How long do car tires last?
If it’s been a while now since the last time you went through the process of buying car tires, you might be asking yourself this question. It’s a good question to ask since you don’t want to let old tires linger around for too long.
Generally speaking, most experts will tell you that you should be able to get about 6 years of life out of car tires before needing to replace them. But the car tire lifespan can change based on a number of key factors.
If you’re trying to predict the lifespan of car tires, you should carefully consider these factors. It’ll give you some indication of when you might need to have new tires put on your car.
Here are the factors that you’ll want to keep in mind when you’re wondering, “How long do car tires last?”
Which Type of Tires Do You Have on Your Car?
There are quite a few different types of tires that you can put onto the average car. Some of the different types of tires that people buy include:
- All-season tires
- Touring tires
- Performance tires
- All-terrain tires
- Winter tires
Each of these different types of tires is going to have a different car tire lifespan. You’ll typically get more life out of, say, all-season tires than all-terrain tires because of what you’ll put each of them through.
You should look up your specific type of tires and research them when you find yourself asking the question, “How long do car tires last?” You’re going to have to worry about getting car tires more often when you have certain types of tires on your car.
Who Manufactured the Tires That Are on Your Car?
The global automotive tire market is worth a staggering $112 billion as of right now. Because of this, there are so many tire manufacturers scattered throughout both the U.S. and the world as a whole.
What does this mean for you? Well, it means that you shouldn’t have any trouble tracking down a company willing to help you with buying car tires. But it also means that you’re going to have to do your homework when getting car tires and find the ones built by the best possible manufacturer.
When you buy tires made by a reliable manufacturer, they’re going to last you so much longer than tires from some no-name company that you’ve never heard of. You’re going to want to shop around for new tires that you know are going to last for longer than you might expect.
How Many Miles Do You Put on Your Car’s Tires?
One of the reasons why it can sometimes be difficult to answer the question, “How long do car tires last?”, is because people don’t always put the same number of miles on their cars each year.
One person might put 25,000 miles on a set of tires every year, while another person puts just 5,000 miles on a set of tires each year. So it wouldn’t make much sense to tell both of these people that their tires are going to last them for about 6 years.
That being said, you can usually count on a set of tires lasting somewhere around 60,000 miles prior to needing to be replaced. So you should keep that number in the back of your head and use it as a barometer for when you should buy new tires for your car.
If nothing else, you should start to inspect your car’s tires a little closer than usual when they get close to the 60,000-mile mark. There’s an easy trick involving a quarter that you can do to see whether or not your tires might need to be replaced.
What Kinds of Conditions Do the Tires on Your Car Face?
In addition to keeping a close eye on how many miles you put on a set of tires, you should also make it a point to consider what kinds of conditions you’re subjecting them to on a regular basis.
If you spend most of your time driving your car on a highway that doesn’t have too many potholes in it, you aren’t going to rack up too much wear and tear on your tires. Your tires are going to be able to deal with these kinds of conditions with ease and won’t need to be replaced before the 6-year mark in most cases.
But if you spend the bulk of your time driving your car on backroads where they’re constantly subjected to potholes and uneven surfaces, you might be looking at replacing your tires a little more often than you would have to otherwise.
You should do your best to avoid putting your tires in harm’s way. It’ll extend their lifespan and ensure that it’s always safe to drive around on them.
What Do You Do to Maintain Your Car’s Tires?
As long as you replace the tires on your car every so often, you might be under the impression that you don’t have to do much else to maintain them. But this couldn’t be further from the truth!
Outside of replacing your tires, you’re also going to need to get into the habit of maintaining them early and often. There are a number of things that you can and should do to keep your car’s tires in great shape.
Here are several steps you should take to maintain your car’s tires:
- Check the air pressure in your tires every few weeks and add air to them as necessary
- Have your tires rotated about once every 5,000 miles
- Have your tires balanced while having them rotated
- Ask your mechanic to check your car’s alignment about twice each year
You can increase the lifespan of car tires by taking good care of them. They’re going to last you so much longer when they have enough air in them and are rotated and balanced.
What Do You Do to Maintain the Rest of Your Car?
Maintaining your car’s tires should extend their lifespan. But if you fail to maintain other aspects of your car, it could have a negative impact on your tires over time.
For example, you need to monitor your car’s brakes and have everything from your brake pads to your brake calipers replaced as necessary. If you don’t, it can obviously cause issues with your car’s braking system, but it can also cause problems with your tires.
With this in mind, you should aim to maintain all of the different aspects of your car to keep your tires in good condition. You should speak with your mechanic about what you might need to do to maintain things like your steering system, your brakes, and more.
The better you are about maintaining your car, the longer that the parts in it are going to last. This includes your tires, which are going to wear out quickly if you don’t make car maintenance a top priority.
How Old Are the Tires on Your Car?
All of the different factors that we’ve talked about here are going to be important when it comes to the lifespan of car tires. But at the end of the day, it’s the age of your car’s tires that is usually going to determine how much longer it’ll be before you need to replace them.
As we alluded to earlier, the average set of car tires will typically last for about 6 years. But there are some tires that might be able to last for upwards of 10 years before you have to replace them.
You shouldn’t ever attempt to push car tires beyond the 10-year point, though. Even if you haven’t spent much time actually riding around on them, they’re not going to be as safe as they once were when they’re more than a decade old.
For this reason, you should make a note of when you buy car tires so that you know when you’ll definitely need to replace them. It’s not worth pushing car tires too far since you’re almost always going to pay the price for it later.
So, How Long Do Car Tires Last? It All Depends on These Factors
As you’ve learned here, there really isn’t a clear-cut answer to the question, “How long do car tires last?”
There are some instances in which you might only be able to get a few years out of a set of tires because of what you put them through. There are others when you might be able to keep a set of tires around for 10 years.
You should answer all of the other questions here to get a better sense of how long your specific set of tires will last. You should also monitor their condition to make sure you don’t find yourself in a position where you’re driving around on bad tires.
Get more tips on buying car tires and maintaining them by browsing through the other articles posted on our site.
