2022 Toyota Sienna Platinum Quick Drive: Revisiting Footrests in Minivans

In a former career I helped design minivan interiors, so despite raising no brood of my own, I have a special place in my heart for sliding-door seven- or eight-seaters. Having just spent a week in the 2022 Toyota Sienna—and upon noticing that this vehicle has risen to first place in our MotorTrend Ultimate Car Rankings, I felt the need to weigh in again on this recent fourth-place comparison-test finisher and member of an elite microsegment—the minivan, with footrests.

Minivans are not fashion statements. (And water is wet, we know.) They become members of the family, helping make memories on vacation road trips; enabling spontaneous purchases of large, bulky items; and making the loading of people and their stuff easier. So when companies completely lose sight of that mission in pursuit of some other perceived priority—like producing a minivan with footrests—the end product no longer qualifies as a minivan in my book. Which is why I strenuously objected to the Kia Carnival SX as winner of our most recent minivan comparison test. Its middle-row footrest-equipped seats are not removable, they can't be folded flat, and they can't be moved out of the way to ease third-row entry/exit. That's a minivan fail.

But the Toyota Sienna Platinum's much savvier captain's chairs feature a lever that tilts the seatback forward while simultaneously lifting the front of the bottom cushion and unlocking the seat slider mechanism, so it can slide right up tight behind the front. This makes it easy to climb in or out of the third row and frees up a full 4-foot-by-6-foot cargo area when the third row is folded into the floor. And because everything's manual, it's lighter and you never have to patiently wait for electric motors to do their thing.

I managed to fit head- and footboards for a queen-size bed, a lawn mower, and many boxes of miscellaneous stuff in the back of a footrested Sienna, which would have been impossible in a Kia Carnival SX.

My Hybrid Synergy Drive AWD model delivered 28-plus mpg during my wintry week in it (summer temps and front-drive would elevate these numbers, but the hybrid is the only engine offered). That's certainly likable, and the extreme engine noise and coarseness my colleagues complained about in our comparison test of the 2021-model Platinum hybrid didn't seem to afflict this 2022—or perhaps they were drowned out during my experience by the snow packed into the wheelwells and crunching under the tires. We also love the high front center console that flies over a giant storage area for purses or diaper bags, and the Noble Brown two-tone interior, which looks like a deep purply maroon color.

The brake feel is inexcusably bad, which is hard to forgive from a company that has been tuning blended regenerative and friction braking since the Prius went on sale in Japan in 1997. The rate the van slows in response to pedal pressure always seems nonlinear and unpredictable. And the infotainment system isn't as crystal clear or intuitive as the very latest such systems.

It may not be the fun-to-drive champ of minivans, but in the categories that count the most to minivan consumers, it's about the minivaniest minivan out there—at least among minivans with footrests. Want peak van? Buy something with foldable and/or entirely removable second-row seats and bring pillows to rest your feet on.