Toyota Axio Fielders: A comprehensive user review

Our "national" car, the Toyota Axio has been the most common compact sedan in Bangladesh for the better part of a decade. 

Throw in a bit of chilli and onion to the mix, you can get its sleeker, more practical cousin, the Axio Fielder. 

The utilitarian Corolla wagons have seen something of a renaissance, with more and more choosing the attractive cousin over the generic sedan. 

Team Wheels sat down with a few Fielder owners, to figure out what made them choose the JDM grocery wagon over any other car. Here is what they had to say.  

2018 Fielder WXB

Sami Ashraf  

I love wagons. I have had a few. We have owned station wagons ever since I was a child. I have driven three Fielders before buying this one. Compared to the last one that I drove (2011 model), this is much better.

I was very shocked to get a mileage of 18.9KMPL in mid-level city traffic on eco mode. I used to get 15-16KMPL on my old one and that too on empty roads during Eid. 

They have added a few simple features that I like a lot. When you put the car in reverse, the left-hand mirror tilts down to the wheels to assist the driver. 

The keyless entry is much more efficient now. I used to own a Premio which had some issues with the feature. The Fielder, on the other hand, responds very quickly. 

The DRL (daytime running lights) is a nice addition. Roads, especially highways, are much more visible. It also comes with traction control and lane assist. 

So far, among all the cars I have driven, if we talk about mid-range cars, I will say the 2018 Fielder provides an experience quite similar to premium vehicles.

However, there are a few things I do not like. 

This car comes with an auto stop feature that is unreliable for Bangladesh's road conditions. It is not good for the engine as well. There is no option to turn this feature off permanently. 

The electronic steering system is not efficient either. It feels like someone else is turning the car for me and that is something I do not like. Any car person would want a car that is fully in his/her control. 

The digital cluster came in Japanese. It can be switched to English, but it does not work for every feature. 

Another very problematic issue is the lack of the temperature gauge, which has been replaced with a small button-like indicator that turns red when the engine temperature is too high. It means you get a warning only when the engine gets overheated, not when or where it will get overheated.  

In total, I would give the 2018 Fielder WXB 8 out of 10. 

2014 Fielder G

Mahbub Hussain

I got my fielder to travel from point A to B, and it serves that purpose. 

It is the first "new" car I got, as compared to my last purchase - a 2000 Evo 6 - the 2014 Fielder is a pretty good car.  

The first owner registered it in 2020 and only used it for 6,000KM, so it still has the new car smell. The wagon had covered around 45,000KM before I bought it and I added another 2,500KM to the odometer in the past two months.

Station wagon options in this country are very limited. 

Growing up, I could only see a handful of Lancers and Honda Odyssey, along with a fair few from Nissan. However, the only thing we consistently got since I was a kid was the Corolla wagon, from the KE30/20 platform. 

Wagons were not very popular back then, it was only toward the 2000s they started gaining recognition in Bangladesh. It was good to see as I have always wanted one. To me, the Fielder looks better than the sedan.

Given the fact that it is a hybrid, the first thing I expected was good mileage. During traffic, I get about 16-17KMPL, while cruising on a relatively free road or highway, I get about 22-25KMPL, with one instance, I even clocked 30KMPL. 

Performance-wise, because of the hybrid platform, you would not feel like pushing it anymore after you hit triple digits. Although it can go faster, the fun threshold of this car is 60-100KMPH. 

The hybrid system adds around 100KG to the car weight which affects the ride height. I did not put an additional buffer in my suspension to increase the ride height, so when I have passengers in the back, I have to look out for a lot of speed bumps within the city. 

My car does not have fog and projection lamps. Toyota has them as options, it is just the car I got did not come with them. 

The infotainment system that came with the car is either from Thailand or Taiwan and was tweaked by the importers. The sound quality is good, I got four surround speakers on the doors from Toyota and I am not a person who listens to a great amount of music.

One feature the Fielder lacks is the looks, particularly from the front. 

Toyota could have made the nose a bit sleeker, but maybe they did not due to Japanese safety standards. The curved upfront nose helps during driving and navigating tight corners, so I believe to achieve that result. 

In total, I would give the fielder 7-8 out of 10. 

2013 Fielder X

Ayan Rahman Khan

Experience? Fun factor? Non-existent. Hotel? Trivago. 

These wagons are purpose-built for practicality and decent levels of comfort at a budget without throwing a fuss. The engine goes "brrrr" and the car moves forward. As simple as that. 

I can, however, imagine a Fielder WXB Hybrid on coilovers being a bit of a hoon, although that is stretching the definition of "hoon" quite a bit. 

They are easy to place on the road and manoeuvre in traffic, even though these are station wagons and thus, are slightly bigger than your average sedan. 

I get around 9KMPL in terms of mileage from my personal non-hybrid Fielder while hybrid Fielders can get you over 10KMPL easily based on owner reviews. However, this varies significantly from owner to owner as this greatly depends on how you or your chauffeur drive the car. 

You can also convert the non-hybrid ones to run on CNG or LPG, if that floats your boat (pun intended if you live in Bashundhara during the rainy season).

The trunk is as big as a layman would expect the trunk of a station wagon to be - big enough to carry a week's worth of groceries from Unimart, Agora, Shwapno or the "kacha bazar", and you can drop the rear seats to further expand your trunk space in case you need to carry a, dining table! 

They are efficient while being great cars for you to take your kids to school or yourself to work with and go on a long drive alone or with your family in (say, from Holy Family Hospital to Dilu Road or whatever your definition of "long" is).

In total, I would give the 2013 Fielder X 6 out of 10.