It would be great if there were one universal best tire out there, but sadly, that isn’t really possible. Where you live, the weather conditions you drive in, what you drive and even how you drive all affect which tire is right for you, and that’s all before you get to one of the most important factors — cost. More expensive tires often last longer and will save you money in the long run, but if you don’t have $1,000 to drop on tires, that advice definitely won’t help you.
Electric vehicles also introduce additional challenges for choosing tires, since they’re typically a good bit heavier than comparable gas cars and can see big swings in range depending on how sticky their tires are. Except it isn’t necessarily the best idea to buy tires with the lowest rolling resistance possible because they’re also typically torquier than gas cars, and without the engine and exhaust noises, you also need to prioritize quiet tires unless you want to hear a ton of road and tire noise.
So, if you own an EV, how do you figure out which replacement tire to buy, the same one that came on your car when it was new or something different? Well, that’s where our friends at Consumer Reports come in, since all that magazine money means they have the budget to actually test these sorts of things. They recently took a Tesla Model 3 that came with a set of Hankook Ventus S1 AS T0s and tested it against other EV-specific tires — the Bridgestone Turanza EV, Hankook Ion Evo AS, Pirelli PZero All Season Plus Elect and Yokohama Advan Sport EV A/S — as well as two highly rated regular tires, the General Altimax RT45 and Michelin Pilot Sport All Season 4.
Onto the results
While Consumer Reports didn’t test every single tire or use multiple EVs, there’s also only so much testing one outlet can do, and the results should at least give you some good guidance regardless of which EV you drive. So, which tire won the comparison test? That distinction goes to the Hankook that didn’t come on CR‘s Model 3, the Ion Evo AS, although the stock Ventus S1 AS T0s did come in second place.
The Ion Evos provided great handling during testing, while also being impressively quiet. They were also pretty impressive in terms of dry braking, hydroplaning resistance, snow traction and rolling resistance, with the latter being a huge factor in an EV’s range. That said, if you live in an area where winters bring a lot of ice, you may want a tire that provides better ice performance. The Ventus S1s, meanwhile, were slightly less expensive than the Ion Evos, and while they offered excellent performance in the dry braking, handling, noise and rolling resistance tests, they struggled with snow traction, making them a less-than-ideal winter option, as well. Still, CR says they’re the better option if you’re focused on efficiency.
EV owners who have to deal with both snow and ice, but also don’t want to swap tires when the seasons change, should instead look at Bridgestone’s Turanza EVs. They’re still all-season tires that excelled in the handling and noise tests, while also offering impressive hydroplane resistance and snow traction that should make them a better choice for winter driving. The downside, though, is that dry braking and rolling resistance proved to be just average.
What about the non-EV-specific tires?
While the overall winner and podium finishers in this comparison test were all EV-specific tires, that doesn’t mean the other tires performed poorly. In fact, Consumer Reports found that if safety is a top priority, the non-EV-specific tires included in the test may actually be better options. As CR put it, “even when emphasizing efficiency (rolling resistance) in our ratings calculations, the [General Altimax] ranked as high as the top-rated tire for EVs mainly because of its performance in areas like wet braking, snow and ice grip, and hydroplaning resistance—all important for safety. What’s more, those exceptional results came without significant sacrifices to range.”
As for the high-performance Michelin Pilot Sport All Season, it understandably didn’t perform as well as some of the others when it came to winter performance. If you don’t have to worry about snow or ice but do get a lot of rain, its superior wet-weather performance also makes it worth considering. That said, if you’re worried about eeking out as many miles as you can from a single charge, the better performance came at more of a cost to range than you’d see in the Altimax.
Ultimately, though, it’s all about priorities and trade-offs. Some drivers wouldn’t even notice a 25-mile drop in range, while others would never willingly give up those last few miles. Some drivers deal with enough inclement weather to make grip and handling more important than efficiency, while those who don’t probably won’t notice what they’re allegedly missing. And since EV-specific tires are often more expensive, you may want to go with a non-EV-specific alternative to save a little money. If you do go that route, though, just make sure the tires you buy come with an XL rating that shows they were designed to handle the heavier weight of an EV.
