2021 Lexus ES

The 2021 ES 300h carries over the 2.5-liter Atkinson-cycle A25A-FXS four paired with Lexus Hybrid Drive for 215 hp total system output — modest for a mid-size luxury sedan where German rivals begin near 250 hp.

Lexus publishes 163 lb-ft for the ES 300h's gasoline engine and quotes no combined hybrid torque figure, so the number understates the traction motor's instant low-speed pull.

The hybrid is tuned for economy rather than urgency — roughly two seconds behind the 302-hp ES 350 and well off the pace of turbocharged European rivals in this class.

Electric-to-gas handovers are effectively imperceptible and the car is exceptionally quiet at cruise, but the four-cylinder becomes audibly strained at full throttle — the familiar Toyota hybrid trade-off: polished at eight-tenths, coarse at ten.

The planetary eCVT delivers step-free, seamless power in normal driving and avoids the worst of the CVT drone, but it flares to sustained high revs when pushed hard; there is no ES 300h F Sport with simulated shift steps until the 2022 facelift.

2021 is the first year all-wheel drive appears anywhere in the ES lineup, via the new ES 250 AWD — but it is tied to that single 203-hp four-cylinder model, so the hybrid being scored here and the V6 ES 350 remain front-wheel drive only, with no AWD option at any trim level.

2021 widens the ES to three distinct powertrains — a 302-hp V6, a new 203-hp AWD four, and this 215-hp hybrid — covering performance, all-weather traction and economy including an electrified choice, though there is still no PHEV or EV.

44 MPG combined is exceptional in absolute terms for a 3,730-lb mid-size luxury sedan — 18 MPG clear of the V6 ES 350 — and lands mid-pack once graded against other hybrids, which is the class that applies here.

As with every Toyota/Lexus full hybrid, city economy nearly matches highway — the traction motor handles most low-speed work and regenerative braking recovers stop-and-go energy that a conventional luxury sedan throws away as heat.

44 MPG highway is strong for a car this size and, unusually for a hybrid, slightly exceeds the city figure — a product of the seventh-generation ES's low drag and Atkinson-cycle engine rather than reliance on regeneration.

A small 13.2-gallon tank — down from the gas ES models' 15.9 gallons — keeps total range below what 44 MPG implies, but 581 miles still means roughly 40% more distance per fill than the ES 350 manages.

EPA's standard 15,000-mile estimate puts the ES 300h at $1,400 a year, and the saving over the class is compounded by the hybrid drinking regular rather than premium.

The ES 300h runs on regular 87-octane unleaded — unusual for a luxury-badged sedan, where premium is the norm — with no plug, no charging hardware to install and no special energy arrangements of any kind.

NHTSA rated the 2021 ES 300h 5 stars overall, with 4 stars frontal, 5 stars side and 4 stars rollover.

The 2021 ES earned IIHS Top Safety Pick+ with Good results in every crashworthiness test — driver- and passenger-side small overlap, moderate overlap, side, roof strength and head restraints/seats. Held just below the ceiling because the award predates the 2022 updated side test and the ES was never run against it.

Lexus Safety System+ 2.0 is standard on every 2021 ES grade — Pre-Collision System with pedestrian and daytime bicyclist detection, all-speed Dynamic Radar Cruise Control, Lane Departure Alert with steering assist, Lane Tracing Assist, Road Sign Assist and auto high beams. Blind Spot Monitor with Rear Cross Traffic Alert is the gap: standard on Luxury, F SPORT and Ultra Luxury but an extra-cost option on the base ES 300h, which is exactly the 'key item optional on lower trims' case.

IIHS rated the standard LSS+ 2.0 system Superior for vehicle-to-vehicle front crash prevention, avoiding collisions in both the 12 mph and 25 mph runs, and Advanced for daytime pedestrian detection. Short of the top band because the pedestrian result is Advanced rather than Superior and IIHS had no nighttime pedestrian test for this model year.

