Overview & Reviews

Acura is an upscale automaker known for offering cars with impressive levels of luxury, features and performance. It's come a long way in a short time, however, as the history of Acura is relatively brief. Parent company Honda introduced the Acura brand to the U.S. market in 1986 in an effort to create a separate luxury division for its products. At first, it was just a two-car show: the Legend sedan, which was the first true Japanese luxury car sold in America, and the Integra sport coupe and sedan.

Though essentially a marketing creation for the North American market, the Acura brand was immediately successful. Consumers liked the features, performance and upscale image of Acura cars, along with the fact that Acuras were backed by Honda's reputation for reliability and low ownership costs. In 1991, Acura introduced its crown jewel: the all-aluminum NSX sports car, which offered performance close to that of other exotic cars while undercutting them in price.

As Acura's product line grew in the 1990s, however, the company struggled a bit. Some of its products were duds, and it risked alienating loyal customers when it replaced the Legend and Integra names with alphanumeric designations. The company jumped on the hot luxury SUV bandwagon in the mid-'90s with the SLX. Unfortunately, the SLX was just a rebadged version of an Isuzu SUV, and its quality did not match customers' expectations.

For the new millennium, Acura revamped its product range. An all-new SUV called the MDX debuted, sporting numerous family-friendly features, including a third-row seat. The Integra was replaced with the RSX sport coupe, and an all-new entry-level sport sedan called the TSX was introduced after that. A complete redesign of its most popular model, the midsize TL sedan, followed, as did a redesign of its flagship RL luxury sedan.

By mid-decade the NSX was gone, but Acura filled out its model lineup with the street-performance-oriented RDX compact crossover, the TSX wagon and the ZDX, a fastback-styled crossover that placed unique styling over practicality. Today Acura is still trying to find its ideal niche but there's no denying the quality of Acura's vehicles, nor their appealing mix of performance, technology and value.

User Reviews:

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  Noisy as heck ! - 2015 Acura ILX
  By Seth L - March 29 - 9:30 pm

  Transmission hums all the time. Acura claims, "its a normal characteristic of the car."

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  Strange and dangerous downshift. - 2015 Acura MDX
  By Jerry - January 19 - 9:17 pm

  Be careful with the strange sudden acceleration when braking. Shifts into lower gear and lurches forward when applying break. Dealer recognizes this and tells me Acura needs to hear more complaints before addressing the problem. Im worried a lot this during slippery roads.

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  Suspension - 2015 Acura MDX
  By Tom vaiarella - January 17 - 2:44 pm

  I saved up my whole life so I thought I would treat myself to a luxury suv when I retired . I bought the 2015 Acura MDX awd . It is wonderful except for the most poorly designed suspension!!! When I go over the slightest bump or man whole cover it sounds like somebody is playing base drums in the cabin and the car shakes like the wheels are going to fall off!!! If wasnt for that I would love the car. I hate that noise so much that I am seriously thinking of trading it in with 7000 miles on it !!!

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  A better idea 12 years ago - 2004 Acura RSX
  By Gilbert Frey - January 2 - 2:57 pm

  Car is not overly comfortable on long road trips. Rear visibility is poor. Blind spots are bad for lane changing. Backup camera is a must (I added this myself). Rear seats are small and cramped and uncomfortable. Hard to exit the car gracefully. Parts are noticeably expensive (had to replace starter recently).

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  TRANSMISSION - 2003 Acura MDX
  By JB - December 24 - 11:29 pm

  I bought this car with 43,000 miles on it in Nov 2006. Car was fantastic. When I bought the car I went for the 12 month extended warranty for an extra $1200. About 11 months into owning the car I got a check engine light and flashing D5 light. Took it to the Acura dealer. Trans DEAD!!! They replaced it for free since it was under warranty and gave me a loaner while they did it. So then about 2 years ago I notice the trans slamming into gear. Changed fluid....same crap. So October 2014 D4 blinking light and check engine light AGAIN!!! Car would not switch out 4th gear. I took it to a trans place and had the trans totally rebuilt new Valve body, PC, gears and synchros. The builder took pics of the trans it was HORRIBLE all burned up and stuff. So what Honda does is place the trans cooler into the Rad so I have no idea how but the cooling fluid got into the trans fluid probably because trans cooler in the rad and ruined the trans. So the builder added an EXTERNAL trans cooler. So now just a few days ago.....D5 blinking light. But no check engine light and car drives fine. I took the car back to the builder and he said there were no trans codes in the history or anything. Im so done with this car. I am VERY VERY disappointed in Honda. All the Honda 5sp Autos are pure garbage and they should be ashamed of themselves. Other than the 2 trans I had to replace the car is awesome. But that trans ruins it! I cant believe Honda acting like they have no idea why this is happening. STAY AWAY FROM THIS CAR!!!! STAY AWAY!!! But an MDX with the new 6spd auto.

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  GPS sucks! - 2015 Acura MDX
  By Michal - December 8 - 9:27 am

  I had great expectations for this car and it has been a great disappointment. Driving experience is excellent, comfy, well responsive, good visibility to the front. Poor visibility to the back when parking. Infotainment is big mess. I find using my i-phone more than cars features, because it takes so much time to enter or find any Point of interest from Acura database which is extremely poor or algorithms for searching are poorly designed. Acura owns apology to all owners for this mess and perhaps free update to fix it. It is also very slow in response and user experience requires numerous endless clicks to get to anything. I prefer hands down my GPS in 10 year old Honda Pilot EX than this new Acura. It seems that a lot of owners are furious over this infotainment fiasco. I really want to love this vehicle but in the future I will definitely look more closely at many other brands before buying another Acura.

