Consumer Reports and their Car Brand Reliability rankings for 2025

Consumer Reports just released their Car Brand Reliability rankings for 2025. This year, some names on the list of the top 10 most reliable car brands might just raise your eyebrows! The 2025 rankings reveal a reliability shake-up where legacy leaders are no longer immune to declines, luxury brands are narrowing the gap, and electrification continues to introduce meaningful reliability risk for consumers. Below please find the rankings, most surprising findings and the biggest movers up and down.

Consumer Reports' 10 Most Reliable Car Brands Will Shock You

Every year, Consumer Reports asks its members about problems they’ve had with their vehicles in the previous 12 months. With data from over 300,000 vehicles that addresses 17 common trouble areas, CR’s reliability ratings are the best in the industry. The result of their testing and surveys is a rating system that assigns scores to brands and specific models. Below is their ranking of the top 10 most reliable car brands for 2025 and their overall scores. Subaru, Lexus, and Toyota top the charts. But, chances are you didn’t expect to see the likes of BMW, Kia, and Hyundai on this list!

Below, CarEdge.com has added the change in Consumer Reports brand reliability score since last year for comparison’s sake.

#1Subaru – 68 (-1)

#2 Lexus – 65 (-14)

#3 Toyota – 62 (-17)

#4 Honda – 59 (-11)

#5 Acura – 55 (-15)

#6 Mazda – 55 (-12)

#7 Audi – 54 (+11)

#8 BMW – 53 (-11)

#9 Kia – 51 (-10)

#10 Hyundai – 50 (-6)

Among the top 10 brands by reliability, all except Toyota moved up this year.

For 2025, Mini and Porsche were knocked off of the list.

It’s important to note that Consumer Reports lacked sufficient data for brand rankings for the following brands: Alfa Romeo, Chrysler, Dodge, Fiat, Infiniti, Jaguar, Land Rover, Lincoln, Lucid, Maserati, Mercedes-Benz, Mini, Mitsubishi, Polestar, Porsche, and Ram.

Here’s how other major car brands scored in Consumer Reports’ testing.

# 11 Buick – 48 (-7)

#12 Nissan – 48 (+3)

#13 Ford – 44 (+4)

#14 Genesis – 40 (-4)

#15 Volvo – 38 (+10)

#16 Chevrolet – 37 (-6)

#17 Tesla – 36 (-12)

#18 Volkswagen – 34 (+8)

#19 Jeep – 33 (+7)

#20 GMC – 33 (-3)

#21 Cadillac – 33 (-3)

#22 Rivian – 14 (-10)

Most surprising findings

Luxury brands outperforming expectations: BMW and Audi both landed in the top 10, defying the long-held assumption that luxury equals lower reliability.

Mainstream stalwarts slipping sharply: Toyota, Lexus, Honda, Acura, and Mazda all posted double-digit score declines, even while remaining in the top tier.

Hybrids beat everything else: Traditional hybrids emerged as the most reliable powertrain, outperforming gas, EVs, and plug-in hybrids.

EV reliability gap persists: Fully electric vehicles showed 42 percent more problems than gas and hybrid vehicles, while plug-in hybrids performed worst with 70 percent more problems.

Tesla’s continued decline: Tesla fell to #17 overall with a significant year-over-year drop, reinforcing concerns around build quality and software reliability.

Rivian at the bottom: Rivian ranked last with an extremely low score, highlighting the challenges facing newer automakers.

Biggest movers up

Audi: +11 points, one of the strongest gains and a standout among luxury brands.

Volvo: +10 points, signaling improving consistency after recent struggles.

Volkswagen: +8 points, showing measurable progress.

Jeep: +7 points, a notable rebound given its recall history.

Ford: +4 points, modest improvement despite high recall volume.

Nissan: +3 points, incremental but positive momentum.

Biggest movers down

Toyota: -17 points, the steepest decline among top brands.

Acura: -15 points, a major drop for a reliability-focused brand.

Lexus: -14 points, surprising given its reputation as a reliability benchmark.

Mazda: -12 points, reversing recent upward trends.

Tesla: -12 points, reinforcing ongoing reliability concerns.

Honda and BMW: each down -11 points, notable given strong consumer trust.

The bottom half shouldn’t be a surprise. In fact, it resembles the list of automakers with the most recalls in 2024:

FCA US (Stellantis brands Jeep, Ram, Chrysler, Dodge, Fiat, Alfa Romeo) – 64 recalls

Ford (Ford and Lincoln) – 62 recalls

BMW – 34 recalls

General Motors – 32 recalls

Mercedes-Benz – 25 recalls

Hyundai – 25 recalls

See the complete list of NHTSA automaker recalls, and check your vehicle’s VIN number for recalls.

How did Consumer Reports come up with their reliability rankings? Here’s what they’ve shared on their rankings page: “This year we calculated brand-level score by first examining 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.” For those interested in a 2025 model, you’ll have to wait until the next Consumer Reports reliability rankings come out in December 2025.

Reliability by Powertrain

Hybrid vehicles were found to have the best reliability among electrified powertrains. A closer look at Consumer Reports’ 2025 data reveals that some hybrids have much worse reliability than others. Ford’s F-150 Hybrid and Escape Hybrid have very low reliability according to CR. Fully-electric vehicles had 42% MORE problems than gas and hybrid vehicles, and plug-in hybrids scored the worst by far with 70% more problems than gas and hybrid vehicles.