Blind Spot Monitor with Rear Cross Traffic Alert is alert-only and comes standard only from the Luxury grade up; the base ES 300h needs the option. Rear automatic braking is a further extra-cost item and there is no safe-exit assist for rear occupants.

Lane Departure Alert with steering assist and Lane Tracing Assist are standard, and LTA centers the car smoothly on marked highways without the ping-ponging of cruder systems. Reviewers note the steering correction is deliberately light and the system disengages readily on faded markings or tighter curves, so it assists rather than sustains centering.

All-Speed Dynamic Radar Cruise Control is standard on every grade and works down to a full stop with follow-away resume, and it pairs with Lane Tracing Assist for a coherent highway-assist package. Braking and gap-keeping are smooth and unobtrusive in reviews, though it stops well short of the genuinely hands-off-adjacent systems at the top of the band.

No hands-free highway driving is offered on the 2021 ES at any trim. Lexus Teammate Advanced Drive did not reach the US until the 2022 LS 500h, and the ES has never received it.

IIHS rated the optional Premium Triple-Beam LED package Good, but the standard LED projector headlamps fitted to the volume ES 300h rate only Acceptable — good enough for the TSP+ award but a clear step down. High-beam assist is standard; curve-adaptive lighting comes only with the upgrade package.

The seventh-generation ES pairs a low coupe-like roofline and high rear deck with thick rear pillars, so over-the-shoulder and straight-back sightlines are average at best; the forward view is good. Camera compensation is only partial — a rear camera is standard but the Panoramic View Monitor and rear cross-traffic braking are extra-cost, and BSM is not standard on the base grade.

IIHS gave the ES the top Good rating for LATCH ease of use, with two complete sets of lower anchors in the outboard positions plus a center tether anchor. Rear door openings are conventional sedan size and the sloping roofline makes loading a rear-facing seat a little awkward, so it lands at the bottom of the top band rather than the top.

The 2021 ES 300h is a conventional five-seat sedan across all three grades — base, Luxury and Ultra Luxury — with a three-across rear bench.

The seventh-generation ES trades headroom for its low fastback roofline — 37.5 inches is mid-pack for a mid-size sedan and noticeably below upright rivals, though the ES 300h's standard moonroof is the configuration most buyers get.

42.4 inches of front legroom is generous for the class and sits comfortably above the mid-size sedan norm, helped by the GA-K platform's long 113.0-inch wheelbase.

Despite the coupe-like roofline the reclined rear seatback preserves 37.8 inches of measured rear headroom, enough that reviewers report six-footers fitting in back. Held at MEDIUM because aggregators disagree slightly (37.4–37.8 in) and Lexus does not publish a roof-type breakdown for the rear.

39.2 inches of rear legroom is a genuine strength of the ES — the car has always been sized closer to a full-size sedan in back than its mid-size luxury rivals from Germany.

This is a real 2021-specific gain: Lexus replaced the ES 300h's nickel-metal-hydride pack with a lithium-ion unit 4.7 inches shorter and moved it from the trunk to beneath the rear seat, erasing the hybrid's former cargo penalty entirely.

Conventional luxury-sedan provisioning and nothing more: a split-lid center console, door bins, a shallow tray ahead of the shifter and a rear-seat pass-through for long items. There is no folding rear seatback, no underfloor trunk storage and no onboard AC power, so bulky or awkward loads have only the trunk opening to work with.

Long-haul comfort is the ES's central promise and reviewers consistently deliver on it — well-padded, supportive front chairs with 10-way power adjustment and a rear bench sized for adults. It sits below the very top band because ventilated seats and genuine leather are extra-cost on the volume grade, which ships with NuLuxe synthetic hide.

On its standard 17-inch wheels and 55-series tires the ES 300h delivers the pillowy, well-damped ride the nameplate is bought for, and the 2021 battery relocation improved front-to-rear weight distribution on top of it. Car and Driver lists ride quality as a headline strength; it stops short of the ceiling only because there is no adaptive damping on the volume grade.

