This Tire Brand Scores The Worst For Owner Satisfaction In Consumer Reports' Ranking

As the only part of the car that's actually supposed to make contact with the road, tires are crucial for keeping your car safe and performing well. But, like anything else in the world of cars, they're not all built equal. That fact is evident when seeing how certain manufacturers failed to perform to standard in a recent Consumer Reports (CR) study on tire brand satisfaction.

The study considered all-season, all-terrain, winter/snow, and summer tires. Of the brands surveyed, Sumitomo ended up with the lowest overall satisfaction levels, finishing at the bottom of the table in two of the four tire categories (all-terrain and summer). It also languished as second-to-last in the all-season and winter/snow categories.

Sumitomo tires performed more poorly than others in key priority areas for consumers, such as handling capabilities, grip on wet roads, and longevity. Their tires were found to wear more quickly on average, compromising a car's ability to grip the road effectively. All four Sumitomo tires rated by CR – namely the HTR A/S P03 (all-season tire), HTR Z5 (summer tire), Ice Edge (winter), and Encounter HT2 (all-season SUV tires) — scored poorly across the board, receiving some of the lowest ratings possible for owner satisfaction.

Sumitomo wasn't the only poorly-rated tire brand in CR's report. Many other brands also performed poorly for customer satisfaction. Much like Sumitomo, Dunlop received poor ratings in each of the four categories assessed by owners, which is bad news for its parent company. Sumitomo Rubber Industries now owns both Sumitomo Tires and Dunlop after it acquired the latter from Goodyear in 2025, following a $701 million all-cash transaction. GT Radial, meanwhile, is the third and final tire brand to achieve the worst possible score in all four categories.

Michelin-owned Uniroyal appeared twice — in the all-season and winter-snow tire categories — but it came in at the bottom of the table on both occasions. Other worst offenders with two appearances on the lists include Ironman, Mastercraft, and Sailun, with all three featuring near the bottom of the all-season and all-terrain class. Another Michelin-backed brand, BFGoodrich, placed towards the lower end of the table of winter-snow tires, and Arizonian only managed a poor score in the all-season category. Kelly and Hercules, for their own part, were given poor reatings in at least three categories, with both brands placing among the worst performers in the all-season, all-terrain, and winter-snow categories.

But there were numerous winners, too. Michelin and Vredestein came out on top of the all-season segment. Michelin was also among the best-performing all-terrain tire manufacturers, along with BFGoodrich, Continental, Falken, and Nokian. The very top of the winter-snow table has Bridgestone, Michelin, Nokian, and Vredestein as the most satisfying brands to own, and those latter three brands dominate the summer tires category, too.