Consumer Reports on most reliable cars: Mazda SUVs, Toyota hybrids, Lexus top

USA’s Consumer Reports' latest survey of over 300,000 car owners pretty much confirms what we all already know, that Japanese cars are the most reliable, while German ones, despite their image of offering superior engineering, often don’t work as well, despite their marketing claims.

Ranked on a 100-point scale, Lexus is the most reliable car brand, followed by Mazda and Toyota. Honda is ranked 6th, Subaru 7th, Nissan 9th, while Hyundai, Kia, and Genesis finished 11th,19th, and 25th respectively.

Porsche is the highest ranked German brand, at 13th, while Audi (15th), BMW (17th), Mercedes-Benz (23rd), Volkswagen (24th) all finished in the bottom half.

Swedish brand Volvo is ranked 20th.

Ford’s upscale Lincoln marque is the least reliable brand surveyed, with Tesla and Jeep rounding up the 3 least reliable car brands in USA.

But what are the most reliable models on sale?

It’s the Lexus GX, which is not on sale here. The GX is basically a Lexus version of the Toyota Land Cruiser Prado. The Kia Niro EV is the most reliable electric vehicle, coming in at second place, followed by the plug-in hybrid Toyota Prius Prime.

In fact, Toyota and Honda hybrids finished in the top-10. Hybrids have a lot more components than regular cars – a point often made by EV enthusiasts who say that EVs are more reliable than hybrids – but Consumer Reports’ data show otherwise.

Japanese hybrids are more reliable than EVs

The Toyota Prius and Prius Prime scored a near-perfect 91 and 93 points respectively. The hybrid-only Toyota Venza (US market Toyota Harrier) scored 92 points, while the Honda Insight scored 87 points.

Apart from the Kia Niro EV (almost perfect 95 points), Ford Mustang Mach-E (71 points), and Nissan Leaf (77 points), most EV owners surveyed reported many problems with their cars. All Tesla models except the Model 3 are among the least reliable cars on sale (Model S – 20 points, Model Y – 18 points, Model X – 5 points).

The Audi e-Tron did even worst, scoring just 5 points while the Volkswagen ID.4 scored 21 points. The Hyundai Kona Electric, which has just been launched in Malaysia and is now Malaysia's cheapest EV, scored 33 points.

Shopping for SUVs? Start with Mazda and Subaru

The Subaru Crosstrek, which is the Subaru XV to us, scored 85 points, identical to the Mazda CX-9. The Subaru Forester scored 80 points, identical to the Mazda CX-5 and Honda CR-V.

The Mazda CX-30 scored 75 points.

We should also add that the Chevrolet Trailblazer is imported from Korea.

Like all surveys, different sample sizes, methodologies, even period of survey done will yield different results but usually the top-3 rankings don’t change much. Generally speaking, Lexus, Toyota, and Mazda vehicles deliver a pleasant ownership experience.

Subaru, Hyundai, and Kia are also pretty good but for various reasons, these brands didn’t rank very high on this particular survey.

Also, it should be noted that although Tesla has a lot of issues with its built quality and reliability, Tesla owners are very happy with their cars and surveys that consider owners' satisfaction (not just problems) will yield a different, higher results for Tesla.

A separate survey by Consumer Reports for owner satisfaction in 2020 puts Tesla at the top, Toyota and Lexus at 10th and 19th respectively.

In other words, Toyota and Lexus owners are extremely demanding and won't tolerate even the smallest fault, but a Tesla owner is very emotionally invested into the brand and he will still be happy with a faulty Tesla.