As much as we love finding the good in the media test vehicles we are blessed to receive, some are pretty mundane, and some are not very enjoyable to drive in the real world. One of the best vehicles we have tested, and we see from peeking at our colleagues’ reviews that they agree, is the Toyota GR86 sports coupe. This is a vehicle that is easy to call one of the most enjoyable vehicles to drive in the real world we have ever tested.

This is a vehicle that you can experience to its fullest on public roads and not go to jail. If you are fortunate enough to have some track time, this is also the perfect car, and it doesn’t matter if that track is a parking lot rally course, fancy-pants private road course, or a drag strip. The Toyota GR86 excels in all driving scenarios. Having tracked the car (in prior model years) and also driven it on many public roads, we feel its perfect environment is a lonely mountain road, and that is where we took our 2023 GR86 Premium tester.

This heading is not ideally worded. It should read, “Is the Toyota GR86 one of the best cars ever built?” The answer is a resounding “YES!” The GR86 is a fantastic sports car with all the right ingredients. Let’s tick some boxes before we begin heaping praise:

• Rear wheel drive
• Manual transmission (standard)
• Automatic option for those who need or want it
• Sports car brakes and sports car handling
• A playful normally aspirated (non-turbo) engine
• Tiny emergency back seats for your gym bag
• Sexy styling

The GR86 is this writer’s favorite Toyota. Having tested the Supra numerous times, we’d opt for the GR86 any day, and your author is a former Supra owner. The GR86 is the complete package, and since its redesign, it has no fatal flaw.

The GR86 has few true competitors in its price range. We would count among its peers the Subaru BRZ, which is its secret twin brother made in the same factory on the same production line using almost all the same parts. We would also include the Mazda MX5 Miata. Finally, let’s include a grouping we call “Overpriced Euro Cars” just for fun.

If you live within walking distance of a Subaru Dealer (like I do) and love that dealer’s service department (like I do), buy the Subaru BRZ instead of the GR86. These two are nearly identical in all possible ways. Yes, the fanatical followers of both of these cars can name a few differences, like a sway bar diameter or point to a small body design element that is different. Still, from behind the wheel, they elicit the same dopamine rush. Subaru builds the engine, so we assume the Subaru mechanics know how to do all the tricky engine stuff better than their pals working at the local Toyota dealership. Otherwise, the Toyota would be our pick because of the rear-end styling. You get two years of included maintenance with the Toyota but not the Subaru version.

The Mazda Miata is just a bit smaller than the GR86, but if you are over six feet tall, that bit makes a big difference. If you don’t fit in a Miata, buy the GR86. Hey, we did a whole story saying that once! They both give you that lovely tingle when you wring them out on a back road.

Sadly, you can’t even get a moonroof in the GR86, which we missed during our testing. The Miata offers two better roof options. You can get a soft top made from premium textiles by Haartz Corp., based right here. Literally right here. I live a couple of miles from the company’s factory and global HQ in Acton, MA. Or you can get a retractable fast-back hard-top Miata called the RF. So, if you want the hard top looks but also want a convertible, you can have both. We’d pick the soft top, having tested all the variations.

If our long lost Aunt Birkett passed away and left us a Jaguar F-TYPE, Porsche Cayman, Porsche Boxster, or a Maserati GranTurismo down to us, we would probably sell it and buy a GR86. Nah, not really, but we cannot with a serious face tell you that any of them are more fun on public roads than the GR86. Fun fact: during our last time with the GR86, your author chased a Maserati all over central New Hampshire’s best lonely back roads for about a half hour. Boy, was the driver surprised we could keep up! (Car Talk disclaimer! Don't try that at home!)

The GR86 has more capability than any driver on any backcountry road can exploit and not end up in jail or at the bottom of a ravine. More power, bigger tires, thicker paint, and all that jazz will not bring you more joy. The GR86 is as much a sports car as anyone can put to use in the real world, and that is one reason we truly love it. Toyota built the perfect sports car for folks who value driving more than a badge.

If we may be allowed to inject some opinion here, let us start by saying the GR86 is one of the best values of any automobile sold in America today. There are two main versions, and neither is really “better” than the other. The GR86 base costs $30,995, including destination charges. You get the car with high-performance all-season tires, and you can choose either a 6-speed manual or automatic. There is no up-charge for either transmission.

The other option, and the one almost all the dealers are allocated, is the GR86 Premium. It costs $33,595. The Premium adds summer-only tires (boo), heated seats (which you won’t need because you can only drive in summer), and seats with a bit more adjustability.

There is also an orange Special Edition, but we suspect they have all been sold. It costs $35,880.

