small car when struck by a
Ford Explorer SUV SUVs are generally safer to their occupants and more dangerous to other road users than mid-size cars. A 2021 study by the
University of Illinois Springfield showed, for example, that SUVs are 8-times more likely to kill children in an accident than passenger cars, and multiple times more lethal to adult pedestrians and cyclists. When it comes to mortality for vehicle occupants, four-door minicars have a death rate (per 100,000 registration years rather than mileage) of 82, compared with 46 for very large four-doors. This survey reflects the effects of both vehicle design and driving behaviour. Drivers of SUVs,
minivans, and large cars may drive differently from the drivers of small or mid-size cars, and this may affect the survey result.
Rollover A high center of gravity makes a vehicle more prone to
rollover accidents than lower vehicles, especially if the vehicle leaves the road, or if the driver makes a sharp turn during an emergency maneuver. Figures from the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration show that most passenger cars had about a 10% chance of rollover if involved in a single-vehicle crash, while SUVs had between 14% and 23% (varying from a low of 14% for the all-wheel-drive (AWD) Ford Edge to a high of 23% for the front-wheel-drive (FWD) Ford Escape). Many modern SUVs are equipped with
electronic stability control (ESC) to prevent rollovers on flat surfaces, but 95% of rollovers are "tripped", meaning that the vehicle strikes something low, such as a curb or shallow ditch, causing it to tip over. According to old NHTSA data, early SUVs were at a disadvantage in single-vehicle accidents (such as when the driver falls asleep or loses control swerving around a deer), which involve 43% of fatal accidents, with more than double the chance of rolling over. This risk related closely to overall US motor vehicle fatality data, showing that SUVs and pickups generally had a higher fatality rate than cars of the same manufacturer. According to
Consumer Reports, as of 2009, SUV rollover safety had improved to the extent that on average there were slightly fewer driver fatalities per million vehicles, due to rollovers, in SUVs as opposed to cars. By 2011 the
IIHS reported that "drivers of today's SUVs are among the least likely to die in a crash".
Handling Vehicles that are larger and heavier in size like SUVs require large amounts of
braking power and more powerful steering assists to aid in turning the wheels more quickly.
Construction Heavier-duty SUVs are typically designed with a truck-style chassis with separate body, while lighter-duty (including cross-over) models are more similar to cars, which are typically built with a
unitary construction (in which the body actually forms the structure). Originally designed and built to be work vehicles using a truck chassis, SUVs were not comprehensively redesigned to be safely used as passenger vehicles. The British television programme
Fifth Gear staged a crash between a first generation (1989–98)
Land Rover Discovery with a separate chassis and body, and a modern
Renault Espace IV with
monocoque (unit) design. The older SUV offered less protection for occupants than the modern
multi-purpose vehicle with unitary construction. In some SUV fatalities involving truck-based construction, lawsuits against the automakers "were settled quietly and confidentially, without any public scrutiny of the results—or the underlying problems with SUV design", thus hiding the danger of vehicles such as the
Ford Bronco and
Explorer compared to regular passenger cars.
Risk to other road users after a head-on collision with an SUV, showing the raised point of impact Because of greater height and weight and rigid frames, it is contended by
Malcolm Gladwell, writing in
The New Yorker magazine, that SUVs can affect traffic safety. This height and weight, while potentially giving an advantage to occupants of the vehicle, may pose a risk to drivers of smaller vehicles in multi-vehicle accidents, particularly side impacts. The initial tests of the
Ford Excursion were "horrifying" for its ability to vault over the hood of a
Ford Taurus. The big SUV was modified to include a type of blocker bar suggested by the French transportation ministry in 1971, a kind of under-vehicle roll bar designed to keep the large Ford Excursion from rolling over cars that were hit by it. The problem is "impact incompatibility", where the "hard points" of the end of chassis rails of SUVs are higher than the "hard points" of cars, causing the SUV to override the engine compartment and
crumple zone of the car. There have been few regulations covering designs of SUVs to address the safety issue. The heavy weight is a risk factor with very large passenger cars, not only with SUVs. In parts of Europe, effective 2006, the fitting of metal
bullbars, also known as grille guards, brush guards, and push bars, to vehicles such as 4x4s and SUVs are only legal if pedestrian-safe plastic bars and grilles are used. Bullbars are often used in Australia, South Africa, and parts of the United States to protect the vehicle from being disabled should it collide with wildlife. Safety improvements during the 2010s to the present led automobile manufacturers to make design changes to align the energy-absorbing structures of SUVs with those of cars. As a result, car occupants were only 28 percent more likely to die in collisions with SUVs than with cars between 2013 and 2016, compared with 59 percent between 2009 and 2012, according to the IIHS.