Among the quietest cars in the segment at cruise — acoustic glass, thorough sound insulation and a hybrid powertrain that runs on electricity at low speeds combine into near-silence. The one caveat is that the 2.5-liter four gets audibly strained under full throttle, which is what keeps this out of the high 90s.

Dual-zone automatic climate control, rear vents, a moonroof and a power driver's seat are standard, but almost every comfort upgrade a luxury buyer expects — heated and ventilated front seats, heated steering wheel, heated rear seats, power rear sunshade — sits in option packages above the base ES 300h, and remote pre-conditioning needs a Lexus Enform Remote subscription after the trial.

Entry price of the hybrid configuration this scorecard describes — $41,910 before the $1,025 delivery/processing/handling fee. The ES 300h carries a $1,910 premium over the gas grades' $40,000 opening price, and the 2021 hybrid range tops out at $50,910 for Ultra Luxury.

The plain ES 300h is the volume hybrid grade, but for 2021 it is the one grade that does NOT get standard Blind Spot Monitor, heated/ventilated seats or memory mirrors — nearly all retail cars add the $1,375 Premium Package, which puts a typical transaction near $44,300 delivered.

The ES 300h is among the cheapest luxury sedans to keep — a Toyota-derived Atkinson-cycle four, no turbos, and a planetary hybrid transaxle with no conventional automatic to service. The figure sits between CarEdge's optimistic owner-cost model and Edmunds' dealer-rate True Cost to Own basis used elsewhere in this catalog, and is consistent with the 2024/2025 ES entries.

Resale is the ES's strongest ownership attribute, and for the 2021 model year it is no longer a projection: these cars hit the five-year mark in 2026, and observed retail values land near 62% of original delivered MSRP — well clear of the luxury-midsize norm. The 2021 cohort also benefited from the 2021–2023 used-car price spike, so this sits above the model's long-run average.

Standard Lexus basic coverage — a year longer than mainstream 3/36 terms and level with Cadillac and the German luxury brands, but short of Genesis and Jaguar's 5/60.

The 6-year powertrain term is unremarkable and well behind Hyundai/Kia/Genesis 10/100, but a 2021 hybrid buyer gets substantially longer cover on the parts unique to this drivetrain — the battery pack is warranted 10 years / 150,000 miles and transfers to subsequent owners.

Included maintenance is short — two visits inside the first year — but the surrounding ownership package is better than that implies: roadside assistance runs a full four years with no mileage cap, and the Safety Connect / Service Connect trials on 2021 cars are long-dated. It lands above Cadillac's single free visit and below the multi-year included-maintenance programs at Genesis, BMW and Volvo.

$44,300 volume-trim price minus its estimated resale value after 5 years (62% retained, or about $27,466) leaves about $16,834 in depreciation. Add the projected $5,000 in 5-year maintenance and repairs, and owning this vehicle for 5 years costs about $21,834 in total.

The 2021 ES is graded on real three-year field data rather than a forecast, and the most on-point study is unusually direct: the J.D. Power 2024 Vehicle Dependability Study surveyed original owners of 2021 model-year vehicles at three years, ranked Lexus highest of all brands, and gave the ES itself a model-level segment award. Consumer Reports rates the 2021 ES Hybrid much more reliable than the average 2021 car with owner trouble spots confined to in-car electronics, and RepairPal puts the ES300h near the top of the luxury midsize class. Held short of the very top of the band only because CR's exact numeric score is paywalled and the electronics complaints are persistent rather than isolated.

For a 2021 car, both of the studies that matter put Lexus first outright: it took the top brand spot in the J.D. Power VDS built on this exact model year at three years, and it climbed to #1 in Consumer Reports' brand reliability rankings published alongside the 2021 model year. That is the strongest dependability standing any brand in this segment can claim, and it is well clear of the German rivals scored here.

