• Only space for two – rears seats are for bags
• Good stowage space between the seats
• Enough boot space for a weekend away

How much space is there?

The Toyota GR86 follows the classic sports car template. Low-slung styling with two figure-hugging seats in the front and a completely useless bench in the rear that’s only suitable for carrying bags.

Still, space in the front is plentiful. Toyota has shaped the GR86’s door cards and centre console intelligently to give you enough room for your elbows. There are deep scallops in the door card to give you enough real estate to twirl the wheel, and the storage bins are integrated into the central armrest so, when you’re not carrying a drink, there’s nothing to bang your elbow on when you change gear. Even the bottle holders in the doors are big enough to hold litre water bottles.

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The steering wheel and driver’s seat both have sufficient adjustment to find the perfect driving position. However, taller front passengers might find the protruding glovebox gets in the way of their knees.

Boot space and storage

For an impractical sports car, the GR86 is quite practical. It has a 226-litre boot, which means it’s smaller than an Audi TT, but larger than a Mazda MX-5. In any case, there’s more than enough room for a weekend’s worth of luggage – especially when you team it with the wasted passenger space you gain on the rear seats.

Plus, the rear seats can be flipped forwards to expand the load area and give you the option of carrying longer items, such as skis. It’s probably more hassle than it’s worth, though, because you need to shove your torso into the boot to access the release straps.

Is it easy to park?

The GR86 is small compared to most modern cars. It’s about 200mm shorter than a Nissan Qashqai, which means it’s easy to steer into parking spaces. However, narrow streets can be a little tricky until you’ve learned the car’s dimensions – it’s hard to judge where the front corners are because you sit so low down in the cockpit.

Over-the-shoulder visibility is restricted, too. The tiny rear three quarter glass means you need to check your blind spots carefully and the rear window is quite small and very steeply raked. It also doesn’t have a rear wiper, so you can’t see out of it at all on a cold, dew-drenched morning.

Happily, rear parking sensors and a rear parking camera are also fitted as standard, so there’s a safety net to stop you from denting the rear end while you get used to the car.

Safety

• Not tested by Euro NCAP
• Reasonable amount of safety tech
• Brilliant active LED headlights

The Toyota GR86 hasn’t been crash tested by Euro NCAP. Small scale projects like this don’t normally pass through the hands of the testers. However, the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) in North America has crash tested the GR86 – and it was impressed with the car’s performance.

It comes with a reasonable amount of standard safety tech, including lane departure warning, cruise control, rear cross-traffic alert, a blind spot monitoring system and automatic emergency braking. There is also a wealth of airbags, including front, side and curtain airbags for both front occupants and a knee airbag for the driver.

The most important takeaway from the IIHS crash tests is that the car’s passenger compartment stays stable in an accident, which means you’re less likely to have a serious injury if you rapidly find yourself approaching the wrong side of a hedge.

You also get traction control and stability control as standard, both of which are useful additions in such a tail-happy rear-wheel drive car. They’re not perfect, though – we’ve tested the car on winding fell roads in the Lake District and managed to unstick the rear end on several occasions, even with all the assists turned on. This is either brilliant or irritating depending on the sort of driver you are.

Watch the IIHS Toyota GR86 crash test video