Lincoln Ranked Below Average In CR’s 2023 Reliability Survey

November 30, 2023 12:22 pm

Ford Motor Company has faced its fair share of quality issues in recent years, though the automaker has made improving that particular area a big focus moving forward. The Blue Oval has set “best-in-class” quality targets for some of its more popular models that it expects to reach by 2025, with others taking a bit longer, for example. But in the meantime, the automaker continues to perform rather poorly in surveys and studies related to quality, with its luxurious arm – Lincoln – ranking last in Consumer Reports‘ 2021 reliability survey, though it moved up to 10^th among all brands last year. However, this year’s survey was just released, and it found that the Ford brand ranked below the industry average, while Lincoln produced similar results.

This year, Consumer Reports included 30 brands in its annual reliability survey, and out of that group, Lincoln ranked 23^rd with a score of 38 out of 100 possible points. That ranks it behind Lexus (79), Toyota (76), Mini (71), Acura (70), Honda (70), Subaru (69), Mazda (67), Porsche (66), BMW (64), Kia (61), Hyundai (56), Buick (55), Infiniti (53), Tesla (48), Ram (46), Cadillac (45), Nissan (45), Genesis (44), Audi (43), Chevy (43), Dodge (42), and Ford (40) as well as ahead of GMC (36), Volvo (28), Jeep (26), Volkswagen (26), Rivian (24), Mercedes-Benz (23), and Chrysler (18). In terms of individual models, CR included two models from the Lincoln brand – the Corsair, which scored a 45, and the Aviator, which scored a 35.

Consumer Reports derives this data using information gathered from its member surveys regarding any issues they’ve had with their vehicles over the past 12 months. This year’s survey contains data from 330,000 member-owned vehicles spanning the 2000-2024 model years, and covers 20 different problem areas such as brakes, interior trim, engines, transmissions, an EV batteries and charging issues. CR then weighs the severity of each problem to create a predicted reliability score between 1 and 100.

In terms of electrified models, hybrids actually performed admirably by experiencing 26 fewer problems than their ICE counterparts, but the same can’t be said of PHEVs (146 more problems) or EVs, which averaged low-to-mid 40s in terms of reliability rankings. The biggest reported trouble areas for those models pertain to EV drive system motors, charging systems, and batteries, while as is usually the case, vehicles equipped with older technology features proved to be more reliable as well.

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By Brett Foote

Brett's lost track of all the Fords he's owned over the years and how much he's spent modifying them, but his current money pits include an S550 Mustang and 13th gen F-150.