The 2021 ES 300h carries exactly one NHTSA campaign — the shared Toyota/Lexus Occupant Classification System sensor short that can prevent front passenger airbag deployment, remedied by a free sensor inspection and replacement. It is a genuine safety defect rather than a software nuisance, which keeps it out of the clean-record top band, but it is a single contained action with no powertrain, fire or structural recall against this model year, and the 2020 engine-block porosity campaign that hit the prior model year does not reach 2021.

The ES 300h pairs the 2.5-liter Atkinson-cycle A25A-FXS four with Toyota's planetary hybrid transaxle for 215 total system horsepower — the most field-proven electrified driveline sold in the US, shared with the Camry and Avalon hybrids, with no clutch packs or torque converter to wear and no chronic high-mileage failure mode. Scored a notch below the later years of this generation because 2021 is the changeover year in which Lexus replaced the ES 300h's nickel-metal-hydride pack with a lithium-ion one mounted under the rear seat: five years on there is no fault pattern against it, but first-year hybrid-battery hardware carries more unknown than the NiMH pack it replaced.

The cabin materials themselves are strong for the money — supple NuLuxe or leather, soft-touch upper surfaces, contrast stitching and well-damped switchgear that reviewers call top-shelf. What holds 2021 below its own later model years is the pre-facelift control environment: this is the last ES before the 2022 update moved the screen forward and made it a touchscreen, so the display sits deep at the base of the windshield and is driven only by the Remote Touch touchpad, which reviewers and owners alike single out as the cabin's weak point.

Assembly consistency is the ES's signature quality attribute, and 2021 is the third year of the seventh generation on a settled, unchanged body, so early-production variation was long since wrung out — reviewers report tight, even panel gaps, damped button action and no flimsy trim. Lexus also recovered its initial-quality standing this model year, leading all premium brands at 144 PP100 after a mid-pack 2020. It stops short of the top band because what complaints do exist against this car are real and recurring, but they cluster on multimedia electronics rather than on how the car is put together.

Lexus runs roughly 240 US rooftops — thinner than BMW or Mercedes-Benz and far thinner than parent Toyota — but it is the reference point for luxury service satisfaction, finishing at or within a point of the top of J.D. Power's Customer Service Index every year across this car's ownership window, and its stores sit inside the Toyota technical and parts organization. The satisfaction record outweighs the modest density and places it above the German rivals in this segment; the store count is what keeps it out of the 90s.

Running costs are the lowest in the luxury midsize class by a wide margin, because the ES 300h shares its GA-K platform, A25A engine and hybrid transaxle with the high-volume Camry and Avalon hybrids — mechanical parts are abundant, inexpensive by luxury standards, and independent shops can work on them, a structural advantage over the dealer-dependent Germans. It stays out of the top band because luxury-specific trim, glass, lighting and body panels are still dealer-priced, and at five model years old the lithium-ion hybrid pack is a real out-of-warranty exposure at roughly $5,200 installed.

The volume ES 300h carries an 8.0-inch center display, small by 2021 luxury standards, and it is not touch-capable: the display sits deep in the dash and is driven by the Remote Touch touchpad on the console. Touch capability and the 4.3-inch forward relocation arrived with the 2022 facelift, not this model year.

Lexus's Remote Touch touchpad is the single most criticized element of this car. The cursor is imprecise, it demands sustained eyes-off-road attention to land on a target, and there is no touchscreen or rotary alternative in 2021. The underlying menu structure and graphics are fine and physical climate controls survive, which keeps this out of the bottom band.

Apple CarPlay and Android Auto are standard on every 2021 ES grade, plus Amazon Alexa integration — but both are wired-only, so this lands squarely in the 'wired standard, no wireless' band. Phone projection is also the practical workaround for the touchpad, since the projected interface at least maps to familiar layouts.

