Dong99

I did not look at a highlander hybrid limited, so I do not know if this version is better than a regular highlander. To my eyes, the material in a regular highlander is a few notches lower in quality when compared to RX, especially leather and plastic - which are pretty much 90% of the surface in the cabin. Wood surface are all covered with PU paint anyway, so it does not really matter than much, as long as it looks good to your eyes.

Another thing is the finish or details of highlander is clearly in the "mass" mode, for example there are visible sharp plastic edges in highlander cabin (not in a place where it can hurt or cut you, but you can clearly see it if you exam the car carefully). Inside RX, everything looks nice and it seems a great deal of thoughts went into the design and the whole thing was put together carefully without cutting corners (as far as I can see).

This is just my person opinion, and in no way I am talking down the highlander, it is a very nice SUV. However, as someone else said, it is not a Lexus. Once again, they are not in the same league, for the difference in cost, they better not be!

UCSB

When I was shopping for my RX450h last September, Lexus was discounting the RX more than Toyota was discounting the Highlander Hybrid. This closed the difference in cost between the two to about $2,000 ($51,957 MSRP FWD 450h vs Higlander Limited Hybrid $47,000 MSRP). This made the RX 450h a much better deal. I purchased the 450h.

I took the Highlander out a number of times. The more I drove the car, the more I disliked it. The high cost of the hybrid Highlander also didn't seem to make economic sense to me.

One thing to keep in mind, both of these vehicles are pretty big. My wife was coming out of a Jeep Grand Cherokee Limited v8. After driving the 450h for a week she wished that she I gone with something smaller. I went down and picked-up a Subaru Outback Limited 2.5i CVT PZEV. She is really happy with this vehicle because it gives her all of the utility she wanted, AWD and is very easy to drive. It is just as comfortable as the RX and cost $17,000 less. Plus I can squeak up to 33 MPG Highway out of it ... sort of makes hybrids like the Highlander pointless. I now have two cars that I am driving ... one being her former RX. Pick carefully ...