Tesla owners like most of their car brand, Infiniti struggles, study says

What is the best car brand? This is a powerful subjective question, but Consumer Reports aimed to once again find a data-driven answer with the results of the latest survey of owner satisfaction. Once again, Tesla comes out on top and leads the package among most brand owners. At the back of the pack is Infiniti, which received no glowing comments from owners.

To understand the rankings, we must first understand how CR came to its results. The publication derived the data from the owner satisfaction survey, based on some questions asked to owners of 369,000 vehicle owners of the listed brands. The main question owners asked was, “Would they buy their vehicle again, given the chance?” The responses of the different models sold under a brand then combine a score, which CR further assesses on the basis of driving, comfort, value, electronics in the car and cabin storage.

Tesla comes first with an overall score of 88 out of 100, although Lincoln surprised us, with a second place and a score of 79. Ram has a third place with 76 points with cousin Chrysler, while Subaru and Hyundai are tied with 75 points. Porsche finishes the top five with 74 points.

It is also important to recognize that some brands sell far more models than others. In other words, more owners have the chance to drag a brand like Toyota, for example, because it sells more models than Tesla. Hyundai, for example, sells more than five different models, but the study received just enough answers to count five specific cars in the data. Who knows how more answers will affect the rankings, so it is best to just look at this information without drawing big conclusions.

CR had to receive a minimum number of responses from owners of a brand and specific models, otherwise they did not count. Therefore, a number of awnings, including Genesis, Acura, Land Rover and others, are MIA in this study.

However, these data constraints can also paint a pretty bleak picture. Take Cadillac and Infiniti, for example. CR received just enough responses to include two Cadillac models and three Infinitis. Yet, even with only a few cars, they stand at the bottom with 59 and 48 points respectively. In other words, there is an opportunity for fewer models to increase their rankings, but most answers for the few cars were pretty meh.