Driving press cars is a fun and part of my job that never gets old. However, they’re rarely able to fit my whole family. I have six kids, and if I ever need to drive my whole family of eight people anywhere, we almost always take my minivan because we don’t all fit in the press car. Even in many cars that do have eight seats, some of those seats are too tiny to accommodate my multitude of car seats. But the Honda Pilot isn’t most cars. It’s a midsize 3-row SUV that can actually fit eight human-sized people.
How Do Car Seats Fit?
Here’s my current car seat setup in my van: The second-row middle and passenger-side seats both have rear-facing car seats for my two sons under two years old. The eldest 12-year-old sits in the second-row driver-side seat, where she can perform baby maintenance like pacifier recovery and snack dispatch. In the third row, I have booster seats in the two outboard seats for the 4- and 7-year-old. My 8-year-old, who no longer needs a booster, sits in the middle of the third row.
You can see why this arrangement typically only works in a minivan or a full-size SUV, not all of which have eight seats. Every square inch of seat space is in use, so space efficiency is crucial to fitting eight people in a car with no minimal complaints on the way to church.
Space efficiency is exactly where Honda’s mastery lies. From the now-defunct (in the U.S., anyway) Fit subcompact hatchback to the paternalistic Odyssey, Honda has historically been very good at cleverly maximizing interior space.
This is also true in the Honda Pilot, the brand’s long-running midsize 3-row SUV. The Pilot offered a rare chance to take the car seat configuration in my minivan and simply transfer it over to a midsize SUV with no modifications and few compromises.
I was impressed by the usable width of the second- and third-row seats in the Honda Pilot when I put car seats in there. The nice fit of the rear-facing baby seat behind the front passenger seat wasn’t surprising. But I was skeptical of whether a rear-facing seat could fit in the middle of the second row like it does in my Odyssey, and it fit in the Pilot better than I expected. However, when sliding the seat next to it to get in and out of the third row, it usually required an extra push to make the seat properly slide parallel to the middle car seat.
Oh, and that middle third-row seat? It doesn’t look like much, but my skinny 8-year-old fit back there. There’s a (literally) narrow set of the population that can fit in that seat; they have to be old enough to not need a booster seat, but small enough to fit in that seat belt. My 8-year-old fit, but my tall 12-year-old wouldn’t when flanked by two boosters.
Stowable Eighth Seat
Let’s say you have a small family with only five children. That’s where my favorite feature of the Honda Pilot shines. In most trims of the Pilot, including this Elite model, there’s standard seating for eight, with a twist. The second-row middle seat is removable. It pops out by pulling a strap, and it can be stowed in the “basement” beneath the cargo floor behind the third row. Alternatively, you can leave it in your garage or basement and enjoy the extra cargo space while having a comfy 7-seater SUV. The seat is a little heavy, but unless you’re switching between the 7-seat and 8-seat configuration often, you won’t have to spend that much time carrying it.
Even if you aren’t as fertile as my family, this is an awesome feature. Lots of 3-row SUV owners have a household population that doesn’t require that many seats; they just like to have the extra seating in case they need it in a pinch.
If any of my kids’ friends need a ride, they can take the bus. I actually need all eight seats. But if you have seating to spare, you might want to occasionally give rides to your kids’ friends, your own adult friends, extended family members, or whomever. The Pilot has the ultimate just-in-case seating with this spare seat. And I can prove that the spare seat is more than just an afterthought — it fits a rear-facing car seat!
So, the stowable middle seat in the Pilot really provides three different seating configurations. You can have all eight seats in place, you can take the middle seat out and have seven seats with a little hallway in the second row, or you can have the eighth seat installed and folded down, which provides armrests, cupholders, and a decent-sized storage cubby. You can never have too many cupholders and cubbies.
Verdict
To a minivan extremist like me, the compromise of a midsize SUV compared to a minivan is palpable. They deliver significantly less interior space than minivans and subtract the tremendous convenience of sliding doors, usually with about the same pricing and fuel economy.
The pros? Well … it’s not a minivan. The way I see it, midsize family SUVs have the exact same uncool quotient as minivans. But, to each their own; the market has spoken, and a lot of people just prefer the styling of an SUV. In the case of Honda, specifically, another pro is that the Pilot is available with all-wheel drive (AWD), and the Odyssey isn’t. But the Toyota Sienna and Chrysler Pacifica are two popular minivans that are available with AWD.
So, no, I’m not in a hurry to trade in my Honda Odyssey for a Honda Pilot. Minivans are still the undisputed champion of practical family transportation, especially if you’re using the third row every day. But if you just won’t drive a minivan, the Pilot is arguably the most minivan-like SUV money can buy. And that’s a good thing.
More 2026 Honda Pilot
Read our full Expert Review of the 2026 Honda Pilot, see this week’s Fair Purchase Price, or see the Pilot models for sale near you.
