Reliability is one of their strongest weighted factors and what they are known for, and it should be as owning an unreliable vehicle just isn't fun.Actual CR reader feedback on the Bronco Sport for Reliability is 5 out of 5. I suspect CR was taking that result into account for the Maverick Reliability estimate, as the Bronco Sport and Maverick are built on the same line in the same plant.
That said, this early in the game they are purely guessing. Unlike the Maverick, the platform that the Santa Cruz is based on is all new as is the engine and transmission, so there's just not enough data yet, but perhaps because of that they are expecting more teething problems with the Hyundai so err on the side of caution.
The Maverick on the other hand is more of a known quantity because the Ecoboost has been around forever, the transmission we know at least since 2020, the infotainment is Sync 3 (or decontented version of it in lower trims) dates all the way back to 2015 IIRC, and as mentioned the Bronco Sport sister vehicle has done well recently boosting their confidence that its going to be much more sorted out its first year.
That said, it also shows that the SC really isn't a slouch otherwise, since the road test and fuel economy are very much on par with 78 vs 77 and 23 vs 24 mpg for the Mav and SC respectively. And for those curious, here is how other midsize trucks scored, first number being road test and second being combined fuel economy:
For those curious why the Ridgeline got a higher "road-test" score than the Mav or Santa Cruz, note that its not just track acceleration, braking, and emergency maneuver performance where its likely both would outperform the Ridgeline but ride-quality and noise and the Ridgeline is notoriously quiet and squishy.
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