This is the basic VP no frills model with the 5 speed manual, manual windows. Great handling, air conditioning and acceleration with that manual transmission. Often cruising at 80mph and getting an average of 35mpg.
We are in our 60's and making the trip to California in 6 days was not a chore.
I'm over 6' and the seats gave adequate support.
Still original tires and brakes.

A little too much road noise, mostly from the tires.

This car was my gift to my son upon graduation from university in Cambridge, Mass. in 2005.
Now he moved to New York and does not need or want a car so my wife and I picked up the car and drove it to California after helping him move.
The Civic now has 40,500 miles on it.
Great service and support from the dealership in Boston. Can recommend!
We'll be selling it soon.
It has depreciated little in value.

MPG, Reliable, bang for buck, Price... Price... Quality of material, comfort on long trips, handling, That V-tec Noise...

Ebrake, blindspots... Im thinking...

A wonderful fun automobile without wrecking your wallet. I went from an 06 sti to this, the sti was garbage, in 20k it had to be replaced as it was no longer reliable. Just closing the door of the civic would tell you how well it is built. Its quick without being unbarable to handle as a daily driver. The seats are comfortable on long trips, im 6'2" tall, the steering is tight and very precise. Smaller drivers may not like the heads up display, it takes some getting used to, as they may have difficulty seeing, there are a few large blind spots. The E-Brake is in a terrible place. But for the MPG and the performance the car is worth every penny. It has the best manual transmission i have ever driven. I have never owned a manual, and been driving about 13 years now. I average about 36mpg, but i also keep my foot out of the vtec, which is hard since it is my favorite song, sounds so mean...

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Wrx, Corolla XRS, Scion TC, 85 camry, 86 mustang svo,

I love this car. I received this car for my 16th birthday and have had no problems with the car since then. It was new when I received it and it still looks new to this day five years later. It gets excellant gas milage and runs like a beauty.

Dashboard- Manual gearshift, suspension handling, gas mileage reasonable with good acceleration, reliability & quality car.

For the kind of car it is, can't see any weaknesses except for rear view sight dimensions (rear view/side view mirrors with respect to car's dimensions) are not as good as some other cars so be careful in changing lanes making sure you see beyond natural 'blind spots'.

Was bought Used at 36K miles, found out that previous owner wanted to go with a 2006 Si- I have driven it 20K miles through countryside and coastal highways. This was bought used with Tien adjustable shocks having been put on it before I bought it. Superb handling around corners, 5-speed shifter built on dashboard unique design is fully functional, with very good quality shift box for a Honda, and short functional distance from it to steering wheel. This is the Si generation before configuration change in 2006? or 2005?- So looks like a 'door stop' design but with desired looks from most young males 16- 25 it seems. Not a Subaru WSI fast 0-60 type car but relatively faster than most on the road. I use it with surfboard rack on car most of the time which produce probably some kind of drag- 25 - 26 MPG in the City; 28-29 MPG on Highway. Requires hi-Octane , only. Inside cargo hatchback not as spaceful as Toyota Matrix/Pontiac Vibe, or Honda Fit. I would think Mazda 3 drivers would compare there car to this, but you would not find too many of these for sale or on the dealer used car lot too long.

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Nissan Sentra SPEC-V SER (2002- this was Nissan's 2.4 engine high torque car, they decided to do away with and go with 1.8cc. Big mistake, was a good car and road handler), Toyota Matrix Xrs.

Exterior is eye catching. Fun car to drive. Digital speedometer and service reminder tools.

Uncomfortable seats-need lumbar support. Static on radio, especially with cell phone charger. Interior looks cheap with plastic dash.

I've owned three cars, all being Honda's. Both my Accords were great, never had any problems with them. So far I'm a little disappointed with the Civic. I decided to try it our instead of getting another Accord because of the gas mileage and I liked the look of this model. My second day driving it I plugged in my cell phone charger and heard immediate static. Since then, there's been slight static in and out on every station whether the charger is in or not. I took it to the dealer, they checked it out over for a couple of days and said it could not be fixed and they've heard this complaint before. They said that it's just poor reception and there needs to be enough complaints in order for Honda to see it as a problem and come up with a solution. I'm wondering if others have this problem also. I'm disappointed with Honda's "that's the way it is" attitude because I did not buy a new car to have problems already.

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1999 Honda Accord EX V6
1993 Honda Accord EX

V-tec motor, slick shifting 5 speed. All the features and ammenities on EX models. Gas mileage and reliability

expense of replacing cabin filtration filters. Dull styling and high cost of maintenance if you follow the manual to a tee

The car has been pretty reliable so far. I bought the car with 33k on it. I have put 10k on it thus far. So far I have had few problems. The driver seat was loose which was fixed under warranty at 35k. Today, however I went to get gas and the door would not release, I think the cable broke, so I had to get into the trunk and manually open the door. The original Firestone tires were pretty much junk at 33k replaced them with Bridgestone G009's which seem to work just great. Best gas mileage so far was 41.5 MPG on the freeway at 71MPH with the moonroof open and no air. This past winter the gas mileage has seemed to diminished. I average around 27MPG in town. The 5 speed is very easy to use even with a light touch, however sometimes I hear a slight grown when I depress the clutch, but Oh well. The radio is very underpowered when I was used to Bose in my Camaro. With gas prices the way the are, however I would recommend a Civic to anyone who is looking for a car with great gas mileage and above average reliability

No maintenance
Great Gas mileage
Very reliable

A little small in the back seat.

