Despite the American government’s best efforts to convince the world that our economy is totally cool and fine, millions of people continue to struggle to make ends meet. As the dollar continues to weaken, the need for a reliable car — and the need to keep driving that reliable car for hundreds of thousands of miles — becomes increasingly important to many folks, including this writer. If you’re looking to buy a car that will save you from excessive repair costs or save you from buying a new car before your bank account is ready to, then you’ll want to refer to the data from the team at iSeeCars and its 2025 list of the 25 longest-lasting cars.
The lore is correct — Toyota makes some of the most dependable cars on the market. In fact, the top nine spots on the list of the longest-lasting cars are occupied by Toyota and Lexus models, and three Hondas round out the top 12. According to iSeeCars, which compiled this data from the odometer readings of over 174 million cars, these are the models you can feel confident driving well beyond the 200,000 mile mark. The overall average likelihood of cars to make it beyond 250,000 miles is just 4.8%, but of all Toyota Sequoias, the model most likely to surpass that milestone, 39.1% will breach the quarter-million-mile mark.
Toyota and Honda dominate the list of cars most likely to make it to 250,000 miles
It’s no secret that Toyota and Honda produce reliable cars, but it’s always nice to have data to back that claim up; you can’t always trust the things that car enthusiasts parrot to each other, but you can in this case. The Honda Odyssey, Pilot, and Ridgeline are the 12th, 11th, and 10th most likely vehicles to make it beyond the quarter-million-mile mark, with 13%, 13.1%, and 14.7% of each model reaching the milestone, respectively.
The Lexus RX hybrid takes ninth place with a 17% chance of lasting 250,000 miles, surpassed by the Lexus GX in eighth with an 18.3% chance, and the Toyota Avalon in seventh with an 18.9% chance. There’s a big jump up to the Toyota Tacoma in sixth with a 25.3% chance of lasting beyond 250k.
Over a quarter of all the top five models on the road will last for over 250,000 miles, which is pretty remarkable. The Lexus IS sedan is the fifth most-likely model to pass the 250k-mile mark, or 27.5% of the cars sold. The Toyota Tundra full-sized pickup takes fourth place with a 30% chance, followed by the Toyota Highlander Hybrid with a 32.9% chance, and the venerable Toyota 4Runner takes second place with a 32.9% likelihood of lasting beyond a quarter-million miles. The Toyota Sequoia is the model that’s most likely to last beyond 250,000 miles, at 39.1%. That’s a whopping 8.1 times more likely than the average car, a mighty impressive feat.
There’s consistent griping about the overinflated prices of used Toyotas, especially the brand’s trucks like the Tacoma and 4Runner, but it’s hard to argue with data that proves they are significantly more likely to last beyond the 250,000-mile mark. And to put that distance into perspective, that’s the same as about 10 trips around the entire globe at the equator. Next time you’re looking for a car you can depend on for years to come, you might want to listen to the people telling you to buy a Toyota or Honda.
