Having a certain affinity for one’s vehicle isn’t at all uncommon, whether that vehicle is a brand-new muscle car or a rust-clad jalopy that tends not to start until the second or third try. As Queen’s Robert Taylor famously sung, “I’m in love with my car / got to feel for my automobile.”
Everyone remembers their first car fondly, even if it was just a run-of-the-mill 15-year-old, road-worn sedan. But which automakers produce the most cherished vehicles? Which cars leave drivers so satisfied that they buy from the same brand again and again?
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Are the best-loved cars also the most reliable?
Interestingly, owner satisfaction doesn’t always go hand in hand with reliability and performance, as one might expect. Some of the best-loved car models are also some of the least dependable, like the all-electric Rivian R1T pickup, which ranked 2nd overall in owner satisfaction but was also deemed the 5th-least-reliable vehicle overall by Consumer Reports.
Here, we leave specific models behind and instead delve into which automakers have the most satisfied customers overall, across all of their models.
Related: The 10 cars with the most satisfied owners, according to Consumer Reports
How does Consumer Reports measure owner satisfaction?
Consumer Reports, a legacy consumer advocacy nonprofit that has been testing vehicles and surveying car owners for nearly a century, compiles owner satisfaction data via its annual survey, which is sent to the organization’s millions of members. The survey asks members myriad questions about their vehicle(s), including how likely they would be to purchase their current vehicle again given the chance to go back in time.
The percentage of owners who answer “yes” to this question provides each car model’s owner satisfaction score. These percentages are then averaged across all of an automaker’s models to yield a composite owner satisfaction score for a car brand at large.
What auto brands do drivers love the most according to Consumer Reports?
Here are the top 15 most loved car brands according to Consumer Reports.
Also included is each brand’s general popularity score, as measured by YouGov. YouGov’s study asked participants whether they had a positive opinion of each car maker, regardless of whether they owned or drove a car by that maker.
RJ Scaringe, CEO and founder of Rivian, unveils a Rivian R3 prototype crossover electric vehicle (EV) during an event.
1. Rivian
Consumer Reports owner satisfaction score: 86%YouGov popularity score: 55th place (27%)Established: 2009Based in: United States
A red Mini Cooper SE electric car at the 2024 Bangkok EV Expo at the Queen Sirikit National Convention Center
2. Mini
Consumer Reports owner satisfaction score: 77%YouGov popularity score: 40th place (43%)Established: 1969Based in: United Kingdom
BMWs on display at the Automotive Summit at the Porte de Versailles Exhibition Center in Paris, France
STEPHANE MOUCHMOUCHE/Getty Images
3. BMW
Consumer Reports owner satisfaction score: 76%YouGov popularity score: 3rd place (66%)Established: 1916Based in: Germany
Porsche cars in a parking area at the Volkswagen automobile factory
4. Porsche
Consumer Reports owner satisfaction score: 76%YouGov popularity score: 16th place (57%)Established: 1931Based in: Germany
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A line of electric vehicles of the model Y is pictured during the start of the production at Tesla’s “Gigafactory”
PATRICK PLEUL/Getty Images
5. Tesla
Consumer Reports owner satisfaction score: 74%YouGov popularity score: 44th place (38%)Established: 2003Based in: United States
Damian B Oh, CC-BY-SA-4.0 via Wikimedia Commons
6. Genesis
Consumer Reports owner satisfaction score: 73%YouGov popularity score: 48th place (36%)Established: 2015Based in: South Korea
A Lexus on display at the Annual All That Glitters Diwali Ball New York City at The Pierre Hotel
Craig Barritt/Getty Images
7. Lexus
Consumer Reports owner satisfaction score: 73%YouGov popularity score: 5th place (63%)Established: 1989Based in: Japan
A Subaru Forester is displayed during the New York International Auto Show at the Jacob Javits Convention Center
8. Subaru
Consumer Reports owner satisfaction score: 70%YouGov popularity score: 7th place (63%)Established: 1953Based in: Japan
Related: The 10 best electric SUVs, according to Consumer Reports data
A yellow RAM truck in Edmonton
9. Ram
Consumer Reports owner satisfaction score: 69%YouGov popularity score: 32nd place (51%)Established: 2010Based in: United States
A Honda Motor Co. CR-V e:FCEV (fuel cell electric vehicle) on display at the Japan Mobility Show in Chiba, Japan
10. Honda
Consumer Reports owner satisfaction score: 69%YouGov popularity score: 2nd place (72%)Established: 1946Based in: Japan
The takeaway
Rivian, one of the newest automakers on this list (Genesis is newer but is the luxury brand of Hyundai), took the top spot by a significant margin, with 86% of owners saying they’d buy a Rivian again if given the opportunity. This is interesting, as Consumer Reports ranked Rivian 28th out of 30 in terms of reliability, meaning that Rivian vehicles are far more unreliable than other cars. Nevertheless, their owners apparently love them.
Another takeaway from the list above is that owner satisfaction doesn’t seem to correlate with automaker popularity among the general public. For instance, 74% of Tesla owners would buy from the brand again, while only 34% of the public have a positive attitude toward the electric automaker.
Interestingly, BMW’s owner satisfaction rating actually matched its popularity among the general public, with the German automaker taking third place in both measures.
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