When we started our yearlong test of the 2024 Subaru Crosstrek Wilderness, our arrival story noted automakers’ propensity for appealing to emotion to sell products. The Crosstrek in general and Wilderness trim in particular, we suggested, put forth a strong appeal toward fantasies of exploration, those moments of longing in between the monotony of everyday life. After living with it for a year, however, our conclusion isn’t based on emotion. Rather, we’re left with a thought born of cold rationality: This is a phenomenal little SUV.

The Crosstrek isn’t going to be for everyone. It’s not particularly sporty. It’s not luxurious, either. Other vehicles offer more everyday utility or off-road capability, simply by being bigger, more expensive, and more purpose-built. But if you’re looking for a small, mainstream do-it-all-within-reason SUV and have about $35,000 to spend, you could do much worse than this.

If a sporty ride or luxury trappings are what you’re after and you want a subcompact SUV, there are quicker and fancier alternatives. A Mazda CX-30 will get you to 60 mph a couple seconds quicker, and it’ll look good doing it, all for about the same cash. If you can stretch your budget by a few thousand, you might even find what you’re looking for on a few luxury dealer lots. The Crosstrek Wilderness isn’t exactly slow, but its 7.9-second 0–60 time won’t be winning many races. It isn’t necessarily what most would call conventionally attractive, either; on at least two occasions, its black plastic body armor and copper accents drew unsolicited criticism while I was just going about my business.

For those who can accept losing an occasional stoplight drag race and who don’t much care if everyone thinks you look pretty all the time, there’s a whole lot else to love here.

As a daily driver, the Crosstrek simply does what it’s supposed to do with no fuss. Virtually every time I went out on an errand, I opened the door, sunk into the driver’s seat, and had a brief feeling of … you know that feeling when you walk into your bedroom and flip the light switch, only to notice for the millionth time that the guy who installed it put it in just slightly crooked? It’s not bad enough that you ever get it fixed, but it’s enough that you’re often annoyed. Getting into the Crosstrek always felt like the complete absence of that. It didn’t spark joy for me. It didn’t make me excited to drive. If I was already in a joyous mood or already excited about where I was about to go, the Crosstrek let that feeling stand unadulterated. And if I was in a bad mood or really just wanted to go back inside and get in bed, it at least didn’t give me yet another reason to feel that way. Long drives didn’t dampen the mood, either.

Many factors played a part there. The seats (save for the middle rear one) are comfortable and feel relatively spacious for a subcompact SUV. You have physical buttons for the things you want physical buttons for but a big touchscreen for a modern feel. It feels safe (and in fact it is). The optional 10-speaker Harman Kardon stereo sounds good, at least to the ear of someone whose ability to speak on audio quality ends at “it sounds good.” There’s plenty of space for you to put your everyday stuff. The list of competent interior qualities is long. The list of interior complaints, meanwhile, is tiny: the aforementioned middle rear seat, which is mediocre at best, and a piece of raised rubber that started coming unattached on the front passenger-side floormat. (This would maybe rise to the “crooked lightswitch” level of annoyance if that mat were by my feet every day when I drove, but new floormats provide a simple fix.)

But the Crosstrek Wilderness’ positives don’t end at “this car did not add passive annoyance to my life.” It also offers moments of brilliance. If you’re shopping for subcompact crossovers, something like off-road competence probably shouldn’t be the top priority for the vast majority of consumers, because for the vast majority of us, that simply isn’t a thing we’re going to do very often. Yet when presented with challenging terrain, this little Subaru can absolutely hold its own and then some. For many, just a veneer of off-road cred is probably sufficient; they just want something that’ll look cool with dirt under the tires and won’t get them stuck while driving down a gravel road. The Crosstrek will do that, yes, but it’ll also do a surprising amount more, which it proved to us on a trip to Southwest Colorado. The traits that enable off-road competence also made it a safe partner when faced with unexpected deep snow. If you want to conquer all trails, the Crosstrek Wilderness’ inherent limitations probably make it a poor choice, though if that’s your goal, you probably aren’t in the market for a $35,000 subcompact SUV anyway.

If there’s anything significant to complain about, it might be the cost to keep it running. Over 14,000 miles, we took it in for just one service visit (it was due for another had we kept it). That single service, which consisted of the typical oil change, new filters, and tire rotation, cost nearly $360. For comparison, another mainstream subcompact in our recent fleet, the 2022 Toyota Corolla Cross, cost nothing for routine maintenance. A few years earlier, a 2020 Mazda CX-30 cost us $375 in routine maintenance, but that covered two service visits over 19,000 miles, not one. And a 2018 Crosstrek set us back about $280 for three services. (That $280 in 2018 dollars is almost exactly the same as $360 today, but again, three services versus one.) At least our Crosstrek was reasonably efficient, landing right on top of its 27-mpg EPA combined rating; its 26.5 mpg over the course of our loan fell short of that Corolla Cross (29.0) but beat the older CX-30 (25.8) and previous-gen Crosstrek (25.9). It cost us about $0.18 per mile to keep fueled, though drivers living anywhere but California (or Hawaii) could expect to pay slightly less.

My only other complaint: It’s, well, subcompact. Cargo space simply isn’t a Crosstrek strong suit, and given the limitations of the segment, that’s somewhat understandable. Yet our Corolla Cross long-termer, a subcompact we praised for practicality, has another 5.2 cubic feet of cargo space with the seats up (25.2 for the Toyota versus the Crosstrek Wilderness’ 20.0). Would I trade a less spacious interior for more cargo space? Or sacrifice its off-road-enabling short overhangs for an extended cargo area? For most of my time with the Crosstrek, my answer would’ve been a resounding no. That’s a compromise I would have been willing to make.

As luck would have it, though, I found myself at a Subaru dealership the day after the Crosstrek returned to Subaru HQ. My wife and I were overdue for an upgrade from her 2008 Honda CR-V, which had finally passed the point where putting more money into it to keep it running seemed like a poor investment. I kept looking at the Crosstreks on the lot while the dealer showed off the newest Outbacks and Foresters; our long-termer had been gone not 24 hours, yet I missed it already. “Sure, its lack of cargo space might pose a rare problem to solve, but that’s nothing two people can’t work around,” I found myself thinking, perhaps still in denial, because that rear seat will soon be in more frequent use, that tight cargo space more important than before.

If you’re a single person or a young couple who desires a true jack of all trades, it’s hard to beat the Crosstrek. It’ll handle just about everything you might realistically need it to handle and then some. You’ll be content with it every time you slide behind the wheel, whether it’s a quick trip to the store or a days-long trip to a faraway destination. It’ll competently transport you through snow and ice and rain. It’ll climb mountains. But if and when you need space for another, its few flaws might prove too much to overcome.

For More on Our Long-Term 2024 Subaru Crosstrek Wilderness