NCAP Safety Ratings: What You Need to Know
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NCAP Safety Ratings: Everything You Need to Know
When buying a new car, vehicle safety is always an important consideration. For prospective buyers, checking and comparing the safety rating of a car should be a key part of the purchasing process. The Euro New Car Assessment Programme (Euro NCAP) is designed to help drivers to do exactly this.
Euro NCAP is a highly regarded independent body that provides safety ratings for new cars. Initially rolled out for the UK’s Department for Transport, NCAP is now used across Europe and is widely recognised as one of the most reliable car safety assessments.
We’ve put together a comprehensive guide to everything you need to know about NCAP safety ratings, including how, with 5-star NCAP ratings, our newest Kia models are among the safest family cars
on the market.
How does NCAP test car safety?
Founded in 1997, the Euro NCAP has been rating the safety of cars for over 25 years. The programme was created to standardise vehicle safety and help families, individuals and businesses compare safety levels across models more easily.
Euro NCAP assesses vehicles via crash testing and then gives them a star rating out of 5. The ratings are determined by a set of rigorous tests across four key areas:
• Adult occupant protection – This includes frontal impact, lateral impact, and whiplash tests, which assess the level of protection the car offers for an adult driver and passengers. It also includes an assessment of the measures provided for efficient and safe rescue and extrication.
• Child occupant protection – This assesses child safety by testing the protection offered by child restraint systems, how well the car accommodates child restraints and the provisions for child car safety.
• Vulnerable road user protection – This tests how well the car protects pedestrians and cyclists, assessing risks of injury to the head, pelvis, and upper and lower leg. Cars can score extra points if they have an Autonomous Emergency Braking (AEB) system.
• Safety assist – This includes tests for the car’s driving assistance technologies,
assessing how they perform under normal driving conditions and typical accident scenarios.
According to the official website,
the Euro NCAP crash testing uses the latest technology and some of the most advanced dummies in the world. The testing is designed to replicate real-life collision scenarios, so a car’s rating is as true as possible a reflection of how safe the vehicle would be in a real accident.
What do Euro NCAP safety ratings mean?
The NCAP safety ratings are based on a 5-star scale, with 0 stars being the lowest rating and 5 stars the highest.
The overall score given reflects how well the car performs during the safety tests across all four categories, along with how much safety equipment the manufacturer is offering. The car scores go beyond the legal safety requirements of the market in which the vehicles are being sold. Therefore, a car that just meets the minimum legal safety standards can score 0 stars, but still be deemed legal and safe by law.
Here’s a breakdown of what the scores mean, according to the official Euro NCAP website:
• Five stars – Excellent overall crash protection performance and comprehensive crash avoidance technology.
• Four stars – Good overall crash protection and some crash avoidance technologies present.
• Three stars – At least average overall crash protection, but the car is not always equipped with crash avoidance technologies.
• Two stars – Nominal crash protection and lacking crash avoidance technology.
• One star – Marginal crash protection and very little crash avoidance technology.
• No stars – Meets type-approval safety standards but lacks important modern safety technology.
Automotive technology is constantly advancing, and the scoring systems evolve to reflect this. For example, the testing criteria were recently adapted to include an assessment of driver assistance and crash avoidance technologies.
Cars tested after 2016 may have dual ratings. One of these will be a rating of the car with the safety equipment that comes as standard, and the second is the rating based on a car with an additional safety pack. These safety packs are usually available to consumers as an add-on.
How to find the NCAP rating of your car
Finding the Euro NCAP safety rating of your car is simple. All you need to do is visit the Euro NCAP website
and type your vehicle model into the search bar. You can also view all the latest safety ratings
from cars tested in the last two years.
Of course, this only works if the NCAP has tested your model. Understandably, the NCAP cannot test every new car that comes onto the market. Instead, the programme tests a selection of some of the most popular and interesting new cars
each year, with the aim of providing a broad range of information from a diverse group of consumers. Organisations that are members of the Euro NCAP each sponsor at least one car to be tested every year, and manufacturers can also sponsor their cars.
It’s also important to remember that, in line with technological advancements in the industry, the rating scheme shifts over time. As a result, the Euro NCAP rating of any car expires 6 years after its date stamp, as indicated on the rating.
At Kia, all of our newest and most popular models, including the Sportage,
the EV6
and the EV9,
have been tested in the last 3 years.
Car safety you can rely on, with Kia
At Kia, car safety is paramount.
Ensuring optimum safety and protection for our customers dictates the way we build all our cars. We are constantly innovating and progressing our active and passive safety equipment, and this is reflected in the impressive NCAP safety ratings of all our newest models.
Tested in 2023, the EV9
received a 5-star Euro NCAP safety rating, the maximum possible score. This followed the 5-star ratings of two family cars
, the Sportage
and the EV6
, both of which were tested in 2022. All three cars received impressive scores across all categories, combining to achieve the maximum 5-star Euro NCAP crash rating.
The EV9, EV6 and Sportage are all fitted with our intuitive and advanced safety systems. This includes a suite of driving assistance technologies
like Remote Smart Park Assist, Lane Following Assist and Forward Collision-Avoidance Assist. Alongside our autonomous driving programmes, these models also boast robust safety measures, like a multi-collision braking system and vehicle stability management.
You can browse all our family cars
or, if you want out more about our safety ratings, head to the official Euro NCAP website
.
Join the Kia family today and enjoy ultimate peace of mind behind the wheel.
Images shown are for illustration purposes only and may not be to full UK specification. Features shown are not standard across the Kia model range and availability will vary dependant on model. For further details please refer to the individual model specification sheets.
Product availability varies by models. To find out which products are available for your vehicle, please contact your Kia dealer.