What are the safest new and used cars in Australia?

If safety is a priority when you’re out on the road, you may be wondering, what are the safest cars in Australia?

Being aware of your surroundings is especially important on the road, where one false move can lead to serious consequences. It’s why many car buyers ask themselves “what are the safest cars in Australia?”

With road accidents resulting in 1,240 deaths nationwide in the year to 30 September 2023, and many more serious injuries, one key to a clever car purchase is knowing how safe it is.

Need another reason to consider car safety? Insurers typically take the safety rating of a driver’s vehicle into account when calculating their premium, so, along with a variety of other factors we’ll look at below, it could end up impacting how much you pay for insurance.

Here are some tips on how to research Australia’s safest cars.

What makes a car safe?

While it’s not necessarily true in all cases, a general rule of thumb is that the newer a car is, the safer it is.

Why? As motoring evolves, manufacturers are becoming ever smarter at incorporating safety features into vehicles of all sizes. These can come in two forms – active and passive – and in general, the more of each a car has, the safer it is.

Active features are designed to stop an accident from happening. They include:

• Auto emergency braking: senses an imminent crash and automatically applies the brakes if you don’t respond
• Lane keeping assist: helps you keep in between lines by intervening when necessary to manipulate your car’s steering
• Rear cross detection: a sensor that picks up movement within a field, sounding an alarm (audio or audio plus visual) if an object is detected
• Rear bumper sensor: alerts you if it senses obstacles nearby while you’re parking

Passive features are those that only operate during an accident. They include:

• Airbags: deploy when a major impact is made with another object
• Seat belts: secure the car’s occupants in their seat, helping them avoid whiplash
• Crumple zone: a part of the vehicle’s structure designed to crumple in an accident, absorbing much of the impact

Fast fact: Did you know many modern cars are designed so that if there’s a major impact to the front of the vehicle, the car’s engine dislodges and slips underneath the car? This is designed to prevent the engine from breaking through to the interior and injuring the driver and any passengers.

What are Australia’s safest cars?

Significant effort goes into assessing the safety of on-market vehicles.

In Australia, two important information sources are ANCAP (the Australasian New Car Assessment Program), which covers new cars, and the UCSR (Used Car Safety Ratings) system, which covers used cars.

Safest new cars in Australia

At the time of updating this article on 17 October 2023, ANCAP has rated 47 vehicles in the 2022 and 2023 rating year/datestamp group as having five stars. These include all kinds of brands, with the most represented being GWM and Volkswagen with four vehicles listed each and Kia, Land Rover and Mercedes Benz with three vehicles listed each.

ANCAP publishes safety ratings for new cars based on “the level of safety they provide in the event of a crash and their ability to avoid or minimise the effects of a crash”. Vehicles receive a 0–5-star safety rating based on their performance across these test areas:

1. Adult occupant protection
2. Child occupant protection
3. Vulnerable road user protection (i.e. vehicles that score highly here are seen to be designed in a way that causes less injury to a pedestrian in an accident)
4. Safety assist (i.e. active and passive safety features)

Ultimately, ANCAP recommends “the safest vehicle you can afford with 5 stars and the latest rating year.” Why? ANCAP says as time passes its rating criteria become ever more stringent.

Today, more new cars than ever have a 5-star safety rating, so it’s important to recognise the test year and different testing scores that a car receives as well as its star rating.

Thoughts on safety draw into question driverless cars. Removing human error and increasing a car’s ability to react quickly will increase safety, at least in theory. However, autonomous vehicles can’t recognise how some fellow road users might react nor can they understand communication from human drivers around them. A recent pedestrian fatality highlighted that the driverless car involved wasn’t programmed to know people might jaywalk.

Safest used cars in Australia

The UCSR scheme, which is overseen by the Vehicle Safety Research Group, provides used car safety ratings based on data from real-world crashes investigated by the Monash University Accident Research Centre.

The ratings system “covers both the role of the vehicle in determining injury outcomes (secondary safety) and the contribution of vehicle design and specification to crash risk (primary safety).”

Monash’s most recent report on this, released in conjunction with the Department of Transport and Main Roads, is the 2022 Used Car Safety Ratings Buyer’s Guide. It doesn’t have overall rankings – instead, it rates cars within their vehicle type category.

The rating scale ranges from 1 to 5 stars, with the lowest performing 20% in a category receiving 1 star (very poor) and the top 20% receiving 5 stars (excellent). Vehicles can potentially also receive a ‘Safer Pick’ notation, which means they “provide good protection for the driver, are less likely to result in serious injuries to other drivers, pedestrians, cyclists and motorcyclists, and have a lower risk of being involved in a crash, including reversing crashes.’

In this most recent report, 55 vehicles were awarded 5 stars and 13 of these received ‘Safer Pick’ status.

