KBB Announces ‘Consumer Choice Awards’ 

Critical Shifts:

• Honda’s Historic Sweep: For the first time ever, Honda completely swept every non-luxury brand category. In addition to winning Best Overall Brand for the fifth consecutive year, Honda secured its first-ever win for Best Car Styling, unseating long-time incumbents with the help of the new Prelude and rugged Pilot designs.

• Lexus and Mercedes Lead Luxury: Lexus maintained its dominance as the Best Overall Luxury Brand and the Most Trusted Luxury Brand (a title it has held since 2016). However, Mercedes-Benz captured the luxury titles for both Best In-Vehicle Experience and Best Car Styling.

• Specialized Category Leaders: Ram retained its crown as the Best Overall Truck Brand, while Honda added to its trophy haul by being named the Best Overall EV/Hybrid Brand, proving that its hybrid strategy (CR-V, Accord, and Civic) is resonating deeply with mainstream shoppers.

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Kelley Blue Book, a Cox Automotive brand, announced the winners of the 2026 Consumer Choice Awards.

The 2026 Kelley Blue Book Consumer Choice Awards are based on consumer automotive perception data from Kelley Blue Book’s Brand Watch study. Kelley Blue Book’s Brand Watch is an online brand and model perception tracking study, which taps into more than 12,000 in-market new-vehicle shoppers annually on KBB.com.

“Honda is an absolute standout this year in Kelley Blue Book’s Consumer Choice Awards, sweeping all of the non-luxury brand wins along with the top EV/hybrid brand honors,” said Vanessa Ton, senior research and market intelligence manager at Cox Automotive. “This data-driven award sweep demonstrates new-car shoppers’ high opinions of Honda on everything from trust and value to styling, performance and more. Meanwhile, Lexus dominates among luxury marques, snagging the overall luxury brand award and two additional luxury wins for trust and value. These Japanese automakers’ first-class engineering, innovation and quality are leading the way. For truck shoppers, Ram claims the top spot.”

Kelley Blue Book’s Consumer Choice Awards are based on annual new-car shopper perception study data. Award categories are calculated among in-market luxury and non-luxury new-vehicle shoppers who plan to purchase within the next 12 months, including truck and electric vehicle/hybrid shoppers.

2026 Kelley Blue Book Consumer Choice Winners: Non-Luxury Brands

2026 Kelley Blue Book Consumer Choice Winner: Truck Brand

2026 Kelley Blue Book Consumer Choice Winner: EV/Hybrid Brand

2026 Kelley Blue Book Consumer Choice Winners: Luxury Brands