Land Rover Discovery SUV (2009-2017) - Reliability & safety

Land Rover has taken a lot of stick for poor reliability and build quality in the past, but the brand has taken a step forward with the Discovery. The car came 33rd out of 150 models in the 2014 Driver Power survey, yet by 2016 this had improved to 26th.

Land Rover Discovery reliability

The Discovery’s performance isn’t bad for a car that’s based on a 10-year-old. It came 26th out of 150 cars in the 2016 survey, with an impressive second-place finish for ride quality – essentially how well it copes with potholes and other road imperfections. It also scored well for practicality and seat comfort, coming second and sixth in these areas, respectively.

Despite these scores, owning a Discovery would seem to be an experience of extremes: the car was rated 150th and last for running costs, while a 108th-place finish for reliability may also raise concerns.

Safety

The Land Rover Discovery was last crash-tested for safety by Euro NCAP back in 2006, when it could only score four stars out of a possible five. That's quite worrying when you consider that most of its main rivals achieved the maximum five-star rating and were also evaluated more recently to a more stringent standard.

That's only half the picture, however, as the car that was tested in 2006 didn't feature many of the up-to-date safety gadgets on the latest model. Since 2014, the Discovery has offered things like a blind-spot monitoring system and cameras that can give you a left-and-right view when pulling out of a T-junction. Both of those options come as part of the £750 Exterior Detection Pack. Another clever extra is the Surround Camera System (£1,015), which puts cameras on all four sides of the car to give you excellent visibility.