A question you see in almost every Miata forum: “Can you daily drive a Miata?” I personally have daily driven my Miata for 3 years and wanted to shed some light on the subject.
Reliability
When considering any daily driver one of the most important things is if the car will leave you stranded. Fortunately, this is where the Miata excels. Unlike the British roadsters the car is based off, the Miata brings Japanese reliability to the roadster platform.
The Miata is well known for it’s well above average reliability and my experience was pretty good for the most part. These cars are known to easily reach 200k miles or more. I personally bought mine with 126k miles and was able to put another 20k on it over 3 years. I didn’t have that many issues but the ones I did have stemmed from horrid repairs from the previous owner.
So, in terms of reliability, the Mazda Miata is a car that won’t let you down. And to add to that, parts are cheap and repairs are pretty simple compared to other RWD sports cars. Mazda has sold over a million of these roadsters so there is also a wealth of knowledge on DIY repairs spanned across the internet.
Space
With a daily driver you need to get groceries and with a Miata, you might have a hard time. It’s simple the Miata is a fun 2 seater sports car in which storage was the last thing on Mazda engineers minds.
The entire car is small and the trunk is no different, you can fit enough groceries for a person or two but you won’t be picking them up for an entire family. And you won’t be picking many people up from the airport, unless they are by themselves with only a small backpack.
Comfort
Nonexistent.
The Miata is designed to be fun and affordable, not comfortable. Bells & Whistles are at a minimum in this car. But then again, you don’t buy one of these and expect those.
I am 5’9″ and fit perfectly fine in the car. If you are 6’0″ and over you could definitely experience some issues with headroom though. On longer drives over an hour and a half you definitely start feeling the tight space. If you do have a long commute I could see someone getting uncomfortable, luckily mine was short.
Is it a Good First Car?
Side note but many people ask if it is a great first car. I would say yes. It’s fun to drive & an excellent way to learn how to drive in a sporty manner. There isn’t really enough power to get into serious trouble like some other RWD cars. The repairs are not all that difficult and you can learn a lot about the mechanical aspects of cars.
Summary
Mazda created a special car with the Miata. If you can deal with the limited space & comfort you will be in for a great ownership experience. I had a great time with this car for 3 years.
There is a reason this car is still in production 25 years later and has sold over a million units.
At the end of the day, you can’t go wrong daily driving a Miata.
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