Consumer Reports: Subaru, Lexus Make the Most Reliable Cars

Sean Tucker 12/11/2024 8:00am

Toyota lost the top spot in Consumer Reports’ list of the most reliable car brands in 2024. Subaru knocked off the usual leader, with Toyota’s Lexus luxury brand taking second and Toyota’s mainstream offerings in third.

Subaru also took first place in the magazine’s overall brand ranking, which combines these reliability scores with test drive impressions and owner satisfaction ratings.

CR’s Methods Are Different

Several publications and consumer groups test new car reliability. Consumer Reports takes a different approach than most, making its results useful and limited.

The magazine surveys its readers about the vehicles they own and what problems they’ve experienced with them. That feedback gives CR a deep well of data on specific brands and very little on others. If the readers trust the magazine and buy what it recommends, it will often cover just a segment of the automotive market.

That phenomenon is particularly visible this year when the magazine didn’t have enough data to evaluate 16 brands. Ram, whose Ram 1500 is usually one of the three best-selling vehicles in America (though perhaps not this year), didn’t earn a score.

Not Every Car From a Good Brand Is Good

Brand scores are useful, but even CR cautions readers not to give them too much weight. “Even within high-ranking companies, there can be significant variation in reliability” between one model and another, says Jake Fisher, senior director of auto testing.

Subaru likely does well because its cars share so many parts. Four models — the Outback, Forester, Crosstrek, and Ascent — make up most of the brand’s sales. All ride on the same platform. “This commonality means that when Subaru redesigns a vehicle, it can make fewer incremental changes by carrying over dependable systems. This reduces the risk of new problems,” explains Stephen Elek, who oversees data analytics for CR.

Larger companies like Toyota, with dozens of cars, trucks, and SUVs, have more opportunities for error.

EV ‘Teething Problems’ Receding

Electric vehicles (EVs) performed particularly poorly in last year’s evaluation. They improved this year, CR writers.

“This year’s survey results have more data on hybrids and electric vehicles than ever before, revealing how newer technology’s teething pains start to dissipate after two or three years. These findings reinforce why it’s best to wait a couple of years before buying an all-new model.”

The Scores:

To build its rankings, CR says, it used “the weighted overall problem rate for all models within a brand for each model year. Then, the brand reliability score was calculated by averaging models from 2022 to 2024 and some early 2025 data for each brand, where there was sufficient sample size.” The results were converted into a score on a 100-point scale.

Rank	Brand	Predicted Reliability Score (100-point scale)
1	Subaru	68
2	Lexus	65
3	Toyota	62
4	Honda	59
5	Acura	55
6	Mazda	55
7	Audi	54
8	BMW	53
9	Kia	51
10	Hyundai	50
11	Buick	48
12	Nissan	48
13	Ford	44
14	Genesis	40
15	Volvo	38
16	Chevrolet	37
17	Tesla	36
18	Volkswagen	34
19	Jeep	33
20	GMC	33
21	Cadillac	27
22	Rivian	14