Tyre Reviews Tyre Tests

The German SUV specialist publication Auto Bild Allrad have become the second magazine in 2021 to publish their all season tyre test, and the first to include the new Michelin CrossClimate 2 (much to our disappointment, we wanted to be first!)

While the Allrad tests aren't quite as in depth as the industry leading Auto Bild tests, they're still an excellent reference point for the market, and especially useful if you drive an SUV, or are interested in how an all season tyre compares to a summer and winter tyre, as both are included as references.

The tested size is 215/65 R17, which fits many popular SUVs such as the VW Tiguan test vehicle, the Audi Q5, Mercedes GLA, Nissan Qashqai and many others. It's worth remembering that sometimes SUV tyre sizes have different constructions to their regular cousins, meaning that surprising results can be a feature in this sort of test!

It's the first Tyre Reviews SUV tyre test, and as usual, we're trying to do this as properly as possible!

We have 8 of the most popular SUV tyres in 235/55 R18, including the Michelin Primacy 4, the brand new Goodyear EfficientGrip 2 SUV, the extremely popular Uniroyal RainSport 5, the new Hankook Ventus S1 Evo3 SUV, the Nokian WetProof SUV, the Vredestein Ultrac Satin, the Avon ZX7, the BFGoodrich Advantage SUV, and a budget tyre.

The 2021 Auto Bild All Rad SUV test has tested ten SUV tyres in the popular 215/60 R17 size. While the German publication used a Jeep Renegade for testing, this size is also fitted to vehicles like the Nissan Qashqai, VW Transporter, Renault Kadjar, Toyota C HR and many other popular crossover SUVs.

As always Auto Bild have done a great job testing, as not only have they tested in the dry and wet, they've also conducted FIVE off-road tests. Given these sort of vehicles rarely see any activity outside of the school run, the tests have a low weighting in the overall results, but it's certainly excellent data if you ever plan to take your crossover SUV on grass, gravel, sand or mud!

The 2020 Auto Bild crossover SUV all season tyre test has tested 11 of the best all season tyres in the rather small 215/60 R16 tyre size, using a VW T-Roc. 

Auto Bild have also included a reference summer and winter tyre, so we can see the difference performances between the three tyre types, but sadly haven't shared which tyres were used as the reference tyres.

The 2020 ADAC SUV All season tyre test has tested seven all season tyres in the popular 235/55 R17, and include a summer tyre in the dry and wet, and a winter tyre during snow and ice testing.

ADAC usually hides all their data and just gives numeric scores, but this year have released braking distances for all four braking tests. This might be to back up their conclusion from this test, which is even the best all season tyres are deficient compared to a summer and winter tyre combination.

For 2020, the German publication Gute Fahrt has tested eight 215/50 R18 SUV tyres using a VW T-Roc.

As with the 18" test in 2019, Gute Fahrt have chosen not to publish their handling data, instead grading each tyres handling subjectively as "very good", "good" or "satisfying". Sadly as this doesn't really work with how the Tyre Reviews database system is set up, we're representing each of the ratings as a number, with 3 being "very good", 2 "good" and 1 as "satisfying".

The 2020 Auto Bild AllRad SUV / 4x4 tyre test has looked at the popular 255/55 R18 tyre size. While the tyre patterns included in the test are aimed at "soft roaders", which spend 99% of their time on normal roads, Auto Bild still went to the effort of testing the handling and traction on gravel of all ten tyres, along with traction on grass, mud and even sand!

Off-road performance is often an opposing quality to on-road grip, with dedicated off-road tyres performing well in loose surfaces such as gravel and mud, but poorly on-road in the dry and wet.  It's worth noting, as we found out with our off-road tyre test, repeatable off-road testing is extremely difficult, especially in mud, so these figures should only be used as a broad guide.

Having already looked at the 2020 ADAC 18" UHP summer tyre test, the SUV version in 235/55 R17 is more of the same.

Of the twelve tyres tested in this popular crossover SUV size, Michelin once again take the top spot with the Primacy 4, thanks to an excellent all round balanced performance.