The 5-star winners in each category, in alphabetical order, are:

Safest used small cars

• Audi A3/S3 04-13
• Audi A3/RS3/S3 13-20
• BMW 1 series 11-19
• Honda Civic 16-20
• Mercedes Benz A-class (W175) 12-18
• Mercedes Benz B-class (W246) 12-18
• Subaru Impreza/XV 16-20
• Toyota Prius 3 09-16
• Toyota Prius V 12-20
• Volkswagen Golf (VII) 13-20

Safest used medium cars

• Audi A4/S4/RS4/AllRoad B8 08-15
• Audi A5/S5/RS5 07-18
• Mercedes Benz C-Class (W205/S205/C205/A205) 14-20
• Subaru Liberty/Legacy/Outback/Exiga 09-14
• Toyota Camry 17-20

Safest used large cars

• Holden Commodore (VF) 13-17
• Mercedes Benz E-Class W212 02-09
• Mercedes Benz E-Class W212/C207/A207 09-16

Safest used small SUVs

• BMW X1 10-15
• Jeep Compass 07-17

Safest used medium SUVs 

• Audi Q5/SQ5 09-16
• BMW X3 10-17
• Ford Kuga 13-16
• Ford Territory 11-16
• Hyundai Santa Fe 12-18
• Jeep Wrangler 07-18
• Lexus RX 09-15
• Mitsubishi/Peugeot Outlander/4007 06-12
• Nissan Murano 09-15
• Subaru Forester 12-18
• Subaru Tribeca 06-14
• Toyota Kluger/Highlander 07-13
• Toyota Kluger/Highlander 13-19
• Volvo XC60 09-17

Safest used large SUVs 

• Audi Q7 06-14
• BMW X5 01-06
• BMW X5 07-13
• Isuzu MU-X 13-20
• Jeep Grand Cherokee 10-20
• Land Rover Discovery 4/Discovery 09-16
• Mercedes Benz ML/GL-Class (W164/X164) 05-11
• Mercedes Benz ML-Class (W163) 98-05
• Mitsubishi Pajero 07-20
• Nissan Pathfinder 13-20
• Toyota Landcruiser Prado 09-20
• Volvo XC90 03-15

People movers

• Kia Carnival 14-20

Commercial vans

• Hyundai iLoad 08-2020
• Mercedes Benz Vito/Viano/Valente W639 04-15
• Volkswagen Caravelle/Transporter/Multivan 04-15

Commercial utes

• Ford/Mazda Ranger/BT-50 11-15
• Ford/Mazda Ranger/BT-50 15-20
• Holden Colorado 12-20
• Mitsubishi Triton 15-20
• Volkswagen Amarok 11-20

How do safety ratings affect car insurance premiums?

How your car rates for safety can have a significant influence on how your car insurance premium is calculated, but it’s not a golden ticket. Insurance companies generally follow a multi-layered process to determine policy pricing.

There are many variables that may be involved. For example, there are tens of thousands of possible answer combinations to the questions PD Insurance asks motorists. Its software ‘rater’ analyses the answers as they’re entered, then calculates the premium according to the expected safety of the driver and vehicle.

Bear in mind that different insurers may ask different questions, or rate answers differently. For instance, some may heavily weight the car’s overnight parking location while others focus more on other factors.

Aspects that may or may not be taken into account include:

• Vehicle type (i.e. year, brand/make, model, series and so on) and how likely it is to be involved in accidents, according to research data
• The geographic location where the car will be based and/or garaged (e.g. some insurers reduce premiums for motorists who live and park their car in a relatively safe neighbourhood)
• The driver’s age, gender and other personal circumstances (such as their driving history, claims history and whether they’re the only driver)
• How the vehicle will be used (e.g. business or personal, whether it will be driven in high-traffic periods)
• If the car has any pre-existing damage
• If the car has any modifications or accessories
• Kilometres travelled per year

Other factors that can affect pricing include:

• If you are a first time customer (some insurers apply a discount for this)
• If you are insuring more than one ‘risk item’ with the insurer
• Whether you pay the premium upfront or by regular auto-payment (i.e. a number of insurers offer discounts to customers who pay their annual premiums in full).

What optional safety features could reduce my car insurance premium?

Some insurers may allow premium discounts for cars with additional safety features, but many don’t.

Tactics that can help prevent car theft such as using self-arming immobilisers and steering wheel, pedal or tyre locks won’t necessarily translate to lower premiums. But, they may provide you with extra peace of mind either way.

Before you add any safety features to your car, it could be worth checking the impact with your insurer. Think about the potential financial benefits of doing so – will it add value or save you money in some way? – as well as the safety benefit it may offer.

You should also be aware that post-manufacturing modifications may actually increase your premium. Why? Some high-tech add-ons, such as throttle controllers and autonomous braking, can be pricey to repair if damaged in an accident, leading to a higher premium.

So, what makes a safe car? Everything from how it’s designed and manufactured to the way you drive, service and maintain it can influence how safe it is to drive. The onus is on the driver (and your mechanic) as well as the manufacturer.

What makes for a lower insurance premium? Exploring all the factors that influence the premium calculation process can be a good place to start. An open conversation with each insurer you’re considering will often assist greatly as well.

Cover image source: ORION PRODUCTION/Shutterstock.com