Opinion

This week marked the start of the Chicago Auto Show, showing us new Hyundais, Kias, a family crossover from GMC, and more, sustaining its reputation as the "consumers' auto show." Oh yeah, and there was a 650-horsepower Mustang GT500 convertible, surely an outlier. Regardless, it was a week of news, ...    Read more

Last week, Chrysler aired a 2-minute commercial featuring Clint Eastwood during the Super Bowl. It was pretty good. But some people are outraged by it. They shouldn't be. So, some of these people said some nasty things. And then some other people said they were stupid. It was like being ...    Read more

On Monday, everyone was talking about the Clint Eastwood and Chrysler 300 Super Bowl ad where the Gran Torino star showed Christian Bale how to really do a Batman voice. But that ad, and others, did not reach as many eyeballs as the video of the Cadillac ATS being slung ...    Read more

New York City issues 10 million parking tickets per year. Ten million. Yet, it only distributed 2989 idling tickets in 2011 by comparison. That number has upset many advocates concerned with cleaning up New York's notoriously dingy air quality. Enacted in 2009, the law cut allowed engine idling down from three minutes ...    Read more

We in the media have been taken aback by this David-versus-Goliath story of California resident Heather Peters beating American Honda in court over her 2006 Honda Civic Hybrid's apparently lackluster fuel economy. Honda's apparent inattentiveness to minding the car's real efficiencies helped cast the company as indifferent to her complaints. ...    Read more

Like a well-manicured lawn (or Alec Baldwin's hair), a meticulously-maintained ride is a thing of beauty. In my first years driving, I'd spend an entire day vacuuming, rinsing, drying, and hand-waxing my car just so it would gleam under the evening moonlight for a night on the town with a ...    Read more

Michigan-based Hagerty Insurance specializes in providing classic car coverage, but the company also does something we especially like— every year it releases a "hot list" of new models that it believe will be future classics. Hagerty asks its team of "valuation experts" to pick ten cars among the countless that ...    Read more

Toyota is the most reliable carmaker. Honda is the greenest. Domestic brands are not dependable. Ford/Chevy/Dodge builds the best truck. Cadillac's/Buick's are for old people. Mercedes-Benz is the most luxurious brand. Ferrari builds the fastest/most exotic cars. Whether or not you are a car person, you've probably heard one, or many, ...    Read more

Online auction house eBay has introduced a new version of its eBay Motors app for the iPhone. This latest version (1.4) offers up two cool advantages over its predecessor. First, you can watch live races on it, so if you're into racing, have at it. But it was the second feature ...    Read more

The larger, more powerful and yet more fuel efficient 2012 Porsche 911 Carrera hasn't even hit the dealerships yet and details of the inevitable turbocharged version are leaking, and Porsche aficionados are salivating with anticipation. The most intriguing piece of news is that Porsche will replace the current 3.8-liter twin-turbo ...    Read more

John Rosevear of The Motley Fool asks if the upcoming Chevrolet Corvette will be the last one produced by General Motors. The answer, of course, is "no," and we can move on to more probable predictions like the world ending this December. You don't believe us? Rosevear argues that the Corvette's ...    Read more

We're believers in the scientific method here at Automotive.com. As people's opinions are as reliable as a politician's words, facts—especially repeatable ones—are as close as inviolable as possible in a world where belief denies global warming and vaccinations are viewed with suspicions. (Personally, we think believers of the latter should ...    Read more

During its first go around with Heather Peters small claims court over her 2006 Honda Civic Hybrid's dismal gas mileage, Honda skipped out on supplying subpoenaed information. But after the case ...    Read more

The past few years has seen major shakeups in the automotive industry, and it shows in a recent survey on brand perception conducted by Consumer Reports. Once dominant players Toyota, Honda, Ford, and Chevrolet remain on top, but each automaker has seen its points gap decrease compared to last year. ...    Read more

Burn the witch! Today, General Motors Chairman and CEO Dan Akerson went before the U.S. House Subcomittee on Regulatory Affairs, Stimulus Oversight and Spending to answer committee members' concerns on the automaker's Chevrolet Volt hybrid electric vehicle. Specifically, the committee wanted to know more about the EV's battery fires, whose investigation ...    Read more

Hybrids aren’t as environmentally friendly as you may think. Take a Toyota Prius, for instance. The car is manufactured in Japan and shipped to the U.S. That takes a lot of fuel. But there’s more to it than that. The rare earth metals used in manufacturing the electric motor—neodymium and dysprosium—are ...    Read more

Automakers have focused on more powerful engines at the expense of fuel economy for decades. At the time it made sense; not only did Americans seemingly want more horsepower, but gasoline was dirt cheap. But the focus has shifted due to rising gas prices, several oil crises, and federal mandates ...    Read more

Finally, two wealthy morons reveal the formula for all-wheel drive supercar fail: Money + Snow + Steep Hill! In what's shocking to literally no one who has ever driven a car uphill, we now have videographic evidence to support what we've known all along--that ice and gravity cannot be defeated by ...    Read more

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration released a statement today that it has closed its investigation of battery fires in the 2012 Chevrolet Volt. The federal agency first became concerned late last year when one of its Chevy Volt test vehicles ignited at its Wisconsin testing facility. Subsequent testing revealed ...    Read more

Last December, General Motors launched Chevrolet Route 66 , a website which showcased select video entries for the automaker's all-important 30-second Super Bowl XLVI ad. The entry, "Chevy Happy Grad", by aspiring filmmaker and Long Island resident Zach Borst, won after garnering more than 32 million views. “When I saw Zach’s ...    Read more

Women, as any relationship counselor will tell you, have a different approach to things than men. This of course drives both sexes crazy, while selling plenty of relationship books and paying psychologists' fees. LeaseTrader has confirmed these differences in the pragmatic approach women take when shopping for their next vehicle. According ...    Read more

“Comparing Volt to Prius v is apples to oranges,” said GM’s Rob Peterson in an email to Bloomberg. Not saying he’s wrong, but the 2012 Toyota Prius v, the tall-roof station wagon variant of the Prius hatchback, did outsell the Volt’s whole year of sales in a little more than ...    Read more

When I was a kid, I wanted to be a professional baseball player so that I could afford to drive the most exotic and fastest cars in the world. In high school, I learned that cars with a roomy backseat provide certain advantages, and my dream changed to include cars ...    Read more

Surrounded by the seemingly endless in-car technology at last week’s 2012 Consumer Electronics Show, it became very apparent that the chips and processors side of the car business has become just as important as what’s under the hood. But where engine technology has plateaued for the moment, infotainment systems are ...    Read more

The Automotive.com team noted a unifying theme at this year's Detroit Auto Show. It underlined virtually every debut, from the all-new 2013 Ford Fusion to the Nissan Pathfinder SUV crossover concept to Toyota's NS4 concept. That theme was purpose. The automakers, now more than ever, are focused on introducing vehicles that ...    Read more