For enhanced safety, the front and rear seat shoulder belts of the Toyota Crown Signia 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 Kia Sportage Hybrid doesn’t offer pretensioners for its rear seat belts.
The Toyota Crown Signia 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 Sportage Hybrid doesn’t offer knee airbags.
The Crown Signia has standard Whiplash Injury Lessening Seats, which use a specially designed seat to protect the driver and front passenger from whiplash. During a rear-end collision, the Whiplash Injury Lessening Seats system allows the backrest to travel backwards to cushion the occupants and the headrests move forward to prevent neck and spine injuries. The Sportage Hybrid doesn’t offer a whiplash protection system.
The Crown Signia has a standard Secondary Collision Brake, which automatically applies the brakes in the event of a crash to help prevent secondary collisions and prevent further injuries. The Sportage Hybrid doesn’t offer a post collision braking system: in the event of a collision that triggers the airbags, more collisions are possible without the protection of airbags that may have already deployed.
To provide maximum traction and stability on all roads, All-Wheel Drive is standard on the Crown Signia. But it costs extra on the Sportage Hybrid.
The Crown Signia has a standard blind spot warning system that uses sensors to alert the driver to objects in the vehicle’s blind spots where the side view mirrors don’t reveal them and moves the vehicle back into its lane. Only the Sportage Hybrid EX/SX-Prestige offers a blind spot warning system.
To help make backing out of a parking space safer, the Crown Signia has standard Rear Cross Traffic Alert and optional Parking Support Brake on the Limited automatically engages the brakes to help avoid a collision. Only the Sportage Hybrid EX/SX-Prestige offers Rear Cross-Traffic Collision Warning.
Both the Crown Signia and the Sportage Hybrid have standard driver and passenger frontal airbags, front side-impact airbags, side-impact head airbags, 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 and available around view monitors.
The Toyota Crown Signia weighs 478 to 678 pounds more than the Kia Sportage Hybrid. The NHTSA advises that heavier vehicles are much safer in collisions than their significantly lighter counterparts.