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The Toyota Sienna Is the Only Minivan in the U.S. With Rear Seatbelt Reminders in 2023

The front occupants of a vehicle are warned - both visually and audibly - if they don’t buckle up. Rear seatbelt reminders aren’t as common, which is a bit curious because not wearing one increases the risk of life-threatening injuries. Implementing a rear-passenger system could save many lives each year, but as long as it’s not federally mandated, most automakers won’t voluntarily eat into their margins by making this feature standard.
Toyota Sienna third-row seats 30 photos
Photo: Toyota
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Rightfully described as lax, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s approach to rear-passenger safety led to a rather weird situation. As of February 2023, only one U.S. minivan is equipped with rear seatbelt reminders, that minivan being the 2023 model year Sienna.

Third-row reminders are included as well. By comparison, all three rivals don’t have rear passenger seatbelt reminders. The culprits are Toyota archrival Honda with the Odyssey, the ailing Chrysler brand with the Pacifica, and the hideously underrated Carnival from Kia. The latter blurs the line between minivan and sport utility vehicle, yet sales leave much to be desired. Only 19,706 units were sold in 2022 stateside, including leftover Sedonas. For context, Chrysler sold 98,624 units of the Pacifica.

Why is the rear passenger seatbelt reminder such a big deal in family-oriented vehicles? Back in 2022, more than a third of children ages 4 to 12 who were killed in crashes were unrestrained. That’s coming straight from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, which knows a thing or two about safety. They also take safety far more seriously than the federal watchdog, which followed the NPO’s lead on more than one occasion.

The nonprofit organization highlights that approximately half of the vehicles evaluated for seatbelt reminders in the past year feature second-row systems, but only a quarter of the grand total have reminders that meet the Insurance Institute’s criteria. The Sienna is the only minivan currently on sale in the United States to satisfy the requirements of the front and rear rows in full, therefore earning the maximum rating available. The Carnival’s front warning system was deemed good as well, but the lack of a rear passenger reminder downgraded the overall rating to acceptable.

Moving on to the segment’s favorite minivan, the Pacifica earned a marginal rating due to a badly implemented front system. Not only did the reminder fail to start within two seconds after the vehicle reached 25 miles per hour (40 kilometers per hour), but the audible tone isn’t loud enough against the ambient noise inside the vehicle at that sort of speed.

The Odyssey is the biggest offender, though. The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety was shocked to find out that the front-row reminder lasts less than eight seconds, which is within the NHTSA’s current safety standard of between four and eight seconds. The problem is, if the audible tone goes away after eight seconds, the driver will be tempted to ignore the instrument cluster’s lashing warning light. IIHS research shows that audible warnings that last more than 90 seconds increase the use of seatbelts by more than a third among drivers who don’t routinely buckle up.

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About the author: Mircea Panait
Mircea Panait profile photo

After a 1:43 scale model of a Ferrari 250 GTO sparked Mircea's interest for cars when he was a kid, an early internship at Top Gear sealed his career path. He's most interested in muscle cars and American trucks, but he takes a passing interest in quirky kei cars as well.
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