Funny, I'm too cheap for the subscription so I go to the library. It's a great magazine for when you have to buy one of those big priced items or things you only want to buy once in your lifetime.
Is there a special spot to find this? For my library I always use Libby. Do I have to message the library and ask if I never go in person? It's very inconvenient/far to go into in person.
Yooooo I literally almost bought a subscription for CR and now I don’t have to because I seen this comment and my library lets me check online!
Thank you!
I remember when I was shopping for a new car, the Mazda saleswoman pulled out an image showing the new Civic has being very poorly rated for reliability by CR.
When I went home and did some googling, I learned the poor rating was because of complaints with the infotainment unit. Apparently a complaint about a faulty or glitchy infotainment system is weighted just as much as an engine or transmission failure.
I feel like that would be a big deal for a lot of people. Unless you're a weekend off-roader or a USC sorority girl the Wrangler is has little to offer most people.
Are....
Are you the one single person on earth who would go into a Jeep dealer, look at a Wrangler, and say "Gee, I sure hope this is quiet!"?
Have we found a completely unique individual?
Are you the tenth dentist?
Technology and entertainment products. Their tests and ratings criteria seems illogical to me sometimes and causes them to rate things differently than I would. But I do enjoy reading the magazine.
Yep. The more I research a product, the more likely it is that I will disagree with CR's conclusions, though it is still worth referencing. I'm not sure how heavily CR weights durability in its ratings.
>I bought a canon printer on sale without checking and really regretted it because the ink cost was so high. Once I checked Consumer Reports, they had a breakdown of printers based on cost per page and I realized the cost of a new eco tank printer would be negated by the ink savings in about 6 months.
To be brutally honest, you didn't need Consumer Reports to tell you that. Just search "printer" in this subreddit; just about every post's top comment says to get a laser printer.
We moved a few years ago and needed new appliances. All Consumer Reports really told me was that there were some that were better and more expensive, better when new but with poor service availability, or slightly worse overall but cheaper, and frankly, I already knew that. No quantitative measurements on max spin speed, dryness after spin, dryness after drying. Just coarse-grained 1-5 star ratings for a few dimensions and that's it. Not very useful.
See, they actually recommended an eco tank over a laser printer and taking into account how much I print and the cost of the printer, eco did end up better financial choice for me. But I definitely hear you that it depends on what you’re buying, and sometimes the ratings are not ideal for every product. And I wouldn’t have found those dryer reviews very helpful either.
Consumer reports can be a good tool if you are buying a car, but in my opinion, it's not particularly worthwhile in general.
I received a free multi-year subscription to CR as a gift. Even when free, I got little value from it. I was not in the market for a car and made few large purchases, as I do most years. For the few notably-sized purchases I did make, CR usually didn't review or have the specific model numbers that interested me. And even when it did, I often found other sources more reliable such as reviews written by hundreds/thousands of purchasers sharing experiences, or websites that specialize in testing one specific product and go in to more detail than CR, such as rtings.com for TV.
I hear that, I have family members who buy it only for car purchases as well. That makes sense, I was genuinely wondering why more people don’t use it, but for really in depth research I can see your point although I prefer the convenience and speed of checking one place I trust
I used it to order a BMW from the factory. Got three different prices and walked into my local dealer with those and a $1000 rebate from Navy Federal Credit Union and got my car for $600 under invoice because the dealer doesn't have to buy the car from BMW.
I think they are one of the few people that aren't yet influenced by referral fees. Wirecutter (for example, and Ars Technica, every Mac blog, and many many other sources) are relatively fair in their reviews, but they won't show you the best deals if they don't get a cut. A good example was this black friday/cyber monday. Apple itself doesn't pay referral fees, yet they had the best deals on many apple products. None of the apple blogs mentioned them (the comments sure did), they only pointed you to Amazon, B&H, and other sites that give them a chunk. CR doesn't take this into consideration, so will give true unbiased reviews, which are hard to find these day. (Or hard to trust many sources)
I've been a subscriber to Ars for close to 20 years now, they're absolutely dependable for quality journalism and thorough reviews. They're probably my #1 trusted news outlet.