Visibility and backover deaths Larger vehicles can create visibility problems for other road users by obscuring their view of traffic lights, signs, and other vehicles on the road, plus the road itself. Depending on the design, drivers of some larger vehicles may themselves suffer from poor visibility to the side and the rear. Poor rearward vision has led to many "backover deaths" where vehicles have run over small children when backing out of driveways. The problem of backover deaths has become so widespread that
reversing cameras are being installed on some vehicles to improve rearward vision. While SUVs are often perceived as having inferior rearward vision compared with regular passenger cars, this is not supported by controlled testing which found poor rearward visibility was not limited to any single vehicle class. Australia's
NRMA motoring organisation found that regular passenger cars commonly provided inferior rearward vision compared to SUVs, both because of the prevalence of reversing cameras on modern SUVs and the shape of many popular passenger cars, with their high rear window lines and boots (trunks) obstructing rearward vision. In NRMA testing, two out of 42 SUVs (5%) and 29 out of 163 (18%) regular cars had the worst rating (>15-metre blind spot). Of the vehicles that received a perfect 0-metre blind spot rating, 11 out of 42 (26%) were SUVs and eight out of 163 (5%) were regular passenger cars. All of the "perfect score" vehicles had
OEM reversing cameras.
Wide bodies in narrow lanes The wider bodies of larger vehicles mean they occupy a greater percentage of road lanes. This is particularly noticeable on the narrow roads sometimes found in dense urban areas or rural areas in Europe. Wider vehicles may also have difficulty fitting in some
parking spaces and encroach further into traffic lanes when parked alongside the road.
Psychology SUV safety concerns are affected by a perception among some consumers that SUVs are safer for their drivers than standard cars, and that they need not take basic precautions as if they were inside a "defensive capsule". According to
G. C. Rapaille, a psychological consultant to automakers, many consumers feel safer in SUVs simply because their ride height makes "[their passengers] higher and dominate and look down [sic]. That you can look down [on other people] is psychologically a very powerful notion." This and the height and weight of SUVs may lead to consumers' perception of safety. In 2004, the
National Highway Traffic Safety Administration released results of a study that indicated that drivers of SUVs were 11% more likely to die in an accident than people in cars. These figures were not driven by vehicle inherent safety alone but indicated perceived increased security on the part of drivers. For example, US SUV drivers were found to be less likely to wear their
seatbelts Actual driver death rates are monitored by the
Insurance Institute for Highway Safety and vary between models. Historically, models like the Chevrolet Blazer were found to have some of the highest death rates among early SUVs due to their high rollover risk and lack of
electronic stability control. Half of the models with the lowest death rates were SUVs. Very Large SUVs had the lowest overall death rate of any vehicle category. The IIHS went on to stress that vehicle mass is a crucial factor in occupant safety. Smaller vehicles have less mass, and offer less protection than larger vehicles. These statistics show that average driver death rates in the US were lower in larger vehicles from 2015 to 2018, and that there was significant overlap between vehicle categories. While the weight advantage of SUVs provides occupants with greater security in an accident, critics argue that this safety comes at the expense of other road users with smaller vehicles. Philosopher Steve Vanderheiden stated that this mismatch in physical characteristics between SUVs and smaller passenger cars can create
crash incompatibility. Tall bumper heights and stiff frames of SUVs can overwhelm the crumple zones and safety cages of smaller passenger cars, leading to deadlier consequences for the latter's occupants. Data from the NHTSA also shows that in fatal head on collisions involving a passenger car and an SUV, an occupant was more frequently killed in the passenger car as opposed to one in an SUV. The difference in size between vehicle classes also disproportionately contributes to injuries and fatalities among pedestrians, with the largest percentage of pedestrian fatalities occurring in crashes involving SUVs and other vehicles in the light truck category. ==Marketing practices==