IIHS names 48 new vehicles Top Safety Picks for 2025
You’re shopping for your next new vehicle, and one of your primary concerns is safety—after all, you want the best protection for you and your family in any kind of collision. Besides front or side impacts, you’re also concerned everybody on board is kept from harm in case of a rollover. You want the head restraints to do their job, you want the headlamps to offer the best visibility when night falls, and you want the automotive industry’s most effective safety technologies, like automatic emergency braking and pedestrian detection.
You want it all, but you’re overwhelmed by all the information on crash tests, star ratings, and safety rankings the blogosphere throws at you. Here’s the good news. The mission of the U.S. Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) is to crunch all the data — and the cars — to straightforwardly rate the safest new vehicles your money can buy.
Every year, a few days before the spring returns, the non-profit insurance-company-funded organization unveils a very select list: its Top Safety Picks. More than 50 years of crash-testing can be found behind this honour roll of annual awards.
To be awarded one of these trophies, vehicles must earn good or acceptable ratings in all the collision tests developed by the IIHS and excel in every single safety technology mentioned in introduction. Any vehicle that gets a Marginal or a Poor rating in even just one of those IIHS assessments is out of the picture.
Therefore, says David Harkey, IIHS President, “consumers looking for a new vehicle offering the highest level of protection for their families should put these award-winners at the top of their list.”
The (new) differentiator in the back seat
Compared with the 71 vehicles that were honoured in 2024, there are only 48 Top Safety Picks and Picks+ for 2025. The reason? IIHS has ramped up its requirements, forcing the manufacturers’ hands by requiring better protection for second-row occupants this year.
“We’re once again challenging automakers to make their new models even safer than those they were building a year ago,” explains Harkey. “Every vehicle that earns a 2025 award offers a high level of safety in both the front seat and the second row.”
How is this tested? By adding a dummy representing a small woman or a 12-year-old child, seated behind the driver, while conducting an updated moderate-overlap front collision test (specifically when a vehicle strikes a barrier at 64 kilometres an hour, simulating another vehicle of equal size and weight, with 40% of its front width overlapping).
Essentially, this small passenger seated on the rear bench has to survive the overlap collision as well as those seated in front—something manufacturers can achieve with seatbelt technology or other safety innovations. If they pass this new safety test, the vehicles that have also fulfilled the other IIHS requirements are honoured by a Top Safety Pick (for those that earned Good ratings generally but an Acceptable rating in the new moderate-overlap front test) or, even better, by a Top Safety Pick+ — the little “+” denotes it received Good ratings in all crash tests, and Acceptable or Good ratings for its headlights and pedestrian-crash-prevention tech.
What are the safest 2025 new vehicles?
There are 48 winners for 2025. Three-quarters of them (36 models) got the ultimate award, the Top Safety Picks+.
Small cars
- Honda Civic hatchback
- Mazda3 hatchback and sedan
Midsize cars
- Honda Accord
- Hyundai Ioniq 6
- Toyota Camry
Midsize luxury car
- Mercedes-Benz C-Class
Small SUVs
- Genesis GV60
- Honda HR-V
- Hyundai Ioniq 5
- Hyundai Kona
- Hyundai Tucson
- Mazda CX-30
- Mazda CX-50
- Subaru Solterra
Midsize SUVs
- Ford Mustang Mach-E
- Hyundai Santa Fe (if built after November 2024)
- Kia EV9
- Kia Telluride
- Mazda CX-70 and CX-70 PHEV
- Mazda CX-90 and CX-90 PHEV
- Nissan Pathfinder
Midsize luxury SUVs
- BMW X5
- Genesis GV70 (if built after April 2024)
- Genesis GV70 Electrified
- Genesis GV80
- Lincoln Nautilus
- Mercedes-Benz GLC
- Mercedes-Benz GLE (if equipped with optional front crash protection)
- Volvo XC90 (if built before December 2024)
Large SUVs
- Audi Q7
- Infiniti QX80
- Rivian R1S (if built after August 2024)
Large pickup
- Toyota Tundra crew cab
Some 12 vehicles were awarded the Top Safety Pick, without the “+.” Consider them the “silver medallists,” if you will.
Small cars
- Acura Integra hatchback
- Honda Civic sedan
Large luxury car
- Genesis G90
Small SUV
- Subaru Forester (except Wilderness trim)
Midsize SUVs
- Chevrolet Traverse
- Honda Pilot
- Subaru Ascent
Midsize luxury SUVs
- Acura MDX
- Infiniti QX60
- Lexus NX
- Volvo XC90 Plug-in Hybrid (if built before December 2024)
Large pickup
- Rivian R1T
Key Facts
Three out of every four of the IIHS’ top-rated vehicles are SUVs. Only 10 cars made the list, almost all compact or midsize: no large car got on the podium save the premium Genesis G90. You may also notice only two pickup trucks earned the Top Safety Pick awards. The Toyota Tundra crew cab is the only pick-up to achieve the safest + rating; while the Rivian R1T got a Top Safety Pick without the +.
The other big misses are the minivans. Admittedly, the new-vehicle market of 2025 doesn’t offer a vast selection of minivan models, but one would nevertheless expect those three-rows vehicles to be among the safest, if any. Sadly, none made the cut.
“The new emphasis on back-seat protection appears to have winnowed minivans and pickups from the winners’ ranks,” explained Harkey. “That’s unfortunate, considering that minivans are marketed as family-haulers, and extended cab and crew cab pickups are often used for that purpose.”
Winners and Losers
If country of origin is important to you (it’s definitely making headlines these days) it’s probably worth noting three-quarters of the Top Safety Picks were awarded to Asian manufacturers—Japanese and Korean. Only seven European-brand vehicles and five Americans models picked up a Top Safety Picks.
Hyundai Motor Group specifically saw the most Top Safety Picks. The consortium, which includes the Hyundai, Kia, and Genesis marques, garnered 12 trophies. Mazda followed with eight awards, meaning almost all of its 2025-model-year vehicles were honoured; more incredibly, all got the full “+” award.
Volvo, historically the champion of car safety, received only two awards, both for its XC90 large SUV (in regular and plug-in hybrid variants). Also note that the 13 accolades won by Toyota and Lexus last year shrank to only three prizes this year.
While both of Rivian’s vehicles — the R1S and R1T — earned Top Safety Picks, no Tesla models did. Surprisingly, not even the Tesla Model Y got the nod, even though the electric SUV was Top-Safety-Picked in 2024.