Hyundai Palisade, Toyota Prius Get Top Safety Scores From Crash-Test Organization
What Car Shoppers Need to Know
- 2026 Hyundai Palisade, Toyota Prius earn Top Safety Pick+ awards from Insurance Institute for Highway Safety
- Award requires excellent performance in three crash tests and other safety evaluations
- There were 14 other vehicles tested that failed to qualify.
Two popular vehicles earned promotions in the latest round of testing by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety. The 2026 Hyundai Palisade and the 2026 Toyota Prius were already named Top Safety Picks; now, both ascend to Top Safety Pick+, the agency’s highest honor.
Related: Speeders Love Using Their Phones, According to Study
How IIHS Ratings Work
IIHS evaluates many aspects of vehicle safety. Being named a Top Safety Pick or Top Safety Pick+ requires a qualifying rating in three different crash tests (two frontal collisions and a side impact) as well as evaluations of the forward collision avoidance system and headlights. IIHS scores vehicle performance in these tests on a scale of good, acceptable, marginal or poor.
The requirements for either award have been growing more strict. To qualify as a Top Safety Pick in 2026, a vehicle must earn good ratings in all three crash tests. It also must score at least an acceptable in the evaluation of how well its headlights illuminate a dark road and how well the forward collision avoidance system avoids pedestrians. Earning Top Safety Pick+ requires a vehicle rate good in the pedestrian test and acceptable or good in a test of its ability to avoid striking another vehicle.
How the Palisade and Prius Won
Only 2026 Palisades built after November of 2025 qualify for Top Safety Pick+. That’s when Hyundai made a change to the second-row seat-belt buckles to better restrain occupants in a crash. Prior to the change, the Palisade only rated acceptable in the moderate overlap front test; with the updated buckles, the rating steps up to good.
The Prius earned its promotion even more easily: Nothing changed. The 2026 model had qualified as a Top Safety Pick+ by every measure but one — IIHS simply had not subjected the Toyota to its vehicle-to-vehicle front crash prevention test when the previous awards were announced. Now it has, and the Prius has been rated good.
The Best (and Worst) of the Rest
IIHS also announced results for 14 other model-year 2026 vehicles it has recently tested, none of which qualify for either Top Safety Pick award: the Audi A3, BMW 3 Series and i4, Chevrolet Equinox, Ford Maverick and Ranger, Honda Ridgeline, Kia K4 Hatchback, Jeep Compass, Nissan Frontier, and the Toyota 4Runner, Corolla, Land Cruiser and Sequoia.
Of those, the Audi A3 turned in a notable performance, qualifying for honors in nearly every evaluation; it does not earn an award because IIHS did not subject it to the side impact crash test. The Chevrolet Equinox also performed well but missed out on Top Safety Pick due to an acceptable rating in the small overlap front test.
At the other end of the spectrum, the Honda Ridgeline and Jeep Compass were conspicuous for the wrong reason. Both earned a single rating of good in testing, the Ridgeline in the side impact and the Compass in the small overlap front. Otherwise, the pair’s results are an underwhelming mix of acceptable, marginal and poor ratings. Both notched the lowest possible score in the moderate overlap front crash, the Honda adding two more poor ratings in the collision avoidance tests.
Also interesting are the results of the four Toyotas tested, all of which earned Marginal ratings in the moderate-overlap front crash. Some similarity in those results is to be expected from the three SUVs, as they share variations of the same frame, but the Corolla most definitely does not. That test, however, was recently updated to include a crash-test dummy in the rear seat, and several automakers have improved their results with modifications to those seat belts. It’s possible that Toyota could do the same.
IIHS Ratings of Recently Tested Vehicles
| Vehicle | Award | Small Overlap Front | Moderate Overlap Front | Side | Headlights | FCPV* | FCPP* |
| 2026 Hyundai Palisade (built after November 2025) | Top Safety Pick+ | G | G | G | G | G | G |
| 2026 Toyota Prius | Top Safety Pick+ | G | G | G | A | G | G |
| 2026 Audi A3 sedan | None | G | G | N/A | A | G | G |
| 2026 BMW 3 Series | None | G | A | N/A | A | M | G |
| 2026 BMW i4 | None | G | G | N/A | M | P | G |
| 2026 Chevrolet Equinox | None | A | G | G | G | A | G |
| 2026 Ford Maverick | None | G | M | G | G | A | G |
| 2026 Ford Ranger | None | G | M | A | A | N/A | N/A |
| 2026 Honda Ridgeline | None | A | P | G | M | P | P |
| 2026 Kia K4 Hatchback | None | G | M | G | A | A | G |
| 2026 Jeep Compass | None | G | P | M | A | M | A |
| 2026 Nissan Frontier crew cab | None | G | G | A | A | P | A |
| 2026 Toyota 4Runner (built after January 2026) | None | G | M | G | G | G | G |
| 2026 Toyota Corolla | None | G | M | G | G | G | G |
| 2026 Toyota Land Cruiser | None | G | M | G | G | G | G |
| 2026 Toyota Sequoia | None | G | M | G | G | M | G |
*FCPV stands for Front Crash Prevention: Vehicle; FCPP stands for Front Crash Prevention: Pedestrian.
More Safety Articles From Cars.com:
- These Cars Do Well in Crash Tests for 2025, According to IIHS
- IIHS: Here Are the Vehicles Most, Least Likely to Be Stolen
- Volvo’s New Multi-Adaptive Safety Belt Is a Smarter Seat Belt
- IIHS Measures How Much Blind Spots Are Growing In Vehicles
- Today’s Safest New Cars Don’t Include Minivans, According to Crash-Test Organization
- New IIHS Crash-Test Metric to Help Assess Risk of Brain Injuries
- More Safety News
- Add Cars.com as a Preferred Source on Google
Cars.com’s Editorial department is your source for automotive news and reviews. In line with Cars.com’s long-standing ethics policy, editors and reviewers don’t accept gifts or free trips from automakers. The Editorial department is independent of Cars.com’s advertising, sales and sponsored content departments.