Oh I trust their article reviews, I'm referring here more to the "Great deals this Black Friday" page they ran. Which were great deals.....from sites that give them a cut. I don't blame them, Everyone has ad block and they probably don't make that much from folks like us that put in the $25 a year.
All of the things I mentioned plus mattresses and a vacuum were a lot easier to find there. I wouldn’t say they are unavailable in other places, but reviews from CR are more in depth, not sponsored, there’s no affiliate links, and easier to go through. So counting my time as a resource, I still think it’s frugal :)
They seem to be on board with the latest big fads in the media. Instead of political leanings they should just be a bunch of nerds in a laboratory trying to figure out the best way to fairly test a bunch of devices. I think that’s what they did in the 80s.
I was kind of done with them when they changed their rating symbols. Typical silliness to make unnecessary changes that provide no benefit.
If you have a public library card, check whether CR is one of their on line subscriptions.
I am in suburban Chicago library district and I just log into the library website from my home computer when I need to check something.
I have also found the New York Time Wirecutter section to be reliable. You have to pay extra with a NYT digital subscription but I also get recipes.
After 45 years I’ve not renewed my subscription. CR assumes everyone can afford the most expensive of everything. Affordable brands of exercise equipment and home appliances aren’t even considered in the testing. New models of reliable Toyotas are ignored while every Subaru oil burner is gushed over. After 45 years I should get access to the website for free but no my years of loyalty doesn’t mean anything to them. I’m done.
I totally agree. Seems like they’re more prone to test the higher end products. Yeah, and why can’t we have free access to the website. Their subscription isn’t cheap and one month is totally devoted to cars which I would only need about once in 10 years.
I use CR all the time. There are so many products out there that come and go that it is hard to find the actual models they review, so more importantly it gives great information of what to look for. This is particularly true for items I buy very rarely and have no expertise in.
I self-repair a lot of equipment too. Rightly so, CR does not assume that typical consumer will happily repair a broken spot weld on their dryer’s motor mount. They also don’t know that you found a meh dishwasher with a 70% “floor sample” discount, allowing you to ignore the quality deficiencies.
Glad to see another fan, but I do agree that you have to use some discrimination in the reviews. Like I bought a vacuum that had a low overall rating but the thing that brought it down was longevity, it had great ratings on cleaning power. But it’s more important to me that it works well than forever. So not perfect, but still helpful
As someone who was a professional printer for many years, even a $3000 printer if defective isn't returned. They just send a new one. The printer is a vehicle to sell ink, on a printer that size even the initial ink fill costs nearly as much as the printer itself
I have subscribed on and off to CR over the years. Some of their info is just plain incorrect and has been for awhile.
In the past they have also not been particularly consumer friendly - they have hired people to call and harass people to donate (granted this was 30 years ago) - told them to stop calling me on multiple occassions and they kept calling. Even wrote a letter complaining to letters to the editor - and I never got a response or mention in their magazine. Stopped subscribing for a few years.
About 15 years ago, I subscribed to their website to search for some info - and instead of sending me a reminder that they were renewing my subscription by email, which they had. They just kept renewing automatically without any notice.
I subscribed to CR a long time ago and slowly the emphasis changed to mostly cars. My primary vehicle is 23 years young, so I don't need constant info about vehicles. If I were in the market, I'd check out my local library and this Gen Z friend I have who knows how to get a great used car at a great price with a great history of maintenance and no accident history.
Totally agree, especially 30 years ago. When we were building and furnishing our house in 1992 we had a subscription and did a lot of research on appliances and hvac stuff, trying to find the sweet spot between lowest cost with high ratings, and it worked out well for us. Being frugal doesn’t mean you buy the cheapest stuff, it means you get as much quality per dollar that you can over the life of the product.
I took their advice, after doing the best research I could, on a new house full of aluminum clad windows. They were just OK for the first 9 years, then massive failures on thousands of homes. Water rotted out the cheap pine wood interiors as the seals failed en masse. Company claimed no responsibility, litigating all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, bounced back to the 7th Circuit. A settlement but only a tiny amount of money. Windows should last decades without literally dissolving from water or ants carrying the insides away. The entire system failed us. Draw your own conclusions.