The GR86 sold today started in model year 2022. It is a different vehicle than the Toyota “86” and Scion FR-S that preceded it. Those were all good cars, but they had imperfect 2.0-liter engines with too little torque and a weird-feeling power band. For 2022, the GR86 was perfected by adding a better 2.4-liter engine. There were styling updates along with a lot of other changes to the new generation. Our review is for the 2023 model year, but the 2022 was pretty much identical. We suspect the next big change will come after 2025 if the GR86 survives the axe. The switch to thin-profit EVs is going to eliminate a lot of low-volume models now on the market.

Nirvana is hard to describe. It’s an emotion, not a collection of words like “Apex, heel-toe shifting, and trail braking.” The folks at Road and Driver pull out all the fancy and obscure terms when they go on a spiel about the GR86. Can we just say the thing will make your face hurt from perma-grin?

The GR86 accelerates with gusto, brakes like a supercar, and is absolutely perfect in a corner. Any corner. One of its best attributes is you can drift it. And we mean you specifically. You need not be Lewis Hamilton to make the GR86 slide perfectly sideways in a corner if you want it to. The GR86 is predictable and one of the safest sports cars you can drive because of this. Do you think you can really test the corner adhesion limits of a Corvette on a public road? We couldn’t even do it on a racetrack with a GM driving instructor sitting beside us. However, ten minutes into a drive in a GR86, you know that limit and how to get to it and back safely.

The GR86 is also like the Miata in an important way. On a back road at 50 MPH, you feel like you are flying along at much greater speed. You take a corner hard, and there is a constable there. You now assume your day is ruined, but when you look down, you are just 9 MPH over the speed limit. S, on you go with no ticket. This is a huge plus for owners. Many of the pricey performance cars we drive feel like you are going slow when you are actually going very, very fast. That is a lot less fun than the experience you get in a GR86. It’s a barrel of monkeys. The most fun you can have with your pants on. All those clever sayings that mean it’s a blast to drive.

The GR86 has the modern safety features found on all vehicles. However, if safety is your primary concern, don’t buy a small, rear-wheel drive sports car. Warning complete, we can tell you that IIHS tested the GR86, and it scored Good on all the tests. NHTSA hasn’t rated the car.

A collaboration between Toyota and any company is never a bad thing. Being a low-volume specialty car is the opposite of good with regard to reliability in most cases, but this particular model has had a long history, and the new generation started in 2022, not 2023. Consumer Reports gives the “86,” as they call it, its Recommended stamp of approval. The predicted reliability rating is three stars out of five. In the 2023 J.D. Power Durability Study, Toyota scored near the top of brands.

We hope you have read this far in our article. We have strong opinions on which GR86 to get. If you plan to drive your GR86 year-round and live above the Mason-Dixon line, don’t drive one home with summer-only ultra-high performance tires. They are unsafe below 40F. They are stupidly unsafe if you plan to drive in sleet, on snow, or on ice. Particularly in a rear-wheel drive vehicle. The Premium trim comes with these unsafe tires according to dealers we spoke with in Massachusetts. So get the Base GR86 if you plan to drive all year round and live where it gets cold. The base also has 17-inch wheels with better sidewalls for handling potholes than the lower profile tires on the Premium’s 18-inch wheels.

If you plan to drive the GR86 every day and you have a commute in city traffic, think hard about how badly you want a stick shift. The GR86 can come equipped with an automatic with paddle shifters at no extra cost. You may have to order one or look harder to find an automatic, but we’ve driven multiple ‘86s with the automatic as media test vehicles. They do exist. The stick shift can be more fun if you know how to drive it and are alone on an empty country road. The automatic will be a much better daily driver in traffic.

We suspect that many shoppers are younger and perhaps first-time new car buyers. If you don’t know how to drive stick already, budget $2,000 for a clutch replacement and budget two of your ten vacation days from work to have it in the shop while it is fixed. If you get the Premium and live where it snows, budget $1,500 to get some all-season tires. Or make sure you have a health care proxy, and your estate plan is in order.

Toyota has one of the shortest warranties in the industry but does include two years of maintenance in the new vehicle purchase price. Thinking of getting an extended warranty? Remember, those don’t cover engine damage from racing, synchro damage from rushed shifts, or smoked clutches.

• Basic: 3 years / 36k miles
• Powertrain: 5 years / 60k miles

Early versions of the GR86 (the FR-S and 86) likely spent a lot of time at the engine’s redline. They probably were speed-shifted a lot. Almost certainly, they were heel-toe shifted, and the driver missed the sweet spot a few times. If you consider a used one, be prepared for stripped synchros in the gearbox and a lot of engine wear. One of the best things about the 2023 GR86 is that it only costs $31K. We would suggest that if you are shopping, try to make the numbers for a new one work.

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