The Toyota Camry is the car that helped the Japanese brand establish its image as a maker of ‘whitegoods on wheels’. It’s a boring-to-look-at, boring-to-drive mid-size sedan that only boring people drive, right?
Wrong.
The current Camry is a fantastic (or tragic, it depends on your point-of-view) example of the right car arriving at the wrong time. The current model launched in 2018, replacing the Australian-made Camry, and bringing with it more interesting looks and a more dynamic driving experience.
To put it another way, this is the best Camry Toyota has ever made.
The problem is it arrived when people were abandoning the once strong ‘medium’ sedan market in droves. In 2016, the previous generation Camry, which was a fine car but not a stand-out, sold 26,488 examples (plus a further 3833 Aurions, which were effectively just a V6-powered Camry) in a mid-size market that sold 51,151 cars.
In 2018, the first year the latest Camry was on sale, it found just 15,269 buyers after the market had declined to just 28,749 sales – a 43.7 per cent market decline in just two years.
Which is a shame because Toyota had taken the criticism of the Camry onboard and produced a much better car. The so-called ‘Toyota New Global Architecture’ (TNGA) was introduced to try and inject more excitement into all of its models. Unlike Volkswagen’s ‘MQB’ that’s simply a modular platform that’s shared across a wide variety of models, TNGA is both shared underpinnings but also a design philosophy.
Building the Camry on the new TNGA meant it’s stiffer, has a lower centre-of-gravity and has been tuned to be a more dynamic and engaging driving experience. Basically, the opposite of ‘whitegoods-on-wheels’.
It may not be the clear class-leader in terms of ride and handling, but it’s not far off and is a genuinely nice car to drive for anyone who enjoys it.
Another plus are the options under the bonnet, or at least when it arrived, when it came with the choice of a 2.5-litre four-cylinder petrol, 2.5-litre petrol-electric hybrid and 3.5-litre V6. The V6 was dropped at the start of 2021, which is a shame because it was a nice engine that provided the Camry with plenty of punch and made it feel like a sporty drive.
However, the success of the hybrid is the real mark of the success of the Camry, providing a spacious, five-seat family sedan with excellent fuel economy, just 4.5-litres per 100km.
And all of this came wrapped up in a much more interesting body. Looks are subjective, but love-it-or-hate-it, no-one can accuse the latest Camry of being dull or conservative. It’s a bold look, with a sleeker roofline that puts to rest any whitegoods comments.
Of course, the Camry is still by far the best-selling medium sedan in the country, already notching up more than 3300 sales in the first three months of this year, with its closest rival only managing 374.
But it’s a far cry from the glory days of the Camry, which is ironic because it’s now a much better car than it was when it was more popular.
Keyword: Right car, wrong time: Toyota Camry - why the Mazda6 rival deserves better