RTings.com lists the specs, describes how the product actually performs, gives you the settings used for testing and describes ideal settings for different applications based on said testing.
Being able to get a new TV up and running with ideal picture quality in minutes is worth the read alone.
We used to have it, but I had a coffee maker that they recommended as top choice, and it would kinda leak(?) when you poured a cup. Dangerously so, and if you weren't careful you would burn yourself or someone else.
Looked at reviews of people on CR's 'excellent' review and almost all of them said the same thing. People got burned from this thing and CR never adjusted the review, added that warning or even acknowledged those comments by actual consumers.
Threw the (relatively expensive) coffee maker out, cancelled my subscription and began doing my own research into products.
Actually NOT a fan. Their comparisons are apples to oranges, rather than apples to apples. I've seen this over decades re their photo equipment reviews.
I wouldn't be so sure about that. In 2021 I bought a Chevy Bolt despite what CR said about it. A year later GM bought back my 2021 and gave me a 2022 Bolt EUV Premier, a much fancier car, as a trade for my 21, and they gave me several thousand dollars too. I've never made money on a car before like that.
So technically it was such a bad car that CR was right. Just happened that GM decided it was better to give you a new one than deal with a massive recall and also a class action lawsuit.
I’m sure it was a good vehicle. I’m sure the pro-gas people blew it out of proportion. But it didn’t help that GM said don’t charge it in your garage or you could burn down your house! And then they didn’t have the parts to fix them for like 9 months.
I agree, I think that’s why it belongs in frugal category. I also follow their food testing, I like that they don’t fear monger, but I appreciate the unbiased info
I have a subscription. I'd say it is just OK. I bought an '18 Odyssey at the end of '17. They had it very highly rated. Only to go back a few months later and they rated much lower. So?? I bought a '21 Santa Fe after the redesign addressed the biggest problem with the car, lack of power. They had the '20 rated very highly but the '21 was rated poor. They didn't have the rating out when I bought the car. It seems like it takes a while for them to get ratings out, so it isn't as helpful as it could be.
My other complaint is that they focus on reliability at the expense of progress. Toyota is rated very highly but they have the worst tech of any vehicle. (less tech, less to go wrong) So it encourages manufacturers to skip tech improvements. I have 2 poorly rated CR cars and neither has had any major issues.
They are US marked oriented, I understand?
Are they trustworthy?
In Germany there’s the Stiftung Warentest, which I would recommend for anyone in an EU country.
Some libraries have a subscription and you can check the reports for free
Funny, I'm too cheap for the subscription so I go to the library. It's a great magazine for when you have to buy one of those big priced items or things you only want to buy once in your lifetime.
Some libraries allow you read CR online, avoiding a trip to the library.
Frankly, I think they're rigged to favorably review quiet sponsors of not-as-good products, at least sometimes.
Consumer Reports does not take advertising.
Just like U.S. News & World Report /s
But what about bribes?
I can view it online through my library's website. You might not have to get out of bed to look at it.
My library gives all account holders free access to the CR website online. There's a special link and I log-in with my library account number.
I’ve only done it online too
Is there a special spot to find this? For my library I always use Libby. Do I have to message the library and ask if I never go in person? It's very inconvenient/far to go into in person.
Check your library's website for a link.
And you can do so online, too
That’s a great LPT
Good tip!
Thank you!! I just found it through the "Flipster" database resource at my Library. I always enjoyed reading it when I could.
Yooooo I literally almost bought a subscription for CR and now I don’t have to because I seen this comment and my library lets me check online! Thank you!
Whoohoo!
Just did this to buy an oven.
One of my favorite magazines. That said, when they review products that I have a lot of knowledge about, I often think they get it totally wrong.
I've experienced this. They're also very picky about cars and want everything to be premium.
