What is considered "poor gas mileage?"?

Question

I know that ultimately it depends on the vehicle, but it seems that the term is more biased and opinionated than anything else. For example, I recently read a news article about the latest ford explorer police vehicles and how they compared to the crown vics from not long ago, and the article said the crown vic got "poor gas mileage." Sure, the crown vic is a big, full size body-on-frame, rwd car weighing in at around 4200 lbs, but you could manage 24 mpg on the highway. For a car of those dimensions, I consider that to be pretty good mileage compared to the old boxy chevy caprices used throughout the 80s to early 90s which got maybe 18-19 mpg on the highway on a good day and they weren't that much heavier. When the Ford Pinto debuted way back before I was born, I remember watching a clip of the commercial for the car and it said it could get up to 25 mpg. Back then, that was considered phenomenal fuel economy and the pinto was smaller and lighter than the last generation of crown vic. I'm willing to bet that in the future, if vehicles are still running on fossil fuels, anything that gets less than 60 mpg is probably gonna be considered "poor gas mileage." Its just the way the times are I guess. I dunno. What are your thoughts?

? · Accepted Answer

I think that you are exactly right. good or bad is all based on a personal opinion. sure you could go and say that if a car goes above or below the expected mileage for its size power and weight is good or bad but ultimately it's all a personal rating. a pickup truck that gets 30 mpg is amazing but a hybrid subcompact that does the same is just shameful. in my opinion, I like to specify that any single vehicle that gets less than 80 the mileage specified by the manufacturer/government is getting poor milleage probably due to some mechanical issue or just the way it is driven.

one of the reasons why I just recently changed car was that I was getting really bad milleage with a 2002 blazer. sure you can't expect it to be very good in the first place but I was well below what I was supposed to be getting and an inspection and tune up couldn't find what was wrong. now the car I have is much smaller and lighter with a smaller engine so it is specified to get much better fuel economy. luckily for me, I am getting much closer to what the EPA rating is so I am happy. sure it's not really great compared to other cars but for what it is, the car I have now is doing great.

Logan · Answer

Anything under 22 would be considered, to me, bad gas mileage

fodaddy19 · Answer

I consider 15MPG or worse (overall MPG), to be poor for a daily driver. Anything over 20 MPG overall is good in my opinion.

What is considered "poor gas mileage?"?

3 Answers