ASK THE EXPERT: WILL MY KIA REMAIN RELIABLE WHEN THE WARRANTY EXPIRES?
Having spent brief periods in the motor trade and renting out cars, Alex decided to try writing about them instead and has done so ever since. He’s been reviewing new cars for more than 10 years, has written extensively about used and classic cars and, ever the glutton for punishment, has now owned more than 50 motors of his own, with varying degrees of success.
In our regular Ask the expert series, Alex weighs in on your car dilemmas to save you money and make your driving life easier.
Dear Alex
I have a 2019 Kia Ceed that I’m very happy with. What is the reliability of this model longer term? Would you advise changing it within the seven-year manufacturer warranty or is it worth keeping a few years longer?
– JH
Dear JH,
When assessing a car’s reliability, motoring journalists usually turn to one of the three or four regular reliability surveys.
There are two problems with that: firstly, those surveys are not always dependable and can be skewed by too-small sample sizes, or by responses from owners with axes to grind.
Secondly, most of those surveys deal with cars that are relatively new: three to five years, for example. That makes it hard to get an objective, reliable (no pun intended) feel for a car’s dependability as it gets older.
For all that, these surveys are the best indication we have. And Kia tends to stack up pretty well; it came third out of 32 brands in last year’s Auto Express Driver Power survey and 11th out of 31 in the What Car? Reliability Survey.
While both of these only invite responses from owners of cars that are younger than seven years, there’s good anecdotal reason to suggest that Kia’s cars are built solidly enough to last well beyond the expiry of their warranties. Owners tend to love them, while they hold a good reputation in the trade.
That being the case, if you’re happy with your Kia, I see no reason to worry about changing it just yet. But if you want to gain the reassurance of a longer warranty, you could always look at a Toyota Corolla.
This is a similar size, but the Corolla is eligible for Toyota’s service-activated warranty, giving a year or 10,000 miles’ worth of manufacturer warranty each time you use a main dealer for servicing.
You can do this until the car is 10 years or 100,000 miles old – giving you potentially three extra years over and above the warranty cover you’d get with your Kia.
2025-01-27T07:31:17Z
