The annual car reliability survey by Consumer Reports found EVs are 79 percent more likely to have problems than conventional cars. Consumers reported electric drive motors, charging and EV batteries had the most common issues associated with EVs, according to the survey.

Jake Fisher, senior director of auto testing at Consumer Reports, noted that there may be “growing pains” among EVs because they are based on new technology or are being manufactured by new upstart companies, such as Rivian. He said companies “need some time to work out the bugs,” according to the magazine.

Plug-in hybrids are more likely to have more issues than gas-powered cars, EVs and hybrid vehicles. The survey said that plug-in hybrids have 146 percent more problems than gas-powered cars.

    • @jordanlund
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      171 year ago

      FTA:

      "Consumer Reports recommended Tesla’s Model 3 and Model Y for those interested in purchasing an electric car. Steven Elek, who heads the auto data analytics program at Consumer Reports, said Tesla’s components are “generally reliable,” according to the magazine.

      However, Elek added that Tesla still struggles with the build quality of its electric cars."

    • zib
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      141 year ago

      That was my thinking. A friend of mine has had a Polestar 2 for about a year now and absolutely loves it. Hasn’t had a single problem with it. Like with conventional vehicles, some brands are just shit for quality and others are great.

      • Zoolander
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        121 year ago

        To play devil’s advocate, I bought a Model 3 in 2017 and have had 0 issues with it also and it has none of the fit-and-finish issues that newer ones have.

        • @Bell
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          1 year ago

          Seconded, mine is a 2018 and has had only one problem. Best car I’ve ever owned.

          • Zoolander
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            51 year ago

            Kinda hate to say it but… same. The stereo is my favorite part and it’s the best stereo I’ve ever heard in a car. It’s incredible.

            • Clay_pidgin
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              11 year ago

              What makes the stereo great? Good speakers, a nice interface?

              • Zoolander
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                31 year ago

                Great speakers that are incredibly well-tuned and balanced with power that gets them right up to the limit without clipping. Granted, these were the premium speakers installed with the first models so I don’t know if they’re still available but they are the best sounding audio system I’ve ever heard in a car.

        • @halcyoncmdr
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          51 year ago

          Same here. No panel gaps or fit and finish issues on mine from Sep 2018. And it’s not like there was a lack of reported issues from that time either.

          • @Mr_Blott
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            1 year ago

            That’s not devil’s advocate though, that’s two exceptions to a rule

            Even over in Europe, Tesla ranks at the bottom for build quality and reliability in almost every metric, for ALL types of vehicles

            You have to be pretty bad to be as unreliable as a Land Rover Discovery, but they’ve somehow managed

        • Arcturus
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          21 year ago

          The Chinese built ones that supply Asia and Australasia are almost faultless as well. My one is an earlier model, US-built, and you can definitely tell the quality difference even with the early models that came from China.

    • Guy Dudeman
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      91 year ago

      My Chevy Bolt has been solid as a rock, and anything that was “wrong” with it has been fixed under warranty.

      • snowe
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        -21 year ago

        CR is the only one placing Tesla that high. Other surveys have placed tesla almost dead last in reliability, with a Which? survey stating that 1/20 teslas have problems failing to start and 2/5ths having major problems otherwise. I literally haven’t seen a single other survey besides CR placing Tesla that ‘high’ (is middle of the pack good now?), and it’s pretty apparent it’s because they consider anything the respondent tells them as a failure as an actual failure, even if it’s just a feature that the person doesn’t like. For example, the slow acceleration in Eco mode on the Ioniq 5 (which I absolutely love, and is perfect for luxury driving) was complained about so much that Hyundai was forced to release a TSB to ‘fix’ it, even though those users could have just used a different mode and gotten the results they desired. That counts as a ‘problem’ to CR. Clearly that’s not what a problem is. A problem is things like the seatbelts not working or the steering wheels falling off

    • @[email protected]
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      51 year ago

      Nope, it’s because of legacy automakers producing shit EVs bringing the average down.

