Honda And Toyota Should Eclipse The 2026 Forester Wilderness, But Subaru Surprised Me

Some model year updates for cars are minimal — a USB charging port or two, here, or a new seat fabric there — and sometimes it's an entirely different car, as is the case with the 2026 Subaru Outback. The 2026 Subaru Forester Wilderness, meanwhile, fits right in the middle of that spectrum. There are a few hardware additions that make result in material differences over the previous model year, and there are some quality of life improvements that maybe don't necessitate the purchase of an entirely new car, but nonetheless make life a little easier for owners.

Having already driven a number of different Subaru Foresters of all trims and powertrains, and enjoyed all of them, the latest and greatest Forester Wilderness was a welcome sight in my driveway. As for what sets this Wilderness model apart from the 2025 model, Subaru says it has a higher ground clearance, improved cooling for better towing (that's up to 3,500 pounds, now, from the old car's 3,000 pounds), and a few tweaks to the all-wheel drive system to make it more off-roady. The less material changes include a different grille and some flashier stitching on the inside.

Powering this Forester is a 2.5-liter boxer-four that should be familiar to every Subaru owner. It passes 180 horsepower and 178 pound-feet of torque through a not-all-that-exciting CVT. Fuel economy is an estimated 24 miles per gallon in the city and 28 miles per gallon on the highway. 

Like every other Forester on paper, that doesn't seem all that exciting. It looks like just a Forester with a lift kit, and the regular Forester looks like an Impreza with a lift kit. But looks don't give you the entire story. After all, most Subarus are just fine specs-wise, yet the brand has a devoted following, so it clearly delivers in the intangibles department as well. 

When it came to driving the Forester Wilderness, it was noticeably less harsh than the Crosstrek Wilderness. Road noise was less noticeable, and the interior felt a little less like a PlaySkool toy. The addition of the optional Harman Kardon sound system was appreciated as well. I suspect the tweaks to the standard equipment tires and adjustments to the drivetrain helped in the comfort factor.

To give the Forester a chance to impress, I drove up to Amish country in Pennsylvania for the time-honored Hevesy Family tradition of buying discount groceries and perusing vinyl record stores somewhere new and exciting. 

Given that Pennsylvania's roads aren't all that great on a sunny Summer day, the Wilderness's soft-road bona fides helped a bit on the cold, wet, and bumpy route through Lancaster. It didn't complain, no matter how many potholes I couldn't avoid or horse and buggy pairings I had to overtake. It's a competent car for driving conditions that might be a little flummoxing for more standard SUVs.

All that said, it's boring to drive. The CVT offers no real thrills beyond its simple contribution to moving the car forward, and the steering feel is pedestrian. It's not particularly lithe in any given sense, to the point you could describe the experience as very nearly forgettable. However — and this is a big "however" — the Forester Wilderness doesn't advertise itself as a canyon carver rally car, so you can't be too surprised at its workaday spirit. 

The interior has been revised, including with what Subaru calls "StarTex" material which promises to better resist water and be easier to clean. Living in Maryland and Pennsylvania in the late fall and winter means that your shoes will always have some degree of mud on them, and I can attest that the Forester Wilderness's interior stood up to some ample punishment. 

For families, that would serve it well in the fight against crumbled up Goldfish crackers and a contents of an entire box of Cheerios and/or dog food spread liberally through the entire surface area of the cabin. For the more adventurous, it offers some peace of mind that your mountain biking gear covered in dust isn't going to hurt anything on the inside.

Subaru's StarLink infotainment system remains laggy and sometimes unresponsive, though it's serviceable enough in this application. The 2026 Outback gets Subaru's much-improved infotainment.

Cost of entry to the 2026 Subaru Forester Wilderness is $38,385 (up from the base Forester model's $29,995) and that gives you a 9.3 inch ground clearance, roof rails with an 800 pound holding capacity, skid plates, big knobby tires on 17-inch wheels, and Wilderness badges everywhere. The plainly named "Optional Package" gets you the Harman Kardon sound system, a color digital instrument cluster, and a power liftgate. It's $2,200. The River Rock Pearl paint job is $395. Add in the $1,450 destination charge and you get to $42,430.

That puts it towards the upper echelon of Subarus as far as price, but that's not saying much when other brands have no issue exceeding $50,000 for off-roady SUVs. The 2026 Toyota RAV4 with its similarly vibed Woodland edition starts at $39,900. However, it has the benefit of being a hybrid with much better fuel economy at 41 miles per gallon. Towing capacity is the same at 3,500 pounds. 

Here, though, is where I'm going to argue for the Forester, even though it — on paper at least — falls short of the similarly priced Toyota.

The Forester Wilderness is just cooler. The go-anywhere and do-anything attitude that it exudes won me over; I wouldn't think twice about actually buying one. Despite the pedestrian dynamics from behind the wheel, I just liked driving it, and I like the overall feeling it's going for. If I had a wishlist, a hybrid drivetrain — or the turbocharger from the Outback XT – would be toward the top of it, but it's pretty darn good as is. There's a reason why the Forester is so popular: the whole package just works. It's a cohesive experience. 

Compared to a Toyota or Honda, you could well argue the Subaru comes in third: it's really easy to look entirely at specs, numbers, and preconceptions towards a brand's supposed place in the car world, and reach a conclusion on that alone. Funny, then, that the Subaru wins on pure vibes.