Native navigation is not standard — it comes only with the Navigation Package that also brings the 12.3-inch screen — so the volume ES 300h relies on phone projection for maps. Voice control is genuinely useful here precisely because the touchpad is not: reviewers note nav, phone, audio and even climate can be driven by voice, and Alexa and Destination Assist (a live human agent) fill gaps, but it is command-based rather than natural language.

The optional 17-speaker, 1,800-watt Mark Levinson system with Clari-Fi is one of the better factory setups at this price, and the standard 10-speaker Pioneer unit is a solid base rather than a token one — audio is one area where the 2021 ES is not dated.

The ES 300h uses a 7-inch TFT multi-information display framed by an analog-style gauge surround rather than a full-width digital cluster — clear and well rendered, but partial. The 8-inch display with the sliding center ring borrowed from the LFA is an F SPORT item and the ES 300h is not offered in that grade.

Lexus Enform Dynamic Navigation pushes map and POI data over the air to navigation-equipped cars, but there is no whole-vehicle over-the-air software update on the 2021 ES — infotainment and module firmware changes require a dealer visit, and the base grade without the Navigation Package gets nothing over the air at all.

The Lexus app covers the core set — remote start and climate pre-conditioning, lock/unlock, vehicle locate, guest driver alerts — but it runs on the Lexus Enform Remote subscription and becomes paid after the trial period, and there is no phone-as-key. Functional rather than polished, and behind the German brands' apps of the same year.

Standard provisioning is USB-A and 12-volt only — no USB-C anywhere in the car — and the Qi wireless charging pad is an extra-cost option rather than standard equipment on the base ES 300h. Rear passengers get power but not fast charging, and there is no household outlet.

Smart Key proximity entry with push-button start is standard on every grade and a hands-free power trunk lid is available, which covers the everyday convenience case well. It falls short of the top band because remote start is app- and subscription-based rather than built into the key fob, and there is no phone-as-key on any 2021 ES.

A rear-view camera is standard, but everything beyond it is optional on the volume ES 300h: the Panoramic View Monitor, Intuitive Parking Assist front and rear sensors, and rear cross-traffic braking all sit in packages. There is no automated parking function, and image quality of the 2021-era cameras is adequate rather than sharp.

A large color head-up display projecting speed, navigation and driver-assist status onto the windshield is offered on the ES 300h, but only inside upper option packages — it is not available as a standalone item on the base grade, which is exactly the 'limited to top trims' case.

IIHS rates the ES's LATCH hardware Good — two full outboard sets plus a center tether — and the 2021 trunk grew to 16.7 cu ft, enough for a stroller. But it is a low fastback sedan: the sloping roofline makes hoisting a rear-facing seat through the door awkward, the rear seatback does not fold for bulky gear, and door openings are conventional rather than generous.

Strong credentials on the trim a family would actually buy: IIHS Top Safety Pick+, a 5-star NHTSA overall rating, and Lexus Safety System+ 2.0 — pre-collision with pedestrian detection, all-speed adaptive cruise, lane tracing — standard on every grade. The deductions are real though: blind-spot monitoring costs extra on the base ES 300h, the standard headlights rate only Acceptable, and there is no rear-seat reminder or safe-exit assist.

For four people this is a very good long-haul car — 39.2 inches of rear legroom, a near-silent cabin, supportive seats and a 16.7 cu ft trunk that now matches the gas ES. What holds it back is rear-row provisioning: vents but no rear climate controls, no rear-seat entertainment, no household outlet, and a fifth passenger sits on a raised center position over a transmission tunnel.

This is the ES 300h's strongest case. The hybrid runs on electricity at parking-lot speeds, the eCVT delivers step-free power with no shift shock, stop-and-go adaptive cruise is standard, and the cabin isolation makes a congested commute genuinely low-fatigue. Reviewers describe it as gliding through city traffic.