      “Most electric cars today are being manufactured by either legacy automakers that are new to EV technology, or by companies like Rivian that are new to making cars,” says Jake Fisher, senior director of auto testing at Consumer Reports. “It’s not surprising that they’re having growing pains and need some time to work out the bugs.” Fisher says some of the most common problems EV owners report are issues with electric drive motors, charging, and EV batteries. (Note: Charging problems reported by members are with the vehicle, not with home or public chargers.)

      If you’d read the article, teslas were the “middle ground” and the only recommended vehicles.

      Their reliability rating hits came from defects like chipped paint, door handles not releasing, and trunks that didn’t close, but their actual drivetrain and batteries were fine.

      • snowe
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        01 year ago

        I would point out that the CR report does not agree with reports from other companies and other countries. Tesla is generally bottom of the barrel. But pointing out something I meant to comment upon the other day, the problems you see coming from these brands all seem to be tied to American automakers, not legacy automakers. In general Korean and Japanese brands have been fine, even German and Swedish brands. But all the american brands? GM? Rivian? Tesla? Ford? Jeep? They’re all terrible. They also tried to point out that the HI5 has had battery issues. 1 recall for 1 issue affecting a very small subset of customers is not anything like massive recalls affecting entire fleets like we’ve seen with GM, Tesla, etc. I have a HI5 and while there are problems, that’s normal for brand new vehicles, and they’re nowhere near as bad as problems I’ve had with american made vehicles (including my f150), and about par with the problems we have with our other korean vehicle (a kia sorento).

        • @[email protected]
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          1 year ago

          Yeah bro no worries, if the car brand you’re emotionally attached to doesn’t do well this year just feel free to ignore or justify the results until your feelings have stabilized. That’s what everyone else here is doing based on their hatred for one dude. No judgement here!

    • SeaJ
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      -11 year ago

      That was my assumption. They have issues with batteries dying from heavy rain because they suck at fitting things together properly. Their manufacturing tolerances are way too high.

  • @Rusticus
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    191 year ago

    Lol. Consumer Reports, the “good old boy” for the fossil fuel industry. What idiot would ever believe a machine with less than 20 moving parts would be somehow “less reliable” than a machine with 2000 moving parts? Sure, panel gaps (Tesla) are the same thing as GM ignition switch faults. Imagine what the MSM would say if Tesla cars killed a hundred people lol.

    • @jimmydoreisaleftyOP
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      51 year ago

      I would say the Right To Repair should also be on peoples mind when looking at cars.

      Reminds me of Apple and how they try to control the repair market to keep profits high and screw consumers.

    • @CaptainPedantic
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      51 year ago

      So you’re just going to ignore data that says something opposite to your preconceived notions about how stuff works? In that case, I’ve brought you a nice box of sand for your head.

      It is surprising that EVs are not as reliable as one would expect, but then again, we have way more experience building internal combustion engines than we do EV components.

      Consumer Reports publishes their methodology for collecting this reliability data. It’s not difficult to find. It’s not a black box.

      I’m in the market for a new EV, so I checked out Consumer Reports reliability data for the models I was looking at. They break it down based on 20 areas (engine, electronics, infotainment, build quality, etc.) and provide reliability for each of those areas. And those areas are not weighted the same. Most of the reliability issues with the EVs I looked at are with electronics (presumably charger related) and drive train issues.

      But despite that, CR still recommends a number of EVs, even ones with meh reliability. Fossil fuel good ol’ boys my ass.

  • @Illuminostro
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    161 year ago

    “The Hill Reliably Panders To Big Business: Electric Bad, Oil Good. Invest Today!”

    • @jimmydoreisaleftyOP
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      11 year ago

      While the survey found that electric vehicles are still less reliable than gas-powered vehicles, Consumer Reports recommended Tesla’s Model 3 and Model Y for those interested in purchasing an electric car. Steven Elek, who heads the auto data analytics program at Consumer Reports, said Tesla’s components are “generally reliable,” according to the magazine.