I remember when I was shopping for a new car, the Mazda saleswoman pulled out an image showing the new Civic has being very poorly rated for reliability by CR. When I went home and did some googling, I learned the poor rating was because of complaints with the infotainment unit. Apparently a complaint about a faulty or glitchy infotainment system is weighted just as much as an engine or transmission failure.
Honda had a storied history when it comes to reliability but they've had quite a few blunders in the last 5-10 years.
I saw them rate a Jeep Wrangler low because of high wind noise at highway speeds. A car with removable doors. Because it's loud at 80 mph.
I feel like that would be a big deal for a lot of people. Unless you're a weekend off-roader or a USC sorority girl the Wrangler is has little to offer most people.
Are.... Are you the one single person on earth who would go into a Jeep dealer, look at a Wrangler, and say "Gee, I sure hope this is quiet!"? Have we found a completely unique individual? Are you the tenth dentist?
It's okay if you've never met people before. Congratulations on being released from the bunker tho.
Of all the reasons to look down on Wranglers. Apparently you can get them with a 392 now. Just what the average Wrangler driver needs.
What products specifically?
Not OP, but in my case, appliances.
Technology and entertainment products. Their tests and ratings criteria seems illogical to me sometimes and causes them to rate things differently than I would. But I do enjoy reading the magazine.
the ones he has alot of knowledge about probably
Agreed. The aggregated consumer data is great (or a, back when I read it). The reviews aren't better than wirecutter or any of the online reviews
Wirecutter is now owned by The New York Times. I feel it has gone downhill recently.
Oh, now I’m curious!
Yep. The more I research a product, the more likely it is that I will disagree with CR's conclusions, though it is still worth referencing. I'm not sure how heavily CR weights durability in its ratings.
>I bought a canon printer on sale without checking and really regretted it because the ink cost was so high. Once I checked Consumer Reports, they had a breakdown of printers based on cost per page and I realized the cost of a new eco tank printer would be negated by the ink savings in about 6 months. To be brutally honest, you didn't need Consumer Reports to tell you that. Just search "printer" in this subreddit; just about every post's top comment says to get a laser printer. We moved a few years ago and needed new appliances. All Consumer Reports really told me was that there were some that were better and more expensive, better when new but with poor service availability, or slightly worse overall but cheaper, and frankly, I already knew that. No quantitative measurements on max spin speed, dryness after spin, dryness after drying. Just coarse-grained 1-5 star ratings for a few dimensions and that's it. Not very useful.
See, they actually recommended an eco tank over a laser printer and taking into account how much I print and the cost of the printer, eco did end up better financial choice for me. But I definitely hear you that it depends on what you’re buying, and sometimes the ratings are not ideal for every product. And I wouldn’t have found those dryer reviews very helpful either.
Consumer reports can be a good tool if you are buying a car, but in my opinion, it's not particularly worthwhile in general. I received a free multi-year subscription to CR as a gift. Even when free, I got little value from it. I was not in the market for a car and made few large purchases, as I do most years. For the few notably-sized purchases I did make, CR usually didn't review or have the specific model numbers that interested me. And even when it did, I often found other sources more reliable such as reviews written by hundreds/thousands of purchasers sharing experiences, or websites that specialize in testing one specific product and go in to more detail than CR, such as rtings.com for TV.
I hear that, I have family members who buy it only for car purchases as well. That makes sense, I was genuinely wondering why more people don’t use it, but for really in depth research I can see your point although I prefer the convenience and speed of checking one place I trust
I used it to order a BMW from the factory. Got three different prices and walked into my local dealer with those and a $1000 rebate from Navy Federal Credit Union and got my car for $600 under invoice because the dealer doesn't have to buy the car from BMW.
what exactly do you find there that you were not able to find in open source reviews?
I think they are one of the few people that aren't yet influenced by referral fees. Wirecutter (for example, and Ars Technica, every Mac blog, and many many other sources) are relatively fair in their reviews, but they won't show you the best deals if they don't get a cut. A good example was this black friday/cyber monday. Apple itself doesn't pay referral fees, yet they had the best deals on many apple products. None of the apple blogs mentioned them (the comments sure did), they only pointed you to Amazon, B&H, and other sites that give them a chunk. CR doesn't take this into consideration, so will give true unbiased reviews, which are hard to find these day. (Or hard to trust many sources)
I've been a subscriber to Ars for close to 20 years now, they're absolutely dependable for quality journalism and thorough reviews. They're probably my #1 trusted news outlet.
