Categories: Cars

Mazda, Genesis earn most 2024 Top Safety Pick awards

Mazda, Hyundai, and Genesis met tougher automotive safety criteria to earn the most 2024 Top Safety Pick awards, the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety announced on Tuesday.

Mazda earned five 2024 Top Safety Pick+ awards for the Mazda 3 sedan and hatchback, the CX-30 small crossover, the CX-50 compact crossover, and the CX-90 three-row crossover SUV. Excepting the MX-5 Miata roadster and the aging CX-5, the small Japanese automaker’s lineup outperformed all other brands in earning the most TSP+ awards, considered the toughest safety criteria of any crash-testing agency.

Genesis, the luxury brand of Hyundai, earned three TSP+ honors for the GV80 three-row SUV, the GV60 electric hatchback, and the Electrified G80 sedan. The combustion G80, G90 full-size sedan, and both electric and combustion iterations of the GV70 earned Top Safety Pick honors, coming up just short on the updated front crash test.

The annual list of Top Safety Pick+ and Top Safety Pick award winners features seven vehicles from Hyundai, seven from Genesis, 11 from Toyota and its luxury brand Lexus, four from Subaru, and both Rivian vehicles earned TSPs.

As for segments, crossover SUVs performed well in the revised tests overall, but trucks and sedans faltered.

“The high number of SUVs that earn awards probably reflects the dominance of those vehicles in the U.S. market,” IIHS President David Harkey said in a statement. “But it’s disappointing that only four pickups and four midsize cars earn awards, considering the popularity of those classes.”

IIHS pickup truck safety test

The nonprofit safety agency funded by the insurance industry ratcheted up the safety criteria again for the third year in a row for the industry’s most esteemed safety awards.

The IIHS toughens its safety criteria as more automakers’ vehicles come under compliance, making it more dynamic than the five-star NCAP assessment overseen by the NHTSA. In 2022, 101 vehicles earned one of the two 2022 Top Safety Pick awards. The IIHS raised the safety bar last year by changing the side-impact test from a strike barrier weighing 3,300 pounds, as it had been since 2003, to a 4,180-pound barrier. The average weight of an SUV has increased 1,000 pounds to 4,600 pounds in the two decades since the test’s last update, according to the IIHS. At this time last year in 2023, only 48 vehicles qualified for a Top Safety Pick under the new criteria. Headlight ratings also factor into the TSP criteria.

So far, 71 models qualify, with 49 models awarded a 2024 TSP and 22 qualifing for the tougher TSP+ honor. Working with the IIHS, automakers can tweak design elements such as headlights mid-cycle or even mid-year on redesigned vehicles to earn the award.

The IIHS also tests for advanced driver-assist systems (ADAS) such as the efficacy of automatic emergency braking with pedestrian detection. To address a spike in pedestrian fatalities, last year the IIHS started testing how ADAS systems can mitigate or avoid collisions with pedestrians in separate daytime and nighttime tests. The revised test for 2024 requires TSP winners to earn “Acceptable” or top “Good” ratings in the combined day and night test, whereas last year served as a trial period in consultation with automakers to adjust systems to attain the ratings.

In addition, to earn a 2024 TSP+, vehicles had to earn “Good” ratings in the updated side impact test and “Good” or “Acceptable” ratings in the updated moderate overlap front test.

2024 Mazda CX-90 IIHS Top Safety Pick+ results

Both of these tests were revised late in 2022 to study the impact of collisions on rear passengers. The updated front overlap test measures the impact of a crash in the rear passenger seat behind the driver by a child or small woman under 5-foot tall and weighing less than 110 pounds. The focus on front seat safety has improved so much in the past two decades that now rear seat passengers, who were historically safer in front crashes, are now at more of a risk. The IIHS found that front seat passengers in a vehicle rated “Good” in the original front crash test were 46% less likely to die in a head-on crash than those in a vehicle rated “Poor.” It’s hoping for the same results now for rear seat passengers.

“We followed the tougher requirements we introduced last year with another major update to the award criteria in 2024,” IIHS President David Harkey said in a statement. “This year’s winners are true standouts, offering the highest level of protection for both vehicle occupants and other vulnerable road users.”

Here are the 2024 TSP qualifiers by make and model:

2024 Top Safety Pick+