      However, Elek added that Tesla still struggles with the build quality of its electric cars.

      • @Illuminostro
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        11 year ago

        “Electric cars are not reliable, but if you’re stupid enough to buy one, buy a Starkmobile to support the myth of The Benevolent Billionaire.”

        Got it.

  • @[email protected]
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    141 year ago

    I had to do some serious digging on this. They previously listed the Chevy Bolt as expected to have good (not excellent) reliability in terms of batteries and motors. A few years later, reviewing their ratings for those same years, it dropped to very bad.

    Once I filtered out the noise (and trust me, there was a lot), it seemed that they were counting recalls as failures. And to be clear, the Bolt had a very significant battery recall that drove most of this. But being a recall, these were all covered for free, and most of the repairs were done before failure (as parts became available).

    While these were technically failures, they are not the type of data that people generally look for. I want to know how likely I’m going to be stuck with a repair bill (especially a big one), and how often I’m likely to be going in for service. Neither of which is covered by this data.

    • @madcaesar
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      21 year ago

      Look I’m all for EVs, but massive recalls absolutely should count as failures. Them covering it just means the company isn’t pure trash.

      • @[email protected]
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        11 year ago

        It’s a valid point of view, but I don’t think that’s what most people use these reliability ratings for. At least for me personally, I use it as a way to gauge the likelihood of future failures. At least in the past, CR has explicitly stated this as part of their methodology. I don’t think the recall is indicative of future issues.

  • Dr. Dabbles
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    131 year ago

    One brand brings the average down. Can anybody guess which one? 🤔

      • Dr. Dabbles
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        -11 year ago

        Yeah, the problem is it isn’t Rivian. I own one, and I previously owned the actual shitty brand.

          • Dr. Dabbles
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            -11 year ago

            Tesla, bud. Sorry to tell you, it’s Tesla that sucks.

              • Dr. Dabbles
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                -21 year ago

                Hilarious that you included the graphic proving you aren’t talking about EVs, but hybrids, phev, and bev. You’re confused about the topic being discussed, clearly.

                Go ahead to their ratings page, select BEVs, and order by score. You’ll kind the EV6 is at the top. If you had actually read their entire article, you would see that they said PHEVs are less reliable than BEVs as a class.

  • @dogslayeggs
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    111 year ago

    I really want to see the data behind this, because it just doesn’t ring true based on my own experience with multiple EVs and a lot of friends who have EVs. Maybe 79% more likely to “have problems” if you are including things like broken plastic or chipped paint or bad design recalls (which I see of as different from buying a vehicle that has a maintenance/repair problem). It’s not shocking that there are fewer recalls on 100 year old technology than 20 year old technology, but it is shocking that there are more serious problems on something with 1000 fewer moving parts.

  • @OhmsLawn
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    111 year ago

    I looked through the article and didn’t see, but I imagine this includes all of the battery recalls. As serious as those are, I don’t see them as reliability issues, so much as product defects.

  • @[email protected]
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    91 year ago

    electric drive motors, charging and EV batteries had the most issues

    Does “an issue charging” include the broken machines? If so that’s not an issue with the EV, that’s an issue with the charger. That’d be like including every downed nozzle someone drove to in an ICE vehicle as an issue as well

    • @[email protected]
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      101 year ago

      FTA:

      (Note: Charging problems reported by members are with the vehicle, not with home or public chargers.)

      • @[email protected]
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        21 year ago

        Sounds good then

        Assuming it’s actually issue switch the car and not operator error (something I see depressingly frequently are people at other fast chargers on a call with support claiming there’s an issue when they just can’t read instructions)

  • @ExfilBravo
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    21 year ago

    Something that just came out and is technologically more advanced isn’t as reliable as the “gas go bang car go fast” version that’s been around longer than we have been alive? I’m shocked! /s

  • @nomecks
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    11 year ago

    My Japanese EV is as reliable as any other Japaneae car I’ve owned.