the rating of “Top Safety Pick” for 2023, a rating granted to only 54 vehicles tested by the IIHS. The Prius last would have qualified as a “Top Safety Pick” in 2018.