if the telluride drives in the snow as well as our sienna with all-seasons can/does, anything better than that is just gravy.
Given your experience with the Sienna, I will elaborate a bit on the comparison. Keep in mind that I only had my Sienna (2018) for one season, and most of the time it had Blizzak WS80 tires on it.
The first thing I will say is that we almost didn't buy the Sienna because we came across some fairly negative reviews about the AWD system. In hindsight I think the reason for those reviews was more about the tires than the AWD system itself (as the AWD comes with runflat tires that are just terrible, IMO).
Also keep in mind that most of the driving I have done in the Telluride in snow is with winter tires...so I can't really give a comparison between the two with all season tires other than the 15 minute drive I did in the morning (on my way to the tire store). What I will say is that the Telluride did great in the deep snow. See picture below for a sense of the snow depth. Even with the all season tires, I was able to drive through deep snow without much issue. I did slide side to side some, and there was some wheel slip, but I was always able to move forward, and never felt like I might get stuck. I only drove in the really deep stuff for 500 feet or so, so keep that in mind.
As for a comparison with winter tires on both vehicles, the Telluride seems to have a few advantages.
1. The Telluride gives the driver more control (or at least the appearance of control) with the "comfort/sport/eco/snow" dial, as well as the center differential "lock" (I use quotes because it's not the same as a true 4WD locking differential). I honestly had a hard time telling the difference between Eco and Snow + lock unless I turned off traction control. (both in how it performed and what was showing on the AWD monitor) I think this is either because the system responds to slip very quickly and/or because if you have been slipping in recent driving it will pre-distribute power to the rear wheels (in eco) even if you aren't actively slipping. When I turned off traction control I did notice a pretty big difference. One other difference in snow + lock mode is that it either limits engine power and/or selects a higher gear, so you can't accelerate as fast even if you mash the pedal to the floor (even if you have plenty of traction).
2. The Telluride has ABS-based torque vectoring. I'm not sure if the Sienna had this or not, but I don't remember it kicking in when driving it last year. On the Telluride I did notice it kicking in, and it seemed to be pretty quick to respond.
3. Ground clearance. In much of the snow I was dealing with yesterday, I would have been pretty nervous to take the Sienna out simply because of the depth of the snow. This might not be justified, and I did see other lower clearance cars getting through it (with difficulty), but somehow I felt much more confident in the Telluride in terms of clearance. The spec is 8", but even with 8.7" in my Outback, I felt more confident in the Telluride. One thing to note about ground clearance is that there isn't a standard way to measure it (as far as I know), so it's just a number that the manufacturer provides.
I actively sought out deep snow, taller mounds / ridges (from plowing) and would drive right through/over them. Again, this was with snow tires, but the Telluride just when wherever I pointed it. A friend commented that "this really isn't very fun because you aren't having any trouble"
I think comparing the two (again, snow tires on both) the main take-away is that I have a lot more confidence in deep snow in the Telluride. Hard to say if it is primarily ground clearance, or all of the other factors, but in the end it drove like a tank.
The only reservations I have are about reliability / longevity...not because I expect any problems, but as I understand it the transmission and AWD system are both in-house designs, and new ones at that. (Can anyone verify that?) So not knocking Kia/Hyundai on that, just noting that both are pretty complicated systems, and it's hard to get right from the beginning...so I will be watching that.
... jeez.