A wonderful car. I have driven it for 6 years, with 90k miles and have had next to no up keep. I just got hit and my car was totaled, I am very sad to see it go. It has really been such reliable, wonderful car for me for the past 6 years. It does great on long road trips. The gas mileage is excellent! Sad to see it go :( But I am having fun looking for new cars!

It's a Honda.

Way too noisy!!

This is my 4th Honda Civic and I can't believe the incredible road noise when on the freeway. It sounds like the wind is whistling through the windows. After a one hour drive on the freeway I could not wait to get out of the car as I now had a massive headache. The noise is so bad I am considering getting rid of the car.

Highway MPG
Honda reliability

City mpg
lack of Honda quality (interior, exterior, paint, etc, etc)
road noise
lack of torque

So far this civic is "ok" There's seriously nothing amazing about it, especially for the premium you pay over other cars (mazda 3, scion tc, others in its class, etc etc) I bought this car because i thought the quality would at least meet or beat the quality of my 96 accord.. man was i wrong.. i'll cover those in the weaknesses though. The car is a bit underpowered, it's mainly the lack of torque. It wouldn't hurt Honda to give us another 10-15lb's of torque to get around the city traffic without pushing past 3k. I hate gassing the crap out of my car just to keep up with granny in her camry or corolla. I only get good gas mileage on long trips, you won't see anywhere even close to 30mpg if you live in/near a big city. I live in LA and i need to deal with suburban traffic.. i've been getting 23mpg city like many others on 8thgencivic.com. On the hwy/freeway though, it's a different story. I got 37mpg going 75mph, and supposedly u can get 45+mpg if you're going around or below 60mph. highway mileage is GREAT. The transmission is smooth only when upshifting, any other time, is is really uncomfortable. Another thing is that the engine is quiet only below 2krpm's, any higher and it's quiet loud and annoying. There's also a lot of road noise, possibly because of the turanza tires, but the road noise is ridiculous on the highway. I drove the car to cabazon and the car isn't stable in crosswinds, the car was being pushed left n right the whole time. The car also isn't THAT stable on hwy speeds also, some freeways (certain parts of the 10) had the car shaking violently.

The a/c isn't that great. Look for threads on 8thgencivic.com and you'll see threads on why the a/c sucks. I had some repairs done to the civic and i got a rental 06 nissan sentra for 3 days. All i can say that is the sentra is MUCH MORE FUN to drive, and the a/c works really well compared to the civic.

There's enough room inside, but definitely not comfy for long trips, and not for people 6ft+. Especially the ebrake location. The rear seating is really comfy, mainly because of the flat floor, but overall it doesn't have enough head or leg room. I'm only 5'9" and i can't sit comfortably if someone my size was sitting in the front seat.

The styling (front) is AMAZING, and thats actually all thats good about the car. I get lots of people looking. I should have gotten a coupe though, it looks a lot better.

I've only had this car for 9k miles and it's already showing it's age. There are rattles EVERYWHERE, lots of paint chips on the bumper, clear coat is extremely thin and fragile, windows/windshield is also as fragile. Also, many interior panels aren't aligned correctly creating rattles. Definitely lacks Honda's "quality"

Overall i would say that unless you drove for really long distances (hwy) everyday, this isn't a great car.

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1996 Honda Accord EX Sedan

gas mileage

rear tire wear, possibly rear suspension

I bought my Civic in July of '06 and currently have 18000 miles. Up until recently the car has been wonderful. Rides great and I get between 30 and 33 mpg with an equal mix of city/highway.

A week ago I took my car in for service for a noise and vibration in the rear end. After checking it out the dealer told me I needed to replace the rear tires because they were excessively worn and "choppy". They said the front tires were fine. The factory tires are Bridgestone Turanza EL400-02. I decided to do a little research before spending the money myself on 2 new tires. I've found a few posts online in various places about the same problem with the tires at roughly the same mileage. A few made reference to a misaligned rear suspension. If you look at the car from the back you can clearly see the tires sitting at an angle like this / . I've looked at all the other civics i've seen since then and all of them have the same angle with the rear tires. I've looked up the Civic on the NHTSA website for service issues but none made reference to this problem. I will be taking my car back to the dealer and hopefully get the problem with the suspension/tires repaired at their cost.

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2003 Honda Civic EX coupe
1998 Honda Civic DX coupe