44 MPG combined on regular unleaded is extraordinary for a 3,780-lb luxury sedan and puts fuel spend at roughly $1,400 a year at 15,000 miles — compact-car running costs in a mid-size luxury body. It is not the top band only because Lexus service labor rates and the 17-inch tire replacement cost run above mainstream, offsetting some of the fuel saving.

A 195.9-inch-long sedan with a 38.0-foot turning circle is manageable but not nimble, and the high rear deck and thick rear pillars of the fastback body make judging the back end hard. Camera help is thin on the volume grade — a rear camera is standard, but the Panoramic View Monitor and parking sensors are extra-cost and there is no automated parking.

Not a work vehicle in any sense: Lexus publishes no US tow rating for the ES, there is no hitch provision, no bed, and the rear seatback does not even fold. Cargo duty stops at a 16.7 cu ft trunk loaded through a conventional sedan aperture.

The mechanical case is real — the Toyota Hybrid Synergy planetary powertrain is among the most durable in the industry and the ES has a long fleet life as a livery and executive car. But everything above the driveline is luxury-oriented: NuLuxe or leather upholstery, no washable surfaces, low ground clearance and 55-series tires that punish rough sites.

Nothing here: no onboard AC power, no bed or tie-downs beyond trunk hooks, no factory roof rails or rack provision, no hitch, no upfit ecosystem. The ES was never engineered against this use case.

An outstanding mile-eater. A 581-mile combined range from the 13.2-gallon tank means fewer stops than almost anything in the class, the cabin is the quietest in this comparison set, the seats hold up over multi-hour stints, and standard all-speed adaptive cruise with lane tracing cuts highway fatigue. Only the modest passing power of the 215-hp hybrid keeps it from the very top.

Pavement-bound by design. The ES 300h is front-wheel drive only — the new-for-2021 Dynamic Torque Control AWD is tied exclusively to the gas ES 250 — with roughly 5.5 inches of ground clearance, no tow or roof rating, no AC outlet for camping and no flat-folding cargo floor.

The 2021 trunk is a genuinely good one for suitcases at 16.7 cu ft — the li-ion battery move erased the hybrid penalty — but flexibility is poor: the rear seatback does not fold, leaving only a center pass-through for skis or lumber, and there are no roof rails, no hitch and no underfloor storage. Fine for luggage, restrictive for anything bulky.

Secure and better resolved than the ES's reputation suggests — the GA-K platform is stiff, body control in corners is tidier than expected, and the 2021 move of the hybrid battery from the trunk to under the rear seat improved front-to-rear weight distribution. It is still a comfort-tuned front-drive sedan with modest tires and no adaptive damping on this grade, so it is composed rather than engaging.

Accurate enough to place the car precisely, but the electric assist is light and largely devoid of feedback — the familiar hybrid calibration. Sport mode adds weight without adding information, and there is no ES 300h F SPORT with a firmer rack for 2021.

Stopping power and fade resistance are fine for a 3,780-lb sedan, but the regen-to-friction handover is the weak point: reviewers describe a clunky, harsh transition as the system swaps modes, which undermines pedal confidence in exactly the low-speed traffic this car is built for.

The Lexus Hybrid Drive planetary eCVT is about as well calibrated as a powertrain gets in normal use — the engine start is imperceptible, there is no stop/start shudder because there is no conventional starter event, and power arrives step-free with no shift shock. Response to a full-throttle request is the limitation: 8.1–8.3 seconds to 60 mph with revs flaring ahead of the road speed.

Near-silent at cruise and in EV operation, with no vibration through the controls — but the 2.5-liter four-cylinder drones audibly when the eCVT pins it at high revs under hard acceleration, the classic Toyota hybrid trade-off. Inoffensive most of the time, coarse at the top.

A 38-foot turning circle is wide for a mid-size sedan — a function of the 113.0-inch wheelbase and front-drive packaging — and it is felt in parking garages and U-turns.

