In the 100,000 miles I’ve driven it, the Volt hasn’t needed a single repair.
I wanted to try electric but need to go 250+ miles on a charge, so going pure electric wasn’t option. (The Volt runs exclusively on battery power but then switches to gas). I bought mine used with 29K miles for the fuel efficiency, but ended up l actually liking the car.
When it was new in 2010, a fully charged battery used to last 42 miles. It now only holds 37 so that’s degraded a bit (but it still gets 40 MPG after switching to gas). Now with 129,000 miles, used Volts like this now cost less than $6,000, so buying at that price, the savings in gas alone would likely more than offset any monthly payments.
The sound system is sublime.
Negatives: The lines of sight in the car are horrible all the way around. Pedestrians approaching the corners of the windshield are at times completely blocked from view. I check my blindspots twice when changing lanes and still don’t feel confident. At intersections I’m constantly having to lean forward and crane my head up to see the stoplight. One line of sight that’s incredibly good is the rear view mirror when the cargo area is fully loaded—totally packed and I can still see completely unobstructed through the back window. Still amazed.
The battery runs below the center of the car, so there’s no center seat in back (four seats total). However, like most hatchbacks, the seats fold down so there’s tons of cargo room. Also, now that I’m out of warranty territory, I installed a trailer hitch for towing trailers/cargo platforms.
An annoyance that probably applies to new high tech cars in general: it beeps too much: always beeping randomly for all kinds of unnecessary stuff.
But speaking of beep features in a good way, this is the first car I’ve had with the additional friendly horn option. All cars need these—especially every car in Chicago, Rome, and NYC.
