2023 Subaru Legacy Touring XT is a split-personality sedan

2023 Subaru Legacy 2.4 Touring XT vs. 2023 Nissan Altima 2.0 SR: A battle with boredom.

This week: Subaru Legacy

Price: $38,715

Conventional wisdom: Edmunds likes the “standard all-wheel drive for excellent wet-weather traction; comfortable ride and seats; available turbocharged engine provides robust power,” but not the “tepid acceleration from base engine, touchscreen interface can be distracting to use, intrusive engine stop-start system.”

Marketer’s pitch: “Love, for all the right reasons.”

Reality: Love means sometimes having to say you’re sorry.

What’s new: The Legacy receives some refreshing outside, along with packaging changes inside.

The Legacy got a redesign in 2020. But there seems to be a lot of what’s old, for better or for worse.

Competition: In addition to the Altima, there are the Kia K5, Hyundai Sonata, Honda Accord, Volkswagen Passat, Kia Stinger.

Up to speed: Acceleration to 60 mph takes just 6.1 seconds with the 2.4-liter turbo four-cylinder tested engine, according to Car and Driver, and that’s a pretty snappy pace.

The power delivery could bring back one’s youth. The youthfulness of, say, someone who is inexperienced behind the wheel, and alternates between feathering the accelerator and then roaring out of the driveway.

I’m hardly inexperienced, so it was all the Legacy’s fault. I never knew which Legacy I was going to get: Mario Andretti’s or the one that belongs to the old man in the hat with his left blinker on. Normally, surprises are fun. These surprises are not.

Over time, the Legacy and I settled into a comfort zone, and I could go decent distances without the random acceleration. But it never lasted.

Lesser Legacies get a non-turbo 2.5-liter four-cylinder.

The jerks would come back: Testing cars these days is more fun than it used to be, and yet not as fun as it used to be. In the early 2010s, I could periodically count on a vehicle to be so subpar that I’d wonder, “Didn’t the engineers ever sit in a different brand of vehicle?”

In the case of the Legacy, I could ask, “Didn’t the engineers ever sit in another Subaru?” I’ve been in the Outback Wilderness and several incarnations of the Crosstrek, the Forester, and Impreza, but I’ve never had a Subaru so balky on the downshifts. At one point, turning on to every street became another adventure in “How long will this car take to decide on a transmission position?” Again, this settled down occasionally, and just when I was thinking “Oh, boy, I’d better revise that review,” the jerks would come back.

Running the CVT in shift mode does help clear up most of that, but some of us are tired and don’t feel like shifting.

On the road: While acceleration and gear changing are random, the handling is at least predictable. Predictable, like aging parents dozing in front of the TV every evening.

Keeping “safe”: Predictable handling is not the default, though. Drivers have to know to press the little car icon on the touchscreen to access the lane assist, and turn it off immediately. It really messes with the handling. I’m not usually a fan of lane assist, but I actively despise this version.

Play some tunes: The giant 11.6-inch touchscreen aims for verticality, similar to a Volvo’s (but integrated in the dashboard).

Knobs control volume and tuning, and the touchscreen handles everything else. Adjusting the equalizer can be a challenge, as steady aim is required.

Sound from the system is OK, about a B+, maybe stretching to an A-.

Driver’s Seat: Drivers should at least enjoy the seat and the setup. It’s roomy and comfortable, and the dashboard is fairly easy to follow along.

Friends and stuff: Rear-seat passengers should be happy campers. Legroom and headroom are both spacious. Foot room is not bad, although size 11½s are a little long to squeeze under the seat comfortably. The middle-seat passenger is not too bad off, as the floor hump is not huge, especially considering the all-wheel-drive components tucked underneath.

The 15.1-cubic-foot trunk is generous and the seats folded down to create an even larger cargo area.

Keeping warm and cool: Toggles control the temperature and buttons in the bottom of the touchscreen all the rest. The touchscreen buttons require the precision of the old Operation game.

Fuel economy: I averaged in the very low 20s on trips around the region, without much chance to get the Legacy onto the highway.

Also the trip computer is way optimistic. It started out reporting 450 miles of range and dropped to 240 after I drove 90 miles. I’m an enthusiastic driver, but that’s a bit much.

Where it’s built: Lafayette, Ind.

How it’s built: Consumer Reports predicts the Legacy reliability to be a 3 out of 5.

Next week: Nissan Altima.