Is this engine reliable? How is the performance and overall efficiency? On paper it's actually a very well engineered motor. I am not a fan whatsoever of turbo engines, grew up all my life avoiding them, but this one feels quite responsive and linear at throttle tip-in compared to others I have tried.

Do you guys like this engine?

good MPG, overall good power, slower then a 350 but way faster then the old 250 motor.
only thing replaced is the boost solenoid, cheap part and easy to replace.

I love turbo engine, they are a bit more involved but not bad unless you start to modify them. The good (bad for tuners and me) thing about this motor it's not very strong and the turbo is too small for any type of high hp medication, it's pretty much tuned for where it needs to be and should last.

If you are worried about the 2.0l V4t engine for only 2k more you get the more powerful 3.5l V6 and bonus AWD in Canada if you are looking for new, 2k is a bargain for that upgrade.
I have seen mention of turbo lag in the forum but myself I avoid turbo engines and went with the V6.

I have over 100k miles on my 2016 200t with the 8AR motor, I've had 0 issues, and I've also been tuned for the last 20k miles. I recently took a trip from FL to NC and back for thanksgiving, and hand calculated an average of 31mpg, getting about 430 miles to a full tank. Its not the most efficient motor, but thats mainly because of how heavy this car is. Reliability, in my experience, has been living up to the Lexus reputation.

I've put about 22,000 km on this year without any issues.

Fuel efficiency is mediocre, but consistent. Usually average 10.5-11 km/l (about 26 mpg) mixed.

I don't feel there's much turbo lag with the engine, it seems like most of the of lag in responsiveness is from throttle mapping and transmission programming vs actual turbo lag; evidence to that is sport mode removes most of it.