One of the main reasons people buy a brand-new car is the promise of a no-hassle ownership experience, free from the drip-drip-drip of service problems that set in as cars age. Nonetheless, CR’s exclusive Auto Survey tells us that some buyers will be taking their brand-new car back to the dealer’s service department sooner and more often than other car buyers will.
The models featured here are the 10 least reliable vehicles. (For more details, check our Guide to Car Reliability.)
Our survey takes a deep dive into the numerous things that can go wrong with a vehicle. We study 17 trouble areas, from nuisances—such as squeaky brakes and broken interior trim—to major bummers, such as out-of-warranty transmission repairs and trouble with four-wheel-drive systems. We weight the severity of each type of problem to create a predicted-reliability score for each vehicle.
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