While one would hope their brand-new vehicle would have a measure of quality right out of the box, analytics company J.D. Power nevertheless continues to issue awards for vehicles which manage to not fall apart in the first three months of ownership.
Specifically, the U.S. Initial Quality (IQS) Study measures initial vehicle quality during the first 90 days of ownership, tracking problems per one hundred vehicles (PP100). It is based on responses from about 99,144 buyers and lessees of new 2024 model-year vehicles and focuses on ten vehicle categories including infotainment, powertrain, driving experience, and other areas of the car.
Alert readers will note some of those categories feature parts of the car which can frustration even if they are working precisely as designed. In fact, the analytics company specifically calls out problems such as issues connecting with smartphone mirroring or confusing touchscreen controls. In other words, the IQS survey will penalize a car if Android Auto doesn’t connect or if its transmission reduces itself to 10,000 oily bottlecaps. We will argue the latter is of greater consequence.
Anyway, this year’s data was taken between July 2023 and May 2024. Ram is the highest-ranking brand overall in initial quality with a score of 149 PP100. Among mass market brands, Chevrolet (160 PP100) ranks second and Hyundai (162 PP100) ranks third. Among premium brands, Porsche gets the highest with a score of 172 PP100. Lexus (174 PP100) is awarded second and Genesis (184 PP100) earns a bronze.
The industry average is 195 PP100 but mass market brands, bought by plebians such as this author, outperformed the mean with a combined average of 181 PP100. Gas- and diesel-powered vehicles average 180 PP100 this year, while BEVs are 86 points higher at 266 PP100. Feel free to use our always-spirited comments section and draw yer own conclusions about these numbers.
[Images: Ram]
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