The 2020 Toyota Supra Gets Better MPG Than a Lot of Other Sports Cars

At this point, we basically know everything there is to know about the new Toyota Supra. We know how much power it makes (335 horsepower). We know how much it costs ($50,290). We even know how many colors it comes in (eight). But until now, we didn't know what is arguably the most important factoid of any sports car: what kind of fuel economy it gets. Okay, so maybe fuel economy isn't really a sports-car buyer's number one need-to-know fact before making a purchase, but it is important.

The Supra is powered by a turbocharged 3.0-liter inline-six sourced from BMW, and only an eight-speed automatic transmission is available. The EPA has now released its official numbers for the Supra, rating it at 26 mpg combined, 24 mpg city, and 31 mpg highway. We decided to dig into the ratings of the Supra's competitors-and a few other tangentially related cars-to see how the reborn legend compares.

We're starting off with the 3-series not because it's a competitor to the Supra, but because the M340i version uses the same engine as the Toyota. The M340i is more powerful, though, with its 382 horsepower and 369 lb-ft of torque besting the 335 horses and 365 lb-ft of the Supra. The M340i is also only offered with all-wheel drive, while the Supra is rear-drive, but both use the same eight-speed auto.

With EPA ratings of 25 combined, 22 city, and 30 highway, the M340i lags behind the Supra by 1, 2, and 1 mpg, respectively. This isn't exactly surprising, as the 3-series is bigger, heavier, and more powerful, but it's also refreshing to see a sports car come out on top in a fuel-economy battle.

The Z4 is even more closely related to the Supra than the 3-series is, with the two sports cars sharing the same platform-although development was done separately-as well as many other components. The 2020 M40i version uses the same inline-six as the Supra and the M340i, with the same power ratings as the 3-series. The EPA has yet to release numbers for the M40i, but BMW estimates it will get 31 mpg highway, matching the Supra.

The lower-end version of the Z4, called the sDrive30i, uses a turbocharged 2.0-liter inline-four with 255 horsepower. It's actually offered in the Supra in Japan, but there are no plans for the four-cylinder Supra to make its way to America-yet. But despite its lower power and fewer cylinders, the four-pot Z4 is barely more efficient than the six-cylinder Supra, with ratings on the 2019 model of 28 combined, 25 city, and 32 highway.

All right, now we're getting into the real comparisons. Like the Supra, Jaguar's F-type is a two-door, two-seat liftback coupe that's only available with an eight-speed automatic transmission. (Okay, there's a convertible version too.) The F-type's base engine is a turbocharged 2.0-liter four with 296 horsepower, and it can't best the Supra. The F-type 2.0T's combined figure of 26 mpg matches the Supra, but its 23 city and 30 highway ratings are each 1 mpg less than what the Supra achieves.

Then there's the F-type's uplevel engine, which is a supercharged 3.0-liter V-6 that comes in multiple states of tune. The standard version makes 340 horses and is rated by the EPA at 23 combined, 20 city, and 28 highway, a far cry from the Supra's 26/24/31. The F-type S, which has 380 horsepower, gets 1 mpg less in each section, and the all-wheel-drive F-type S is 1 mpg lower still.

A few years ago Porsche made the controversial decision to replace the Cayman and Boxster's naturally aspirated flat-six engine with a turbocharged flat-four when it facelifted the models to create the 718. This change was made under the guise of improved efficiency, but it turned out the fours weren't any better in fuel economy. Making matters worse, the six-cylinder Supra does better than each version of the Cayman.

At 25/22/29 mpg combined/city/highway, the base Cayman with the 300-hp 2.0-liter four gets 1 mpg less than the Supra in the combined rating and 2 mpg less in the city and highway tests. The Cayman S has a 350-hp 2.5-liter four, which is rated at 1 mpg less than the base Cayman in each test, and the Cayman GTS is even less efficient at 22/20/26 mpg.

Because the Supra is auto only, we only compared it to versions of the Cayman equipped with the seven-speed PDK automatic. But when equipped with the six-speed manual, each version of the Cayman is even less fuel-efficient.

At first, we were only going to compare the Supra to the TT RS, the wildest version of Audi's design-forward coupe. With a 400-hp turbocharged inline-five, a seven-speed dual-clutch automatic transmission, and all-wheel drive, it has one of the most unique characters in the segment. The TT RS' 29-mpg highway figure gets close to the Supra's rating of 29 mpg, but its 22 mpg combined and 19 mpg city numbers are 4 and 5 mpg less than the Supra's, respectively.

But then we realized that not only does the Supra beat the TT RS, it beats all the other TT models, too. The base TT uses a 220-hp turbo four and all-wheel drive, and while it matches the Supra's combined and highway numbers, it gets 1 less mpg in the city. Then there's the TTS, which uses a 292-hp version of the TT's engine and matches the regular TT's city rating but gets 2 mpg less on the highway and 1 mpg less combined.

The Chevy Corvette is a bit of a wild card for this comparison. At $56,995 to start, it's not that much more expensive than the Supra. Like the Supra, the Vette has two seats and a liftback hatch and is rear-wheel drive. But the Vette also has a 6.2-liter V-8. So, as you probably expect, the Supra creams the Chevy when it comes to efficiency. With its optional eight-speed auto, the base Vette is rated at 18 mpg combined, 15 city, and 25 highway; that's 8, 9, and 6 mpg worse than the Supra.

Also as you would expect, the supercharged Corvette Z06 is even worse at the pump, and don't get us started on the monstrous Corvette ZR1. (Okay, with the auto, the ZR1 gets 15/12/20. Not bad for 755 horsepower, actually.)

Now we couldn't complete this comparison without talking about the fourth-gen Supra Turbo, could we? At least for American audiences, this generation is what made the Supra truly iconic-with a little help from The Fast and the Furious. The Turbo model was sold from 1993 to 1998, and used a twin-turbo 3.0-liter inline-six pumping out 320 horsepower and 315 lb-ft of torque-pretty close to what the new 2020 model makes. The Supra was fast as hell, looked awesome, and was great to drive. But as you now know, all that we care about is fuel economy.

Ratings fluctuated throughout production, so we're going with numbers from 1997. Back then, the Supra Turbo was rated by the EPA at 18 mpg combined, 16 mpg city, and 22 mpg highway when fitted with the optional four-speed automatic. Compared to the new car, that's 8 mpg worse in the combined cycle, 8 mpg worse in the city, and 10 mpg worse on the highway. Now that's progress! With the six-speed manual, the Supra Turbo did 1 mpg worse in the city.

The Supra Turbo wasn't the only version of the fourth-gen car offered in the States. The base car, which was great in its own right, had a naturally aspirated 3.0-liter inline-six making 220 horsepower and 210 lb-ft. With the manual, it matched the Turbo's EPA ratings, but with the automatic it did 1 mpg better in the combined and highway tests.

With the new Supra being so much better in fuel economy than the old model, that's sure to bode well for how good it will be in general, right? We're being a bit cheeky, but in our first drive of a prototype of the new Supra, we came away extremely impressed. We can't wait to get a production version to review-especially so we can run it through our highway fuel-economy test.