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  I was shocked! - 2015 Acura TLX
  By Steve Turso - December 2 - 8:22 am

  It took a while for me to get over no spare tire with this car or you can buy one for about $300.00 - 400.00 but we had a problem, the battery went completely and couldnt be jump started. We then found out that with the awful new transmission they forgot one thing.......you cant put the car in neutral to push it unless it starts. Roadside assistance came out and they had no idea, I called the dealer and they said the only way to move the car is to jack up the car and put rollers under the tires. So I wrote Acura and this is what they had to say "We value you as an Acura client and we appreciate the opportunity of responding to your concern. On behalf of Acura, we offer our sincere apologies for the circumstances which prompted you to reach us. We assure you of our interest in your feedback and we thank you for bringing your concern to our attention. Upon further research, the information provided by your dealership is correct and we apologize for any convenience this may have caused. It is our pleasure to note your valuable feedback as Acura strives to produce vehicles which exceed our clients expectations and your insight assists us in fully understanding consumer perspective." Do with it what you may but I think its clearly a case of engineers not thinking about the consumer. Its just like when they reasoned no spare tire saying it increased the fuel mileage...I found that funny. Acura is losing site of you and me. My 4th Acura and surely my last.

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  Great looking car, but pricey & poor fuel economy - 2006 Acura TL
  By Keith Eliot - November 27 - 12:07 am

  This is a great looking car with Acura reliability. I have a 97 Acura CL with 223,000 miles and the thing just keeps going. I have owned the 2006 TL for over a year and have enjoyed driving it, but the biggest downer is it comes nowhere near the advertised fuel economy. Check the forums online and youll see other owners saying the same thing. This is the main reason Im rating this car 3.5 stars and not 4.5 stars. Its way over 250 hp and with that power and weight you arent going to get great gas mileage. The quandary here is that similar Accords do get very good mileage, and my TL isnt getting close to what is advertised. Im getting 16-17 in the city and only 19 combined. If I do take a rare highway trip its around 25mpg, but the downer is the city driving, I feel like it should be at least 20 mpg. Take this into consideration when buying. Acura is one of the only car manufacturers that had a Sirius XM receiver as stock in 2006, this is a huge plus! The stereo is also pretty awesome for stock radio, even includes a subwoofer. If you like keeping your paint perfect, the touch-up paint for the White Pearl model straight from Acura is a complete joke & will drive you nuts fixing little marks & dings. Its not even close to a match due to the two-tone nature of the treatment. Youll be spending hours to get one nick the right color from one or two base coats of white and then a dozen or so of the stupid pearl top coats to get the darkness to match because the base coat is way way too light. What every happened to the simple days or just one coat of paint in a touch-up tube that matched pretty well? The dual climate control works but doesnt work well if the passenger wants it warm and the driver wants it cold, the workaround is you have to turn the temp up really high on the passengers side to get warmer air to come out that side if the driver is pumping the AC. This is true in my car even though both sides have their own digital temperature control. Weird. A final complaint is you can lightly hear the interior creaks and noises when going over speed-bumps doesnt seem quite as solid as you would think from an Acura. You only notice this when driving along in a quiet car with the radio off. Nothing serious, but my 97 CL doesnt have this problem. The real selling point of this car is looks and reliability, if you can do with the weak MPG this might be the car for you. Its fun to drive, will impress the neighbors and is a real rocketship. If you can find a black interior, do it - stays much nicer looking if you have kids.

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  Outdated tech package makes the TLX a near miss - 2015 Acura TLX
  By William - November 22 - 10:53 am

  There are many things that I expect from a mid-level luxury car and the TLX is a miss on half of them. The climate control system when set to auto seems to set the fan speed on the higher settings which are extremely noisy and doesnt seem to hold temperature very well. The lane keeping system is a dangerous miss it disengages often and for no apparent reason with an almost inaudible chirp, and sometimes doesnt indicate that it has disengaged at all. The navigation system is awful The trip planning doesnt take into account traffic when calculating route times and therefore you will often get the worst routes. There is no option to send route information or addresses from your phone/online to your cars nav. The transmission is smooth in normal mode but the economy mode is a little herky-jerky. Shifting from park into reverse on a slight incline (think driveway) results in a gut-wrenching noise. The sport mode and sport+ modes are fun in winding mountain roads, but the lack of any acceleration limits their fun factor. Braking is mushy. The seating is spacious and comfortable in both back and front. The seating controls are intuitive and easy to reach. The two driver settings are tied to the keys which is a nice touch. The trunk is also large and easy to access. If the lane keeping system and nav performed as expected this would be the perfect touring car , but like I said its a near miss

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  Like a old pair of worn out boots - 2001 Acura CL
  By B.C - November 16 - 11:09 am

  2001 CL type-S Aesthetically it is terrible. The clear coat is really thin so the paints fades in spots and on the edges. The fake "wood" trim peels off everywhere in the interior. The interior hardware is really sturdy other than the trim and the cover for the front cup holders. The tranny had issues with the torque converter which was a recall but Honda took care of that. The trainsmission slipped rarely for a few years after that but works ok 7 years later. The Engine is a diamond. It wont die on me even though I wanted it too so the wife would let me get a new car. I really dont treat the engine the respect it deserves. The O2 sensors quit on me 8 years ago and I use nothing but regular gas. Oil change 3 to 4 times a year with regular oil. The car runs rich due to my negligence but passes emissions every time. I get between 16.8 and 17.2 mpg city driving. My assessment...the car is like a pair of old work boots that gets uglier in time but wont wear out. Its dependable