Client Studies has launched their annual “Finest Automobiles” subject. Their definition of “finest” includes a mix of their self-conducted highway assessments, security rankings, proprietor satisfaction surveys, and proprietor reliability surveys. Nonetheless, I’m principally simply involved about their reliability rankings. I like to trace those shifting up and those shifting down. I do consider it says one thing broad concerning the present state of every producer.
Subaru makes use of loads of the identical components throughout all of its autos, which implies fewer new designs and thus larger reliability. They’re additionally now a extra mature firm, after a interval of very quick progress. Their all-wheel drive has principally stayed the identical for years and years, and it’s on each automobile so that they have it down. Toyota/Lexus has an extended historical past of choosing small, incremental adjustments relatively than full redesigns. This makes them extra boring, however boring tends to be dependable.
Nonetheless, Client Studies recommends that you simply store by particular automobile mannequin and never simply by model make. Usually, new fashions have extra issues than these which are 2-3 years previous.
Hybrids are surprisingly now practically as dependable as conventional ICE automobiles regardless of their add complexity, whereas plug-in hybrids have 70% extra issues general than ICE autos (down from 146% extra final yr). Pure electrics have 42% extra issues than ICE autos (down from 79% extra final yr). My assumption is that that is once more as a result of hybrids have been round longer and the engineers have had an opportunity to unravel the issues that arose. I’m nonetheless fairly pleased with my previous Toyota minivan, though I’ve been watching critiques of the brand new Volkswagen ID Buzz. Perhaps after a number of extra years…
