They have a better reliability rating then most other car companies according to JD Power. Not perfect, but average around 85% for the few models I checked. Perhaps the opinion is anecdotal but I have not heard nor experienced any issues myself.

They are pretty darn reliable cars when you consider how much performance they squeeze out of them, and how uncompromising the driving experience is. Moreover, that they can handle being driven HARD day in and day out for decades and stay reliable- something really no other car make can do.

I bought an old Porsche Boxster for cheap on Craigslist and commute daily with no breakdowns for the last 3 years... it's not a Toyota- it's reliable because I spend A LOT of my free time doing preventative maintenance on it. While it requires a lot of maintenance, a cheap economy car would be toast in a few days if driven as hard as I drive this thing. Yet in stock form I could take it to the track and keep up with crazy unreliable exotic supercars that cost 30x what I paid for it.

IMS bearing??

IMS issues are way overblown, failures are actually fairly rare, and permanently fixed by swapping out the bearing when you do the clutch, which is easy to do and doesn't cost much. Mine already had an LN Engineering retrofit kit when I got it, as do most of the used cars I've seen for sale.... but I've sometimes seen them with 200-300k miles on the original IMS as well.

My main issue with the early watercooled flat 6 Porsche engines is that they are just so complex and costly to rebuild. They will easily last several hundred thousand miles of hard use, but when they do need a rebuild, doing it properly can easily cost $10k just for materials to rebuild it yourself properly.

I just thought it was a funny retort to a seeming assertion that they were extremely reliable.

Although I think I only got $9k for my old Boxster, so a $10k rebuild seems a bit painful... I imagine they go for more now. I didn't love the car, unfortunately.

That issue, while valid, has one of the highest ratios of "talked about on the forums divided by frequency of occurrence". If I had a 1997-2005 affected engine, I don't think I'd do the preventative maintenance work proactively until it came time to replace a clutch anyway.

Agreed. Bought a 10 years old Porsche 911 for use as my daily driver (still cost a bomb, because Singapore). Great performance and reliable. And a real head turner. And surprisingly parts are readily available (for some reason, UK is the place to import them from, for cheap)

Yep, that's where they shine. There are always cars that are "more", but few that can be used as hard as Porsches. When you fall out of love with something more exciting because it spends more time in the shop than on the road, the Porsche is always there ready to go.

The last time I checked Consumer Reports, Porsche was actually on the list of reliable used cars.

cant repair modern ones diy anymore with everything requiring dealer programming. Not that it’s unique, but I understand they’re on the bleeding edge of what all parts require dealers to replace.

If you see what the GT3 RS can do then you’ll understand why a regular Joe can’t maintain it. They’re basically a GT3 race car with a little less downforce (it has DRS too) and (barely) street tires. Everything is made of carbon fiber and special alloys. All new sports cars are going that way, computers are an irreversible need for performance today. Not just for the engine, but for brakes, traction control, suspension control, etc.

Until panels start falling off and various axles break under pressure. In Europe they wouldnt even make a recall until years after they’ve been sued in the US.

In the UK ranks as the least reliable brand: https://www.thecarexpert.co.uk/porsche-named-least-reliable-...

A common trend with german carmakers in recent years. Not good for Europe as a whole.

Do you have any details on what Warrentywise uses for their data? The data seems to suggest all of the "cheap" cars are more reliable then all of the "expensive" cars. Which is just wrong, if anything it's a spread of cheap/expensive on top and cheap/expensive on bottom.

That data seems to imply there is perhaps another reason for the rankings then what is to be assumed.

Warrantywise does aftermarket extended warranties in the UK.

I can't say how but it seems to me that may have an influence on their data.

They do include the cost to repair among other things, which means that only do they break often, they also cost a lot to fix. Cheap brands on the other hand when they do break down are either fixed by the manufacturer for free or dont break as often. German cars are infamous for the high number of defects that their manufacturers wont issue recalls for. Therefore the ranking is accurate.

It still feels a bit off. I expect an expensive car to have expensive repairs. When looking at the cost of a repair I would perhaps consider the cost as a proportion of the MSRP, or resale value, not the raw cost.

I would expect it to be completely independent, because it's not likely IMO that the web app team(s) have anything to do with actual cars.

their cars have a very good reputation for reliability

Yeah, among people that never owned one.

Compared to what? A Toyota Corolla? Higher performance requires higher maintenance for any brand. In motorsport you will be frequently replacing parts as they are pushed to the limit.

Compare a Porsche 911 versus Corolla on a track and see which one is actually more reliable after 20 hard laps.

Counterpoint: Porsches are notoriously horrible in 24 hours of lemons. These are mostly 924, 944 and boxsters.

For 18+ hours of w2w racing I'd take the Corolla.

In any case, apples and oranges. Porsche seems to build reliable stuff compared to their actual competitors which are Ferrari, Lotus, etc etc. Toyota comparisons are meaningless.

