Four Things To Love About the 2024 Honda Passport TrailSport

The Honda Passport is a carry-over for 2024. Unlike the Pilot, the Passport has not had a recent redesign. However, we still love this five-passenger mid-sized SUV. Here are four reasons why, based on our most recent test week with the $46K Trailsport trim.

The Hond Passport Is Perfectly Sized For Five Passengers
Many crossover SUVs we test are clearly built to a budget and fuel economy target and end up being a smidge too small for our liking. The Honda Passport, by contrast, offers rooming seating for all five passengers. You need not pull the front seats forward when adults are in the back. Ample legroom is available everywhere all at once. Headroom is generous in every spot. You can actually use the rear center seat and not have kids at each others’ throats. 

The Honda Passport Has the Cargo Area of Your Dreams
Better than the abundant passenger space is the ginormous cargo area. It is so wide. So long. So tall. So perfectly designed for loading an unloading heavy items. What could possibly be better? Well, how about a second huge storage compartment underneath? That’s right. The cargo area is massive and sits atop a bonus expanse of cargo space for stuff. And the spare tire is sitting in there, surrounded by enough space for endless gear. That missing third row of seats sure frees up a lot of space for stuff.

The Honda Passport TrailSport Has Great Tires
Honda equips the Trailsport trim of the Passport with General Grabber A/T Sport all-terrain tires on 18-inch rims featuring a generous sidewall. These are fantastic tires! They are great in terms of handling and comfort, and they are not noisy. Yet, they are much more rugged than standard all-season tires. If you live where the schools have stolen the DPW’s budget, and potholes are out of control, this is the SUV for you. If you venture off pavement, look no further for a perfect SUV to get you to the trailhead, cabin, or boat launch. 

The Passport Is a Honda - So We Love It
Honda makes vehicles that are easy to live with. The infotainment system is easy to operate. The seats are human-sized. The visibility is fantastic, and there are no blind spots. There are knobs where knobs make sense. Things work in a Honda. We love vehicles that make sense, and everything in the Passport is where you expect it to be and works like you expect it to work. 

If you want a small crossover SUV, the HR-V is well worth a test drive. If you want a hybrid, buy a CR-V. If you want a three-row SUV, the Pilot is among the best ever made. If you want a minivan, the Odyssey sets the standard. However, some folks want a roomy five-passenger SUV that is easy to live with and does everything well. That’s the Passport’s job, and it does it better than any other vehicle in its class today. 
 

Image of Honda Passport cargo area by Honda. Top of page image of 2024 Honda Trailsport by John Goreham. Tire image by John Goreham.

John Goreham is an experienced New England Motor Press Association member and expert vehicle tester. John completed an engineering program with a focus on electric vehicles, followed by two decades of work in high-tech, biopharma, and the automotive supply chain before becoming a news contributor. In addition to his eleven years of work at Torque News, John has published thousands of articles and reviews at American news outlets. He is known for offering unfiltered opinions on vehicle topics. You can follow John on Twitter, and connect with him at Linkedin.