Your membership has expired

The payment for your account couldn't be processed or you've canceled your account with us.

Re-activate

Save products you love, products you own and much more!

Save products icon

Other Membership Benefits:

Savings icon Exclusive Deals for Members Best time to buy icon Best Time to Buy Products Recall tracker icon Recall & Safety Alerts TV screen optimizer icon TV Screen Optimizer and more

    Best Used Cars and SUVs Under $20,000

    If you can't find an appealing new car, consider these reliable models that performed well in our tests

    2016 Toyota Highlander Hybrid
    2016 Toyota Highlander Hybrid
    Photo: Consumer Reports

    While buying a pre-owned car is known as a smart way to save money, it can also get you into a model that has the safety, comfort, and convenience features you otherwise might not be able to afford in a new car.

    To help you better focus your search, we analyzed years of test data and hundreds of thousands of survey responses to find the best used cars that cost between $15,000 and $20,000.

    In this article Arrow link
    MORE ON USED CARS

    The models below are the ones we would recommend to our friends and family. The most reliable vehicle is highlighted, with other highly rated models listed beneath it in order of their reliability ratings.

    Each has standard electronic stability control, an important safety feature. Many are also available with active safety features such as forward collision warning (FCW), automatic emergency braking (AEB), blind spot warning (BSW), and/or rear cross traffic warning (RCTW) as optional or standard equipment.

    These vehicles performed well in our tests when new and consistently demonstrated multiple years of much-better-than-average reliability in our Annual Auto Surveys for the 2010 to 2024 model years.

    Of course, even for the used cars we recommend, there can be outliers. Maybe a former owner didn’t care much for car maintenance, or there was a problem at the factory the week the car rolled off the line. Before you buy, make sure to pay for a thorough inspection by a certified mechanic so that there are no surprises down the road.

    This article is available to CR members.

    See the Used Car Top Picks and Which Brands Make the Best Used Cars?

    Become a member to read the full article and get access to digital ratings.

    We investigate, research, and test so you can choose with confidence.


    Jon Linkov

    Jon Linkov is the deputy auto editor at Consumer Reports. He has been with CR since 2002, covering varied automotive topics including buying and leasing, maintenance and repair, ownership, reliability, used cars, and electric vehicles. He manages CR’s lineup of special interest publications, hosts CR’s “Talking Cars” podcast, and writes and edits content for CR’s online and print products. An avid cyclist, Jon also enjoys driving his ’80s-era sports car and instructing at track days.