Reprinted Articles

In the United States, car seat companies’ products must pass certain crash test and safety ratings in order to be sold on the market.

It’s not possible to determine the safest car seats based on these tests, because the manufacturers aren’t required to make the test results available–and so they never will. Still, we can at least be confident that each car seat sold in the United States matches or even exceeds governmental requirements.

Each year, Consumer Reports does do independent crash test ratings of car seats. It should be noted, however, that these tests are often discounted by scientists for various reasons, including past mistakes, and what they consider poor reporting and poor parameters. However, it may be a good starting point.

Consumer Reports has written about its top picks over the years. Do remember, however, that even the safest car seat in the world is only as safe as the user. If you don’t install it properly or use it properly each time your child rides in the car, then of course it’s not safe.

Recently Consumer Reports conducted a test involving rear-facing infant car seats. This was an effort to make up for the previous year’s test, which had errors. All the seats they used (eleven in total) passed crash test standards as defined by the government when secured with a seatbelt and when using the LATCH.

(LATCH is an acronym for Lower Anchors and Tethers for Children.) Once again, the US’ system of testing fails to gives us any idea of which were the best and worst performing models.

Consumer Reports addresses this problem by trying to identify the safest car seats. They do it by rating the car seats on Ease of Use and Fit to Vehicle. These two things will have an enormous impact on the safety of car seats.

If it doesn’t fit in the car properly, it’s impossible to install it safely, and the harder a car seat is to install, the more likely that someone will not have it properly and safely installed.

With these guidelines in mind, Consumer Reports determined that Chicco Key Fit was the best, safest car seat. Britax Companion came in second place.

For the Best Buys, Consumer Reports deemed Baby Trend Flex-Loc and Graco SnugRide as having the best value and features for your money.

Tags: Infants and Toddlers