Pilot vs. Highlander: The $1,694 Gap That Fuel Explains

Over five years, the 2022 Toyota Highlander costs $31,738 to own. The 2025 Honda Pilot costs $33,432. That $1,694 gap is not huge, but it is consistent, and it is almost entirely explained by one thing: fuel. If you drive a lot, or gas prices climb, that gap grows. If you barely drive, it nearly disappears. The Highlander is the cheaper car to own, and the numbers are not particularly close on fuel economy.

Take the Highlander. It saves you about $28 per month compared to the Pilot over a five-year average. That is not life-changing money, but it is a tank of gas every time it shows up. The Pilot offers a newer model year and a slightly fresher feature set, but you are paying for it in fuel costs every single week you own it. If you are cross-shopping these two, the Highlander wins on pure cost unless something specific about the Pilot's design is worth that premium to you.

The Real Story in the Numbers Is Not Depreciation

Both cars share identical depreciation curves in this comparison: $3,400 in year one, then $2,158, $1,589, $1,157, and $936 in years two through five. Insurance is identical too, at $1,440 per year each. Registration matches dollar for dollar. So depreciation, insurance, and registration are a wash. Completely. That means the only places where these cars differ are fuel, maintenance, and repairs.

Fuel does the most work. Over five years, the Pilot burns through $12,193 in fuel. The Highlander costs $10,668. That is a $1,525 difference from fuel alone, which accounts for about 90 percent of the total five-year gap. Maintenance and repairs make up the rest, and those differences are smaller than you might expect.

Side-by-Side: Every Number That Matters

Category	2025 Honda Pilot	2022 Toyota Highlander
Total Five-Year Cost	$33,432	$31,738
Monthly Average	$557	$529
Fuel (5 yr)	$12,193	$10,668
Maintenance (5 yr)	$2,924	$2,707
Repairs (5 yr)	$1,620	$1,668
Depreciation (5 yr)	$9,240	$9,240
Insurance (5 yr)	$7,200	$7,200
Registration (5 yr)	$255	$255

One number in that table might surprise you: repairs. The Pilot actually costs $48 less in repairs over five years than the Highlander. It is a small difference, and it should not move the needle on your decision, but it does push back slightly against any assumption that a newer Honda is automatically riskier to own than a Toyota.

Year by Year: When Does the Highlander Pull Ahead?

Year one looks almost identical for both cars. The Highlander runs $4,476 versus the Pilot's $4,789, a gap of $313. Most of that is fuel. Depreciation, insurance, and registration are the same.

By year three, the Highlander has opened up a cumulative lead of roughly $900. Year four is the expensive year for both vehicles. Maintenance spikes to $1,335 for the Pilot and $1,236 for the Highlander. That is likely the timing belt or major scheduled service interval, depending on trim and engine configuration. Budget for it regardless of which car you choose.

Year five is the cheapest year for maintenance on both cars ($289 Pilot, $268 Highlander), but repair costs are climbing. The Pilot reaches $510 in projected repairs in year five; the Highlander hits $525. These numbers reflect the normal aging process of a used vehicle, not a red flag for either model specifically. But if you are buying at under 30,000 miles today, years four and five of your ownership window put these cars closer to 60,000 to 80,000 miles. That is when some owners start to see unscheduled work.

The Highlander leads in every single year. It never falls behind. That consistency matters more than any single-year figure.

Which One Is More Likely to Surprise You at the Shop?

Repair costs in our calculator reflect expected averages, but averages hide variance. A car with a good reliability record hits close to average. A car with a spotty record can blow well past it in a single visit.

According to RepairPal, the Toyota Highlander earns a reliability rating of 4.0 out of 5.0, ranking it second out of 14 midsize SUVs. Average annual repair cost is $489. Serious issues, meaning repairs with a probability greater than a typical unplanned visit, are relatively rare.

The Honda Pilot earns a RepairPal reliability rating of 3.5 out of 5.0, ranking it seventh out of 14 midsize SUVs. Average annual repair cost is $542. Neither of these is a problem vehicle. But the Highlander has a meaningfully better track record, and that record helps explain why our five-year repair projections stay close even as the Pilot skews slightly lower in year-by-year totals.

The 2025 Pilot introduced a new platform and a new turbocharged four-cylinder engine in the 2023 redesign. That engine is relatively new to the road with limited long-term data. If long-term unknowns bother you, the Highlander's established V6 and its known reliability history is the lower-risk choice.

The Fuel Gap in Real Dollars Per Month

The 2025 Honda Pilot is rated by the EPA at 20 city / 27 highway MPG for the standard front-wheel-drive configuration. The 2022 Toyota Highlander comes in at 21 city / 29 highway MPG in comparable trim.

That two-to-three MPG advantage for the Highlander translates to roughly $25 per month in fuel savings using our year-one figures ($2,343 Pilot versus $2,050 Highlander, divided by 12). As fuel prices rise in years two through five, that monthly gap holds steady or widens slightly. Over the full five years, the Highlander saves you the equivalent of about eight full tanks of gas compared to the Pilot, just on fuel economy alone.

That may sound modest. But these are the kinds of savings that compound in the background without any effort on your part.

Who Should Buy Which Car

Buy the 2022 Toyota Highlander if you drive more than 12,000 miles per year, you are sensitive to fuel costs, or you want a vehicle with a long and well-documented reliability record. The Highlander's lower fuel burn does more work the more you drive. At 15,000 miles per year, that fuel gap grows meaningfully compared to our baseline estimates. The Highlander also gives you a proven powertrain with years of owner data behind it. If your goal is simply to spend as little as possible owning a three-row midsize SUV, this is the answer. The $1,694 savings is real, it is driven by a consistent MPG advantage, and it requires no trade-off in depreciation, insurance, or registration costs.

Buy the 2025 Honda Pilot if you specifically want the newer model year for its updated safety technology, interior design, or feature set, and you are not primarily motivated by minimizing cost. The Pilot is not a bad value. It is just not the cheaper option. Buyers who prioritize a more recent redesign, plan to keep the car closer to the 30,000-mile starting point and not push into high-mileage territory, or who find a strong purchase price on a specific Pilot that offsets the running costs, can justify the choice. But go in with clear eyes: you are paying about $28 more per month, almost entirely in gasoline, for the privilege of a newer platform. Decide whether that trade is worth it to you before you sign anything.

There is no scenario where the Pilot costs less to own than the Highlander over five years, based on these numbers. The Highlander wins. The only real question is whether something about the Pilot is worth $1,694 to you personally.