Four model years of electric SUVs, each scored against its own class and year. 2 of the 22 we can score match or beat their classes — no electric sedan does.
October 2026 · 2022–2025 model years · 4 min read
Electric SUVs are not better than electric sedans as a group — the median of each field is almost identical, 1.93× against 1.87×. What differs is the top. Two of the five below average as clean as a typical vehicle in their class, or cleaner, across four model years, led by Toyota bZ4X at 0.90×. No electric sedan gets within 0.53 of that.
Every vehicle here has at least two scored model years between 2022 and 2025. That filter removes some genuinely good one-year scores and it is deliberate: a single model year is not a track record.
Mean combined index — both how often a vehicle needs fixing and how costly those fixes are, in one number — across every scored model year, each measured against that year's class average. 1.00× is a typical vehicle; lower is better. The 2025 shortlist plots the two dimensions separately.
Mid-Size SUV · mean 0.90× · 3 scored years · latest #16 of 66 · open in the lookup →
Toyota came late and arrived with the best-scoring electric SUV in the window. 2023 at 0.93×, 2024 at 1.04×, 2025 at 0.71× — no bad year, which almost nothing else here can claim. Renamed from bZ4X to bZ for 2025; it is one vehicle and scored as one.
Large SUV · mean 1.00× · 2 scored years · latest #24 of 42 · open in the lookup →
The surprise, and the one readers will argue with. Two scored years, 2024 at 1.00× and 2025 at 1.00×, both landing mid-pack in the large SUV class on 16,240 total sales. A small-volume, very expensive vehicle whose score is consistent across both years it has.
Compact SUV · mean 1.09× · 2 scored years · latest #30 of 42 · open in the lookup →
Discontinued, and therefore a used-only answer — which is what most people reading a reliability ranking are actually shopping for. 2022 was its strong year at 0.71×, #13 of 37.
4. Audi e-tron — 1.09× mean across 2 years, latest #12 of 38. Look it up →
5. Nissan Ariya — 1.23× mean across 3 years, latest #25 of 42. Look it up →
The best-selling electric vehicle in the world does not make this top five. Averaged across four model years it sits at 1.27×, 6th of 22 electric SUVs — and that average is dragged down entirely by where it started.
Tesla Model Y went 1.98× → 1.48× → 0.89× → 0.72× from 2022 to 2025, and Ford Mustang Mach-E went 1.99× → 1.47× → 0.97× → 0.72× over the same four years. Both are now in the top third of the mid-size SUV class. Both would be unbuyable on their 2022 scores. A four-year mean punishes exactly the vehicles that fixed themselves, which is why the year-by-year table is here and not a footnote.
If you are buying a used electric SUV: rank the model year first. A 2024 or 2025 Model Y or Mach-E outscores a 2022 of either by a factor of two, and outscores most of this top five's earlier years too.
The median 2025 electric vehicle sits in the 24th percentile of its class, against the 58th for gasoline — so the SUVs here are the exception, not the rule. They benefit from competing in classes that are themselves full of new vehicles, and from four model years of iteration on the problems that sank the 2022s.
Where the gap persists is frequency, not cost. Electric vehicles draw reports about 3.9× as often as gasoline ones; when something goes wrong the cost is within a few percent of the same. The 2025 overall shortlist charts that across all four powertrains.
One caveat worth stating plainly. This measures reported issues per vehicle sold. Electric vehicles are newer, their owners skew early-adopter, and software faults that a gasoline car would never generate a report for are counted here. Some of the EV frequency gap is almost certainly reporting behaviour rather than hardware. The severity figures, which barely move between powertrains, are the harder number.
Across 2022–2025, Toyota bZ4X has the best mean combined index at 0.90× — cleaner than a typical vehicle in its class — from 3 scored model years with no weak year among them.
The 2025 Model Y ranks #18 of 66 mid-size SUVs at 0.72×, the top third of its class. Its four-year mean of 1.27× is worse because the 2022 scored 1.98×. Buy the later years.
The 2025 is, clearly: #17 of 66 mid-size SUVs at 0.72×, with the lowest fix frequency of any 2025 EV in the top five overall. The 2022 scored 1.99× and is a different vehicle on these numbers.
2022 and 2023 broadly. Subaru Solterra scored 2.75× in 2023; Rivian R1S scored 4.25× in 2022; Volkswagen ID.4 scored 2.76× in 2022.
Failure reports filed with NHTSA, weighted against US sales volumes and benchmarked within segment and model year. Full methodology.
All 12 systems, the full class plotted, and every model year back to 2004 — for any vehicle in the dataset.
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