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In terms of reliability, are Subaru vehicles similar to Toyota cars? I have friends who own Subarus (and even ones on this board) swear by their reliability, and there are people who also buy Subaru Outbacks, Imprezas etc at 100k miles and drivef them for another 100-150k.
But many review sites that keep date still state that the Subaru cars have "average" or "unknown/questionable" reliability.
Yes, they are known to be extremely reliable. I purchased one new last year and attempted to find a used one. It was impossible because no one trades them in with low miles. My sister's MIL had her last one for around 12 years and she just purchased the same model I have. My last car was not reliable, had ridiculously expensive labor/parts, and used premium gas, so I'm really hopeful the Subaru lives up to its promises. I haven't had any problems yet but have only had the car 18 months.
The older Subarus, especially the turbos, had a reputation for head gasket problems. This has generally not been a problem for ones made in the past ten or so years. They are not quite as reliable as Toyota, but still in the top 25% of manufacturers in terms of general reliability.
In terms of reliability, are Subaru vehicles similar to Toyota cars? I have friends who own Subarus (and even ones on this board) swear by their reliability, and there are people who also buy Subaru Outbacks, Imprezas etc at 100k miles and drivef them for another 100-150k.
But many review sites that keep date still state that the Subaru cars have "average" or "unknown/questionable" reliability.
Subaru had a head gasket issue around 10 years ago with their 4-cylinder engines. They made good on the repair for most owners but something like that certainly hurts your reliability reputation. More recently, there were issues for a few years with oil consumption on cars that weren't broken in properly. Those also seem to be behind them. Subarus are built using an awful lot of parts from the Toyota parts bin. They do their own engines and CVT transmissions but everything else on the car is using Toyota suppliers.
I own a 6-cylinder 2015 Outback. It's had a number of non-critical recalls where the work was done during an oil change. Not surprising from a first model year car. I have no reason to believe it won't be Toyota-like in reliability.
Subaru dealers tend to be more concentrated in larger metro areas, mountain, and Snowbelt locations. As production continues to expand at the Lafayette, IN plant, the dealer network could expand further down the road.
^ Those 4WD systems suck so much you better off just getting FWD with snow tires. As much as I love Hondas, without a real locking AWD system found in the MDX and Pilot you better off without it.
The older Subarus, especially the turbos, had a reputation for head gasket problems. This has generally not been a problem for ones made in the past ten or so years. They are not quite as reliable as Toyota, but still in the top 25% of manufacturers in terms of general reliability.
Head gaskets actually are the least worries imo. I've owned 5 different Subarus and none of them had those failures. The real problems Subarus of pre-2007 cars is engine sludge buildup. The gasket problems are fixable however the sludge problems are much worse if your Subaru does not get regular intervals of 3000 mi gas changes they will cause engine failures.
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