From a design perspective, they’re generally reliable to 100,000 miles. After that, stuff like wheel bearings and bushings become issues.

All of this assumes that the oil changes intervals are religiously followed, the car is never allowed to overheat, etc.

The elephant in the room, tbh, isn ownership. Scrimping and cheating on maintenance will turn any good design bad. So if you see head gasket issues, oil burning, spotty oil change records, 3rd party parts use… RUN away.

 

I have a daughter in a 15 Outback. It's a good safe car for a younger driver. I appreciate the Eyesight option as well as the blind spot monitoring.

AWD vehicles tend to have more maintenance than a FWD car so expect some drive train related components to wear out as you get up in the higher mileage range.

 

All the main points have been covered, so I'll just add that if you can, get a 2018+ model. Extra features like Android Auto and CarPlay became available from that year onwards.

 

Good point. CarPlay is a big advantage… especially for young people who are pretty firmly connected to phones.

 

Obviously I can't vouch for every 2018 Outback ever made, but mine's been 100% completely reliable. Even the car's cheap "leather" seats that have plagued other owners are still looking good in my car

I would have zero hesitation about jumping in Wanderlust right now and driving from here to the west coast and back, aside from getting in trouble at work for unexcused absences.

 

Having recently completed a 7000km road trip in my own 2019 Outback 3.6, I can 100% back up The Rigger's claim that the car is ultra reliable.

 

We had a 2016 with the 3.6 and then we traded it for a 2018 with the 3.6 because the tech was better. We put 33k on the 2016 and no problems. The 2018 has 52k and also has been trouble free.

 

I'm approaching 190k in my 17 3.6 and mechanically it has been excellent. Even exceptional. That said I would NOT let my daughter or wife take the car. Reason is the parasitic drain that will leave your battery drained in cold weather. Last year I posted SOA approach to fixing the issue. THey admit it is an issue with the Starlink and 3g. If that issue is fixed and ou have a well maintained offering, then It;s a go!

 

Thank you all for your response! I've read that the 2018 (at least, but I think also the 2017) suffer from battery drainage issues..? Like keeping the trunk open for an hour and you can't start the car, or not driving for a week (if that would ever happen...) and the battery is dead?

 

the battery drain from the power rear gate control module - you can either use a carabiner, or similar, to manually close the latch…. Or, there is a fix you can pay for, replace the power rear gate control module.

BUT - only the 2017-2019 models have an updated power rear gate control module available. The 2015-2016 models do not.