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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  New To Me But So Far Impressed - 2007 Acura RDX
  By UTRDX - October 5 - 8:07 am

  I just recently purchased a preowned RDX with about 10000 miles on it. I am really enjoying this car. I am getting about 25 mpg on the highway and about 19 in city. Overall this car seems very good, not at all underpowered, previous car was a sedan powered by V6 and this little SUV blows it out of the water. The interior is very confortable (no wood trim is a plus for me as I think it looks tacky). I am hoping that the car is as reliable as other honda cars and am looking forward to updating when I get a few more miles under my belt.

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  Great Vehicle with Terrible Infotainment - 2016 Acura MDX
  By Mike - October 5 - 2:05 am

  We recently leased a 2016 MDX AWD with Tech Package. If we were to do it again the smart money would be the base awd model with the AcuraWatch safety feature package. Let me explain why....First off the car rides, accelerates, stops, turns, and everything else regarding moving extremely well. Even the headlights are exceptional. The interior seating design and the way they slide is also great. The safety features shake the steering wheel if you depart your lane and warn you when other cars are too close. Whats left is the way you interact with the controls in the dash and on the steering wheel. Every single thing about the interaction with the controls is unnecessarily complicated. In many cases it takes an extra click or 2 in a menu than in other cars. For example to turn seat heater on you need to click a button on the screen, select the heat level, then close the sub-menu. In every other car on the planed you click the button once to turn on the seat heat then another click to change the heating level. I consider this annoying, but not a deal breaker. Then you get into the gps. The gps takes longer than most to figure out how to do the basics. Its cumbersome to enter an address. The guidance is also poor. Sometimes there is no audible instruction on when to turn and a strange map of your turn with a flag that isnt always oriented the way you are travelling. To sum it up you are better off placing your phone with google maps over the nav screen. I can only hope there is some kind of update to enable android auto or the apple car os. Last but not lease the Bluetooth connectivity doesnt play nice with my samsung galaxy s6. Every 30 seconds or so it pops up an error it cant import the phonebook. A quick google search indicates this is a common issue for many. Then you quickly find out the text interaction is terrible. When you get a text a notification takes over the entire screen asking what you want to do (imagine you were getting ready to make a turn following gps). So then when you act on the notification you have to pick from a very small list of predefined reply messages. Every other car I have used including cheap rentals allow you to speak a text reply. My other vehicle is 2015 ram 3500 with uconnect and it does all of this with no issues. In a day and age where so much of your interaction with a vehicle is the electronics acura needs to do a much better job. The kicker is you pay thousands extra for this tech package and get terrible tech bundled with some really good safety features. After having the MDX a few months I can say I would buy it again, but would not get anything above a base model awd with acurawatch.

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  Disheartened TL Owner - 2001 Acura TL
  By DaAcuraTL - October 4 - 9:41 pm

  Was continually taking it into the shop for repairs. There were 37 repairs in 7 years and this is not counting servicing, which were all done on time. Multiple attempts to fix the nav system (7 months) multiple attempts to fix handling problems on two separate occasions (23 months total) had to replace molding between doors 11 times had to replace all four window drive units at separate times had to replace heater system had to replace one motor mount had to replace windshield washer pump assembly had to replace door latching system in passenger door and drivers door is going out also had to replace all the brakes at 19,000 miles and had to replace positive battery cable.

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  Sweet Car - 2005 Acura TSX
  By sylvester vanchiro - October 4 - 8:13 pm

  I looked at 3 other cars in this class, and after it was all said and done, I knew this was the car I wanted. Two years later I still am one happy driver. This car has and does everything I need in a car and the reliability has just been great. Cant really say enough about this car, just happy I made the right decision.

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  Unparalled Bang for the Buck! - 2007 Acura TSX
  By cajun jake - October 4 - 5:55 pm

  Outstanding overall value. You cannot beat what comes standard on the TSX for the price. Leather, bluetooth, 360 watt stereo (XM, 6 CD changer), heated seats with memory, sunroof. On top of all this, the TSX is extremely fun to drive and very agile. This car wants to be pushed to the limit and it eagerly responds. Note this is a sport sedan not a luxury car that floats on the road like grandpas Lincoln. MPG is OK, average around 24 in mix driving and around 30 on the highway. I guess I was expecting a slightly better MPG given the TSX comes with a 2.4 liter 4 cylinder engine, however the TSX is engineered to maximize full use of this engine.

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  Very Happy Wife - 2007 Acura MDX
  By BIgd... - October 4 - 1:04 pm

  So far just getting used to all the gadgets has been a challenge. I really like the feature when you unlock it but forget something and have to go back. You can program it to lock in 30, 60 or 90 seconds after you may have inadvertently unlocked it and forgot. Great security feature. I have taken it on a few long trips and am also very happy with the cruise control especially on steep hill climbs like I have in BC,Canada. I have set it at 80 MPH and climbed a 12%-18% hill grade and maintained it for the 2km hill climb. Awesome!! I actually like the navi control knob that some people seem to hate.

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  Thirsty - 2007 Acura TSX
  By disco1999 - October 4 - 4:25 am

  Will consume just about the same amount of gas for a 4cyl as a 6cyl TL, the TSX lacks power. No XM radio available even in the navi package.

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  BEST OVERALL... - 2006 Acura TL
  By VTC - October 4 - 1:23 am

  Overall a great HighLine Luxury Vehicle, got style, performance, brembo brakes avail; body kit avail. very quit inside, Overall is stll a well rounded off car for riding smoooth everyday to work and roomy for guests.

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  Great performance, annoying rattles - 2007 Acura TL
  By DWW - October 3 - 6:50 pm

  I had a 2003 Type S and loved that cars ride, so thought that in purchasing the 2007 Type S Id be just as pleased. The new Type S has unbelieveable power and acceleration and handles like a nimble sport car. All in all a very exciting and sporty ride. The sporty suspension does make the ride a little harsh. Almost every imperfection in the road gets transmitted through the steering wheel. The comfort is great and I love the navigation system and telematics. However, the interior rattles drive me crazy. No excuse for a luxury sport sedan of Acuras caliber to have this problem.

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  Mines a Red One - 1995 Acura NSX
  By OZZY - October 3 - 3:05 pm

  Dont even think about buying one without T-tops, what a blast. Just sounds terrific, handles great and there arent many cars around thatll beat you away from a light. Holds two sets of golf clubs and gets amazing gas mileage. Built like a swiss watch and sturdy as a tank. And if youve ever driven a Viper, you wont miss the 200HP - NSX build quality and driveability leave the Dodge embarassed. Big wow factor, even at the club, too much fun for what I spent, pleased with my purchase.