If there’s one thing that most car, truck, or SUV owners can agree on, it’s that outfitting those vehicles with new tires is frequently prohibitively expensive. That is, perhaps, more true for trucks and utility vehicles than your run-of-the-mill sedan, however, if only because most truck tires tend to be larger and require a different level of toughness than an average everyday driver.
Given the fact, most truck owners no doubt consider price point one of the primary deciding factors when it is time for a new set of tires. The quality of the tires themselves is surely high on most lists of qualifiers too, particularly when you account for the sheer number of brands now available to consumers. If, however, you are considering a truck tire from one of the major tire manufacturers, a recent J.D. Power study contends that there is a well-known brand that you should probably avoid — Hankook. J.D. Power shows that consumers have made it clear that truck tires from the South Korean manufacturer are among the worst on the market.
In total, consumers awarded Hankook’s truck tires just 750 points of the 1,000 available in the satisfaction survey. If you’re curious, said survey focuses primarily on four areas of customer satisfaction, with J.D. Power ranking ride quality, tire wear, traction and handling, and tire appearance in order of importance. Almost 40,000 consumers were surveyed overall, focusing on owners of vehicles from the 2023 to the 2025 model year.
How other brands fared in the JD Power Truck Tire ranking
For point of reference, that 750-point score placed Hankook’s truck tires behind nine other manufacturers in the J.D. Power study. It also rated the brand well below the segment average of 775 points. Hankook was, however, not the only notable tire brand whose truck and utility models were rated below that average by consumers, with General Tires, Continental, Falken, and, Goodyear also failing to breach that threshold, scoring 758, 763, 771, and 773 points respectively.
Goodyear — one of the world’s oldest tire makers — is perhaps the most surprising brand to place in the lower end of the truck and utility vehicle tire market, as it has long held a strong reputation in that particular market. Still, it would seem plenty of real world customers are less than satisfied with their truck’s Goodyear tires.
Which brands fared better in this survey? As you’d expect, there are some very recognizable brand names listed in the top five, with Bridgestone, Firestone, Michelin and BFGoodrich placing fifth, fourth, third and second in the J.D. Power study. They did so with scores of 776 points, 781 points, 788 points, and 790 points in that order. Topping the list is, perhaps, another surprise for truck tire consumers, with Pirelli taking customer satisfaction honors in the truck tire market segment. In fact, the Italian tire maker was the only brand to crack the 800-point barrier, doing so narrowly with a total of 801.
Stephan is the sports journalist for the Maple Grove Report.
