2000 Mazda Protege Reviews, Pricing & Specs

Great acceleration, braking is okay, handling is amazing. Build quality is pretty good except the weak spots in the body where it tends to rust. Fortunately this protege has had very little rust poke out. I personally like the look of my compact 4-door family car and all the mods compliment it a lot. Gas mileage with the v6 motor that is in it now is around 30mpg highway and 24mpg city. Regular maintenance and doing the work myself saves on cost. The car is just an overall blast to drive anytime and anywhere.Apr 11, 2012

The 2000 Mazda Protege' tan was about as boring a car can get. I bought it brand new with 5 speed manual transmission. My personality and lifestyle at the time was very conservative and it was probably why I gravitated to this conservative sedan. Probably the only daring thing I did in choosing it was opt for the tan interior. I would say like me my choice of car in this point of my life was severely lacking in personality. I used it purely for commute to work and on weekends slapped a bike rack on the back and rode my mountain bike more. I was enmeshed in the daily grind just like everyone else. All trips were only around Rockville, Gaithersburg, and Germantown, MD. I did not venture much out. I was a homebody and a nobody, kinda like the Protege. All was fine in surburbia. Then tragedy struck me and it centered around the Protege. Nobody got hurt but me. Eventually I moved away from Montgomery County. Also, I must mention in my opinion the Protege was not built to last. Little things started falling apart on the vehicle like rod bar on the wheel/axle and things under the hood started to prematurely corrode and wear out. I even took it to a prominent Mazda dealership for an oil change and they forgot to replace the cap and oil got on everything under the hood. As opposed to past vehicles, the Protege was not fun to drive and manual transmission in the thicket of I270 traffic made it a chore. This vehicle also for some reason made me sad so I sold the pity for a pittance. Jan 30, 2012

comfortable car good like even better when modified , mine was manual and it was doing the job , after 11 years still as good , easily sold (in my country don't know about you). repair costs were not the cheapest in the word but still cheap. the car's acceleration is good if you keep looking after it braking and handling are brilliant easily controllable , safety is good never had big accident to be certain.Jul 04, 2011

This car is bloody amazing. Like really. I bought it for $1200, with 4 snows on steels. When i bought it, it had 299,987 kms, and that was in august 2010. Now, january 2011, its got 312,848 and still runnin like a champ. Its my first standard and i pretty much learned how to drive it myself. A few hiccups; new plugs and wires due to a cylinder misfire, but really other than that, it needed a lightbulb over the licence plate to pass ontario saftey regulations. Jan 31, 2011

My Mazda handles greatly and the brakes aren't sensative like the 1993 Geo Prizm my family has. The only problem my Mazda has is the engine problem, we haven't been able to fix it since we bought it last year. The overall appearance looks almost perfect on the exterior except for a few poor dabs of paint job here and there, but that ain't noticable; there's also scratched paint on the front driver side bumper. The interior is nice and cozy, nuff said. Cutest car I've ever driven but I'm biased on that because I own it and I know that owners of their first cars (If those cars are nice enough) will say that their car's cuter than anyone else's.Feb 18, 2010

The downsides of this car are far more then the positive attributes. When I first bought it the acceleration and power was awesome, much better then my Civic DX I previously owned. However after missing one oil change the car quickly deteriorated and then when I fixed all of the problems, Mazda told me the main problem was due to a recalled part that had never been replaced. The car looks a lot like my civic and definitely cost about the same, however I sometimes wish I had a Honda again.Jan 10, 2009

Performance - everything is very good considering this is a $4000 car and I am getting a steady 30 mpg. Of course nothing is overly impressive but, isn't a let down either. Build Quality - Most of the car parts are light: doors, trunk, etc. The car in general is built very well though! It has needed no repairs. Only routine maintenance has needed to be performed. I have had this car for about 3 1/2 years now and it has been a daily driver. I have probably put close to 50,000 miles on it since I bought it. It is now pushing 140,000 and is still running like the day I bought it. Cost of ownership - for anyone who has to drive a lot and doesn't want to have to worry about a high maintenance vehicle, this is perfect! I consistently get 29-31 mpg with a mix of city and hwy driving. Fun Factor - 8 of 10 on country roads with 2 or less people in the car. Any more than that and the acceleration starts to decrease drastically. It is a 5 speed and it grips the road well. Also has a sun/moon roof.Jul 26, 2008

My car is not much but it is a good car none the less. It gets me where i need to go without any problems and it has a good ride for a small little car. It looks ok i mean its not a sports car but with some work i could make it look a lot better by adding a body kit and new wheels and stuff like that. It gets great gas milage, which i really love! I like it better than my last car which was an 1994 Pontiac Grand AM which sucked lol! I also bought this car for a steal! All in all I am very pleased with my car for now but I wouldn't complain if i got something nicer lol!!!Jun 30, 2008

This was a great used car deal. When I first bought this car it's wasn't appealing. I got a new paint job and added the rims and some Khumo Ecsta tires and firm KYB shocks. Performance wise the engine is disappointing. Carrying the 1.6l ZM engine, the car is under powered, you only start to feel the power after you pass the 2500 RPM range but it still isn't all that. The handling of the car is very impressive though I corner at sometimes over 90 km\h and the tires don't even make a sound. I find that the rear of the car is light and so oversteer highly possible but if you get accustomed to it you can have the back come out like if it was a RWD. This 2000 model doesn't come with ABS either and I think I like that. I get all the braking power I need when I need it and that is necessary for me especially for when I need to bring this car to a stop in a quick time. I probably would get into many accidents if this had ABS. Also, hand braking this baby is sweet, could turn this green machine 180 degress in a flash. Just love this car. The only other thing to comment on is the reliability. I find it's quite reliable. I know most people in Barbados have a fear of Mazda but the truth be told there is no problem it' s just I find mechanics want to have an easy life. I never had a serious problem with my ride. All you need is a qualified and skilled mechanic. The problems faced with these cars are because of the Coil Pack, Idle Sensor and transmission Solenoids. Once these are fixed you have no problems the car runs like a dream. My personal beef with this car however is the fuel consumption. I find that it consumes gas rapidly, even my girlfriends altezza have better gad mileage than this. I get a little over 650 km from a full tank where she gets over 900 km and we pay the same amount to full the tank. Other from that though, this is a great handling ride. Just make sure you are in front at the beginning of the race and ensure there are alot of corners, one of the best handling FWD vehicles I ever came across well that is after the Honda of course. Mar 17, 2008

My car has a JDM front body kit, as well as side skirts / rear skirt from the MP3 protege. Additionally, it now has a lower lip intended for the 01+ Protege's, but modified for the 2000. It has a full suspension setup with Tokiko HP struts and JDM Espileir Springs, rolling on 17" ASA JS5 rims, wrapped in Kuhmo Ecsta SPTs. The engine is fully built, repacing the original 1.8L with the bigger and more powerful 2.0L, which was bored to 2.1L and the compression raised to 9.5:1. Other engine mods include a cold air intake and header-back, catless exhaust, tipped by a Dynomax Super Tubo muffler. Other mods are on the car, but you'll just have to ask to find out what they are...Feb 10, 2008

The Protege is a great car that handles amazingly in the city or out on the long bends. Great mileage followed up with a huge amount of low end torque that does seems to fade away quite dramatically after second gear, which requires a slightly different driving style to get any top end power out of it. Followed up with great reliability and low maintenence costs as well as a huge array of available modifications keeps the protege a welcomed addition to anyones garrage.Nov 20, 2007