Wide adjustment range (power driver's seat with power lumbar, tilt/telescope wheel) and a genuinely comfortable, well-supported position with real physical climate controls retained. Two things cost it: the low fastback roofline compromises rearward sightlines and makes ingress/egress a drop rather than a step, and the console-mounted Remote Touch pad falls where a wrist rest should be.

Pleasant but forgettable, and deliberately so — the ES 300h is engineered for serenity, not for the long way home. It is quiet, smooth and undemanding, with no sound worth hearing, an 8-second 0–60 and steering that asks nothing of the driver. Not unpleasant, simply not the point.

Every 2021 ES grade ships with the full Lexus Safety System+ 2.0 driver-assist suite, a 10-speaker Pioneer audio system, NuLuxe upholstery and — new for 2021 — standard Android Auto alongside Apple CarPlay and Alexa, at a delivered price German rivals cannot approach. The base ES 300h is the one grade that misses out, though: Blind Spot Monitor is standard only from Luxury upward, heated and ventilated seats sit in the $1,375 Premium Package, and the 8-inch display is a non-touch unit driven by the widely criticised Remote Touch touchpad.

The 2021 ES 300h is the reference point for content-per-dollar in luxury midsize — a genuinely quiet, well-trimmed cabin, 44 MPG combined and class-leading resale for roughly $10,000 less than a base E-Class or 5 Series, and KBB gave it the luxury-car Best Buy for the third straight year. What the money does not buy is performance: 215 total system horsepower and low-8-second acceleration is the price of the value proposition.

2021 is the year the ES lineup got genuinely wide: eleven grades across three powertrains from $40,000 to $50,910, the first all-wheel-drive ES in the model's history (the ES 250), and a 1,500-unit ES 350 Black Line Special Edition. The hybrid buyer sees a narrower slice of it — only base, Luxury and Ultra Luxury, with no F SPORT grade (that arrived for 2022) and no AWD at any price, since all-wheel drive is confined to the four-cylinder ES 250.

2021 was the strongest year of this generation after its 2019 launch: the ES was the best-selling luxury sedan in the United States at 45,406 units, up 4.9% on 2020, and it managed that growth in a semiconductor-constrained year when most rivals lost ground. The qualifier is the longer arc — volume never returned to 2019's 51,336, and slid again to 41,465 in 2022 as the segment gave way to SUVs.

2021 was a peak year for Lexus's core equity: the brand topped J.D. Power's Vehicle Dependability Study outright and took KBB's luxury-brand resale crown, which are precisely the qualities that make an ES easy to own and easy to sell — and they show up directly in this car's residuals. Lexus remains less aspirational than Mercedes or BMW, and the ES in particular reads as the conservative, comfort-first choice rather than an object of desire.

The 2021 model year splits cleanly in half for a buyer. Early on, deals were genuinely good — 0% APR financing and bonus cash as high as $4,500 on the ES — but the semiconductor shortage gutted support by autumn: bonus cash collapsed to $500, Lexus cancelled rebates across much of the country, and lease payments rose by up to $128 a month. Lease cash remained the one durable lever, with reports of $3,700 in Lexus lease support on an ES 300h.

2021 is the third year of the seventh-generation (XZ10) ES launched for 2019 on the GA-K platform, and the last year before its facelift. It was not a stand-still year — the first-ever AWD grade and standard Android Auto both landed for 2021 — but the interior, the non-touch display and Lexus Safety System+ 2.0 were about to be superseded, so a 2021 buyer was twelve months from a visibly updated car.

The 2021 ES collected the class's recommendation hardware — top of U.S. News's luxury midsize ranking, KBB's luxury-car Best Buy, and an IIHS Top Safety Pick+ — and reviewers reliably praise its ride isolation and build quality. It is still a recommendation rather than a comparison-test winner: enthusiast outlets mark it down for uninvolving dynamics and a strained four-cylinder in 300h form, and the Remote Touch touchpad is a near-universal complaint in 2021 reviews.