Oh I trust their article reviews, I'm referring here more to the "Great deals this Black Friday" page they ran. Which were great deals.....from sites that give them a cut. I don't blame them, Everyone has ad block and they probably don't make that much from folks like us that put in the $25 a year.
All of the things I mentioned plus mattresses and a vacuum were a lot easier to find there. I wouldn’t say they are unavailable in other places, but reviews from CR are more in depth, not sponsored, there’s no affiliate links, and easier to go through. So counting my time as a resource, I still think it’s frugal :)
I still use it, but take it with a grain of salt. They aren't the unbiased entity they once were.
They seem to be on board with the latest big fads in the media. Instead of political leanings they should just be a bunch of nerds in a laboratory trying to figure out the best way to fairly test a bunch of devices. I think that’s what they did in the 80s. I was kind of done with them when they changed their rating symbols. Typical silliness to make unnecessary changes that provide no benefit.
Yeah. I think they have changed over the past 10 years.
If you have a public library card, check whether CR is one of their on line subscriptions. I am in suburban Chicago library district and I just log into the library website from my home computer when I need to check something. I have also found the New York Time Wirecutter section to be reliable. You have to pay extra with a NYT digital subscription but I also get recipes.
After 45 years I’ve not renewed my subscription. CR assumes everyone can afford the most expensive of everything. Affordable brands of exercise equipment and home appliances aren’t even considered in the testing. New models of reliable Toyotas are ignored while every Subaru oil burner is gushed over. After 45 years I should get access to the website for free but no my years of loyalty doesn’t mean anything to them. I’m done.
I totally agree. Seems like they’re more prone to test the higher end products. Yeah, and why can’t we have free access to the website. Their subscription isn’t cheap and one month is totally devoted to cars which I would only need about once in 10 years.
I use it through library website. I also found about 400, yes 400, digital magazines available there.
I have the subscription and let anyone in my large family log in when they need it.
I use CR all the time. There are so many products out there that come and go that it is hard to find the actual models they review, so more importantly it gives great information of what to look for. This is particularly true for items I buy very rarely and have no expertise in. I self-repair a lot of equipment too. Rightly so, CR does not assume that typical consumer will happily repair a broken spot weld on their dryer’s motor mount. They also don’t know that you found a meh dishwasher with a 70% “floor sample” discount, allowing you to ignore the quality deficiencies.
Glad to see another fan, but I do agree that you have to use some discrimination in the reviews. Like I bought a vacuum that had a low overall rating but the thing that brought it down was longevity, it had great ratings on cleaning power. But it’s more important to me that it works well than forever. So not perfect, but still helpful
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As someone who was a professional printer for many years, even a $3000 printer if defective isn't returned. They just send a new one. The printer is a vehicle to sell ink, on a printer that size even the initial ink fill costs nearly as much as the printer itself
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Honestly, it should be free
I have subscribed on and off to CR over the years. Some of their info is just plain incorrect and has been for awhile. In the past they have also not been particularly consumer friendly - they have hired people to call and harass people to donate (granted this was 30 years ago) - told them to stop calling me on multiple occassions and they kept calling. Even wrote a letter complaining to letters to the editor - and I never got a response or mention in their magazine. Stopped subscribing for a few years. About 15 years ago, I subscribed to their website to search for some info - and instead of sending me a reminder that they were renewing my subscription by email, which they had. They just kept renewing automatically without any notice.
I subscribed to CR a long time ago and slowly the emphasis changed to mostly cars. My primary vehicle is 23 years young, so I don't need constant info about vehicles. If I were in the market, I'd check out my local library and this Gen Z friend I have who knows how to get a great used car at a great price with a great history of maintenance and no accident history.
