Consumer Reports Updates Convertible Carseat Ratings – July 2014 - Update from Our Blog

Consumer Reports Updates Convertible Carseat Ratings – July 2014 - Update from Our Blog

The updated ratings on convertible carseats are published and the results are going to make some people happy and others not so happy. There’s just no way around that. Parents who already own top-rated convertible seats are going to be happy while those that own seats at the bottom of the lists may be less-than-pleased. […]

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Oh man, I wish I had a CR subscription. You guys gave quite a bit of info on the infant seat evaluations when they came out a few months ago. I wish you could share some more of the details on the convertible results. I'm very interested to know how the Foonf did. I'm not surprised at all with the high ratings for the NextFit and the Britax convertibles.

Re: Consumer Reports Updates Convertible Carseat Ratings – July 2014 - Update from Our Blog

For what it's worth, Foonf was the lowest rated of all the higher-weight harness convertibles CR tested. Crash protection score was "very good", basically the same as all the other seats tested, but it didn't get good marks in ease-of-use or in RF fit-to-vehicle.

That's not a surprise, really. We like the Foonf but there's definitely a learning curve involved. It can be a great seat for "seasoned" parents/advocates or for those looking for something specific (narrow/3-across/ERF, etc.) but it's not necessarily the best choice for typical parents who are looking for simplicity. Ditto for the Radian - which also didn't get high marks.

Re: Consumer Reports Updates Convertible Carseat Ratings – July 2014 - Update from Our Blog

aporthole said:

Oh man, I wish I had a CR subscription. You guys gave quite a bit of info on the infant seat evaluations when they came out a few months ago. I wish you could share some more of the details on the convertible results. I'm very interested to know how the Foonf did. I'm not surprised at all with the high ratings for the NextFit and the Britax convertibles.

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We wish we could also, but it's a fine line with copyright issues. Sharing modest sections of content is perfectly fine, but sharing all their ratings would not likely be acceptable under "fair use". With the infant seats, we did list strictly the new crash protection scores (but not all of the overall ratings), as CR was nice enough to include us with this information for publication.

Given the low scores given to Foonf and Radian, it's pretty likely that they weighted ease of installation and ease of use pretty highly. That's probably a good thing for a typical reader of Consumer Reports, where many just want something that they can use properly without much hassle. We know our readers are also seeking factors like extended rear-facing and three-across possibilities. These readers likely don't mind taking the extra time to learn about the unique features and a possibly more time consuming installation in some vehicles.

Like Kecia suggested, our criteria at CarseatBlog for recommending a carseat is a little different than Consumer Reports, and we have the editorial space to give more detailed reviews to make sure parents know the pros and cons of the seats and choose among our recommended models without the influence of ratings scores.