As Honda celebrates 25 years of hybrid-electric vehicle sales in North America, the company says more than 30 per cent of vehicles sold in Canada today are hybrid models.

It all began with the Honda Insight.

The small, two-door hatchback launched in December 1999. The model was built at Honda’s Takanezawa plant in Japan alongside two vehicles with a vastly different mission. Where the Insight prioritized being as frugal a ride as possible, the other two cars built at the plant, the Honda S2000 and the Acura NSX, prioritized speed and performance.

The original Insight did, however, have some things in common with the S2000 and NSX. For starters, it was a two-seater, and secondly, it had a stick shift, featuring a five-speed manual transmission, something you won’t find in today’s hybrid cars.

The car also featured advanced aerodynamics and a lightweight aluminum body and structure to help improve efficiency. Thanks to the use of stamped aluminum sheets, an extruded aluminum frame and aluminum die-castings, the Insight’s body was nearly 50 per cent lighter than the steel body of a Civic Hatchback, but had 38 per cent more torsional rigidity.

At the time it was sold, the Insight had the lowest coefficients of drag (0.25) of any mass-produced car sold in the world, Honda said.

The original Insight, produced from 1999 to 2006, is still the most fuel-efficient mass-produced Honda sold in Canada, with a fuel-efficiency rating of 3.4L/100 km in highway driving.

There were several versions of the Insight over the years, with the most recent model ending sales in North America in 2022.

Today, Honda sells hybrid versions of the CR-V, Accord and Civic in Canada. The Civic Hybrid sedan and CR-V Hybrid are built at Honda’s Alliston, Ont. plant.

The company intends battery-electric and fuel cell electric vehicles to make up 100 per cent of its vehicle sales by 2040 and to be carbon neutral as a company by 2050.

More information on the company’s vehicles is available on the Honda Canada website.

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