Warning, lots of data ahead! For the 2019 winter, Auto Motor und Sport have tested eleven of the best winter tyres in the 215/55 R17 crossover SUV size.

The biggest plus of this test is the sheer amount of data they've produced, as they've rated the tyres both objectively and subjectively in a lot of categories.

For their 2019 summer tyre test, Auto Express have tested eight SUV tyres in the popular 235/50 R18 size.

The 2019 Auto Motor und Sport tyre test has tested eleven crossover SUV tyres in 215/55 R17. While this fitment isn't the most exciting fitment in the world, usually being found fitted to vehicles like the Vauxhall Mokka, Skoda Karoq, Seat Ateca, Hyundai Kona and Audi Q2, it is a high growth segment thanks to the huge sales of these types of cars.

The results of this test are fairly straight forward, with only one note. The Continental PremiumContact 5 tested has been replaced by the PremiumContact 6, which undoubtably would have fared better than the seventh place overall.

For 2018, the German publication Auto Zeitung have tested nine SUV / 4X4 winter tyre patterns in 235/60 R18 using an Audi Q5.

The tyres on test covered the premium and midrange segments, with a single budget tyre included, the Wanli Snowgrip S1083. The Wanli tyre was less than half the price of the most expensive tyres on test, so it will be interesting to see whether the Chinese manufactured tyre can improve on past performances.

The 2018 Auto Bild SUV / 4x4 winter tyre test has used an Audi Q5 to test ten 235/60 R18 winter tyres, with the Goodyear UltraGrip Performance Gen-1 SUV proving to be the best tyre on test thanks to an excellent all-round performance.

Surprisingly Pirelli edged out Continental to second place, with a brilliant result for the Pirelli Scorpion Winter. This tyre has been on the market a number of years now, and historically hasn't tested as well as Goodyear or Continental, so there must have been and update for the 2018 winter season.

The Continental Winter Contact TS850P SUV rounded out the top three, with its only real weakness appearing during the important dry braking tests.

Thanks to the explosion in SUV type vehicles, tyre companies are feverishly updating their SUV and 4x4 product lines. To see which manufacturer is currently doing the best job, Auto Bild Allrad have tested eight of the latest patterns in the large 265/60 R18 size.

For 2017, the "All Road" edition of the German publication Auto Bild has tested ten 225/55 R17 winter tyres. This size is commonly used by compact crossovers, such as the BMW X1 used in this test.

The biggest interest in this test was the Chinese budget winter tyre from Pace. With the most expensive set of winter tyres costing 660 euros at time of test, the budget Pace tyres were a full 400 euros cheaper, at just 260 euros. Are the savings worth the performance drop? Read on below to find out.

Sadly there's very little data available for this 235/55 R17 SUV tyre test conducted by the European motoring bodies ACE / ARBO / GTU, nor are Michelin featured, but it's still worth a read if you drive a crossover vehicle such as the Ford Kuga or Volkswagen Tiguan which uses this tyre size.

This year the German motoring orginisation ADAC have tested winter tyres in 195/65 R15 and 215/65 R16.

Unusually for a winter tyre test, Continental faulter in this 215/65 R16 SUV tyre size, only finishing seventh overall. This leaves the door open for Dunlop to take first place with the Winter Sport 5 which proves to have a very balanced all round performance with no glaring weaknesses.

BF Goodrich finished in a very strong second place, winning the majority of the test categories but missing out on the top spot due to a slightly weak wet performance, where as the third placed Goodyear UltraGrip Performance Gen-1 proved to be extremely strong in the wet, but a little disappointing on snow.

With the SUV sector booming, tyre manufacturers are starting to merge their car and SUV lines into one product. The latest, and according to this test by the Swedish magazine Vi Bilägare, greatest example of this, is the new Continental Premium Contact 6.

We've currently very few details about this years ACE / GTU SUV Summer tyre test, but we do know some things.

The testers tested eleven 215/60 R17 tyres using a the crossover SUV Vauxhall Mokka. No offroad tests were done, as crossover SUVs spend most of their lives on the black stuff.