> Porsche seems to build reliable stuff compared to their actual competitors which are Ferrari, Lotus, etc etc. Toyota comparisons are meaningless.

That was my point

> Compare a Porsche 911 versus Corolla on a track and see which one is actually more reliable after 20 hard laps.

This is what I read. I'd still put money on the Toyota if the test is not blowing up.

I'm not very familiar with the Corolla specifically, but most modern regular cars don't have enough cooling capacity for the engine or brakes, to be driven flat out, and the oil supply systems can starve the engine of oil if driven at max cornering on a long sweeping curve. All of those issues can pretty much cause immediate failures if taken on a track, even in a well built car that isn't designed to be used like that. There are probably simple aftermarket solutions that do prepare a Corolla for reliable track use but you would likely at a minimum need different engine oil, brake fluid, and brake pads... whereas any Porsche model will be factory spec'd with fluids and consumables suitable for track use.

Look at this for example:

Porsche 986 Boxster S front brake rotor: 318 mm x 28 mm

Toyota Corolla AE101R front brake rotor: 238 mm x 22 mm

You have massively larger brakes on the Porsche... and many Corollas even have ancient drum brakes on the rear, which can barely dissipate enough heat for normal non-track driving. The Corolla will boil it's brake fluid on the track, and the pedal will go soft which is extremely dangerous.

There is a Corolla built for the track. Any other Corolla will completely fail within a few laps.

https://www.toyota.com/grcorolla/

Surprising to see a 3 cylinder engine but it looks very cool!

There are plenty of older Corollas you can use on a track day. My AE92 did fine for a few laps.

Of course you can use any car on the track for "a few" laps before the brakes fail. The point was that it won't have the endurance of a 911.

Late 80s early 90s Corollas were very popular first track day cars in Australia and New Zealand. A standard AE92 Corolla FX-GT will happily go on a track day as long as it has fresh brake fluid. I've done it!

Exactly... you can't compare the reliability of a street legal track ready race car with a cheap economy car. Compared to other exotic cars with similar performance, the longevity and reliability of Porsche is unequaled... and with proper maintenance they handle decades of hard driving.

Most people dont drive these cars on tracks. They drive them in cities and motorways, which in Europe force you to drive the same way you’d drive a Corolla. It’s not just mechanics that lack. Plastics come off and have nothing to do with track driving. The spyder or the 981 equally suffer from roofs and door panels simply ungluing. Mechanics are as bad as the Cayenne’s engine blows up just by looking at it. All in all the myth is gone, these cars are not what used to be. Well the porschea boxster and cayman were infamous for ims issues, oil leaks, and various other non essential mechanics failing. Marketing is one thing, real life is another.

A performance car doesn't magically get reliable just because you drive it slow- usually the opposite actually, you get carbon buildup issues, timing chain wear issues, etc. if a motor engineered for high RPM reliability is driven gently, or worse, lugged frequently at low RPMs.

I mentioned IMS issues elsewhere in this thread, but I think you're also being disingenuous with the Cayenne.

The Cayenne is a pretty darn impressive vehicle- a full sized SUV that handles well enough to be fun on a race track, and yet also does incredible offroad. It has a lot of engine options, and while some of the earlier high performance V8 engine options had issues, most of them are very reliable. It does pay for all of that performance and capability by being pretty complex, but it's also very well built. As the older Cayennes have become cheap, there's a big following now of people doing serious offroading in them, and the suspension, body, and interiors really hold up well to hard offroad use.

I would say Porsche engines tend to have new design flaws when they do a ground up engine redesign cycle, because they are really pushing the limits with new ideas and tech, and they get reliable again after a few years. Most other car companies pretty much avoid doing that, or doing it as often, because they aren't trying to extract as much performance.

> They drive them in cities and motorways, which in Europe force you to drive the same way you’d drive a Corolla.

Expand, I'm interested. I mean, my thought would be, Germany is the land of the no-speed-limit autobahn, the US was 55 everywhere until recently.

But realistically it doesn't mean that an average Porsche owner does nothing but speeding on Autobahns. Similarly lots of people in the US drive pickups but only a tiny portion of them actually use them the way they were meant to be used

There are some segments of autobahn in Germany where there is no speed limit. There are many segments where there is a speed limit, varying from 80 mph to 60 mph, especially in or near cities where most people live. There are many segments where there is dense traffic or road construction. You can't just speed through those areas at 160 mph while shouting "out of my way, peasants!"

If they ever built a car more reliable than the 981/991 generation, I don't know what it is. They were regularly beating Lexus on quality surveys at that time.

What was your experience, and with what model(s)? Sounds like you got burned.

>They were regularly beating Lexus on quality surveys at that time.

Not saying that Porsche didn't improve their quality a lot, but it was Lexus that really dropped the ball there.

No kidding. Can you imagine the meetings at Lexus HQ that must've followed those survey releases...

I’ve owned two, both daily driven. I’d consider them reliable.