Subaru Forester review - Reliability and Safety

Safety and reliability are Subaru’s strong suits. The Japanese firm has placed a focus on making its cars some of the very safest on sale in recent years, while expertise gained from decades of producing hard-wearing cars has found its way into the brand’s current line-up. 

Subaru’s reputation is backed up by a strong showing in our 2019 Driver Power owner satisfaction survey. A 6th-place finish (out of 30 manufacturers) put the brand ahead of Honda, Jaguar, Audi, BMW, Mercedes and Volkswagen to name but a few, although the current Forester itself is too new to have made an appearance. It’s also worth noting that Subaru was voted top for its safety features, beating traditional safety champion Volvo in the process.

Subaru’s EyeSight safety system is fitted as standard – it uses a series of cameras mounted in the windscreen that are used to scan the road for hazards and can use automatic emergency braking to avoid collisions with cars, pedestrians and cyclists. It also incorporates adaptive cruise control, pre-collision throttle management and lane keep/departure assistance. The car includes blind spot monitoring, rear cross traffic alert and lane-change assist as standard, plus reverse automatic braking.  

Warranty

Subaru supplies all of its cars with an impressive 100,000-mile, five-year warranty, so the Forester is competitive in this respect in its class. Hyundai offers its Tucson and Santa Fe SUVs with the same level of cover, while Kia still rules the roost with its famous seven-year, 100,00-mile warranties.

Servicing

Traditionally, Subaru owners have had to be prepared for fairly steep servicing costs – albeit with the tradeoff of their cars rarely going wrong in between visits to the dealership.