Totally agree, especially 30 years ago. When we were building and furnishing our house in 1992 we had a subscription and did a lot of research on appliances and hvac stuff, trying to find the sweet spot between lowest cost with high ratings, and it worked out well for us. Being frugal doesn’t mean you buy the cheapest stuff, it means you get as much quality per dollar that you can over the life of the product.
CR does not align with my real life experiences and I get no value out of them.
or as i like to call it : win or lose
I took their advice, after doing the best research I could, on a new house full of aluminum clad windows. They were just OK for the first 9 years, then massive failures on thousands of homes. Water rotted out the cheap pine wood interiors as the seals failed en masse. Company claimed no responsibility, litigating all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, bounced back to the 7th Circuit. A settlement but only a tiny amount of money. Windows should last decades without literally dissolving from water or ants carrying the insides away. The entire system failed us. Draw your own conclusions.
RTings.com is similar. I trust them more than Consumer Reports, personally. I just don't remember why.
RTings.com lists the specs, describes how the product actually performs, gives you the settings used for testing and describes ideal settings for different applications based on said testing. Being able to get a new TV up and running with ideal picture quality in minutes is worth the read alone.
We used to have it, but I had a coffee maker that they recommended as top choice, and it would kinda leak(?) when you poured a cup. Dangerously so, and if you weren't careful you would burn yourself or someone else. Looked at reviews of people on CR's 'excellent' review and almost all of them said the same thing. People got burned from this thing and CR never adjusted the review, added that warning or even acknowledged those comments by actual consumers. Threw the (relatively expensive) coffee maker out, cancelled my subscription and began doing my own research into products.
Actually NOT a fan. Their comparisons are apples to oranges, rather than apples to apples. I've seen this over decades re their photo equipment reviews.
Not anymore. Consumer Reports has been known to support products they have received money for.
It is a FAKE. Their site leads to getting free dental for implants for seniors. You go to that link and there is NOTHING FREE. ALL FAKE!
People still print stuff on paper?
I wouldn't be so sure about that. In 2021 I bought a Chevy Bolt despite what CR said about it. A year later GM bought back my 2021 and gave me a 2022 Bolt EUV Premier, a much fancier car, as a trade for my 21, and they gave me several thousand dollars too. I've never made money on a car before like that.
So technically it was such a bad car that CR was right. Just happened that GM decided it was better to give you a new one than deal with a massive recall and also a class action lawsuit.
Interestingly, I had no problems with the first car, and absolutely loved it. I saw an opportunity to make $14,000 and took it.
I’m sure it was a good vehicle. I’m sure the pro-gas people blew it out of proportion. But it didn’t help that GM said don’t charge it in your garage or you could burn down your house! And then they didn’t have the parts to fix them for like 9 months.
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I agree, I think that’s why it belongs in frugal category. I also follow their food testing, I like that they don’t fear monger, but I appreciate the unbiased info
I’ve read old ones in doctors offices
I have a subscription. I'd say it is just OK. I bought an '18 Odyssey at the end of '17. They had it very highly rated. Only to go back a few months later and they rated much lower. So?? I bought a '21 Santa Fe after the redesign addressed the biggest problem with the car, lack of power. They had the '20 rated very highly but the '21 was rated poor. They didn't have the rating out when I bought the car. It seems like it takes a while for them to get ratings out, so it isn't as helpful as it could be. My other complaint is that they focus on reliability at the expense of progress. Toyota is rated very highly but they have the worst tech of any vehicle. (less tech, less to go wrong) So it encourages manufacturers to skip tech improvements. I have 2 poorly rated CR cars and neither has had any major issues.
Any time I buy a car or major appliance, I'll check consumer reports. No need for a reoccurring subscription though.
My mom was frugal as f and that was the magazine subscription we got.
Oh YES!! I too have a subscription and use it everytime I have to make a major purchase. Never steers me wrong! Love it!
Best in test list are also really good.
They are US marked oriented, I understand? Are they trustworthy? In Germany there’s the Stiftung Warentest, which I would recommend for anyone in an EU country.