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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  Truthful review. - 2007 Acura TL
  By ChrisM. - July 15 - 11:42 pm

  I love the car if youre looking for a quiet ride, this is not the car for you. Interior is poorly built, and there is much rattling. Outside drivers mirror bangs on something, center speaker rattles over bumps, dashboard (made of plastic) rattles over bumps, passengers headrest makes a sound like someone is chewing gum in your ear. Also, if you test drive the car, leave the window open and keep your ears keen to the metal banging that happens underneath the car when hitting bumps at over 30mph. My car suffers from this and the 2 TL loaners that ive received so far also did this. Annoying, but I was told its normal and not much can be done about it. Performance, design all good.

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  Great Car - 2007 Acura RL
  By larrynimmo - July 14 - 8:15 am

  Number one attribute isno wind noise. The only reason you can hear the quiet tire noise is because there is no wind noise. Very comfy seats.Great tech features. Not enough power especially low end torque. Phenomenal handling characteristics. This car will turn on a dime with good manners. Fuel ecomony is poor, but I dont put on so many miles that its a factor.

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  Caveat emptor - 2003 Acura TL
  By skpjah - July 12 - 3:07 pm

  Bought it used - since then the Bose radio went out the drivers side heated seat element went bad the headlight lens leaked and the HID transfomer went out the dash lights went out the sunroof, dash and other components rattle. Almost all have been fixed but the repairs were very expensive and not what I expected to have to deal with on an Acura. This is the Honda Motor Car Co. premium brand vehicle and it certainly wasnt built like it!

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  Love it or hate it, True Sports Car. - 1998 Acura Integra
  By DarkFireTeg - July 5 - 8:57 pm

  I want to start by saying this car likely saved my life in a T collision with a Mercury Grand Marquis. Struck my front right at the left tire, I spun out, but was entirely unharmed. The Mercury was likely going in excess of 65. On to the car. My first. It was right at the price and had all the features I wanted. Low maintenance, fun to drive. Throw it into corners, slide it around bends, and for Petes sake, put your foot down. You wont be disappointed, I know I wasnt. After the crash I went and got a 2000 GS. Interior is tight, but that should be expected. Will get a bit rough on long drives. Automatic was nice, In retrospect, Grab the manual for even more fun.

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  Cool Looking but.... - 2007 Acura TL
  By ed batizu - July 3 - 3:35 pm

  Like the looks of the car and the nav features are great. The transmission is clunky (especially downshifting into 1st gear) and I was hoping that it would "break in" more. The seat is not as comfortable as my Volvo S60 but good leg and head room. Solidly constructed - brakes and handles well. Like the safety features. Nice car but will most likely go Infiniti or Lexus next time for the added comforts.

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  Type S - 2007 Acura TL
  By Bertinoj - June 29 - 10:28 pm

  I owned an 04 TL, and an 05 RL. I traded that RL on a G35 coupe. Loved the G35, but really missed the Acura product. So, this past June 25th I walked into an Acura dealership and negotiated a deal on a 07 TL type S. A lot of the bells and whistles of the RL, faster and more stable than the TL. How can you go wrong. Not as fast as the G35, but so much more refined, and a pleasure to drive.

• 

  Great car, even better sound system - 2007 Acura MDX
  By Ryan - June 29 - 7:39 pm

  Ive owned my MDX since October 06, have about 8,000 on her. Really a top notch SUV. Ride and handling are smooth and accurate. The interior design of the car is absolutely stunning. Seats are very comfortable and although some controls not in the most convenient of places, where else would you put them? There are a lot of features in this car. The navigation and voice recognition are excellent as is the handsfree phone operation. The most impressive feature is by far the DVD audio stereo system. The sound that comes out of this thing is beyond description, especially if you have a DVD audio disk. Overall, clearly one of the best SUVs out there today.

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  This is Acura quality??? - 2005 Acura TL
  By SadPanda - June 29 - 1:23 pm

  I did a lot of research before buying my TL. Every car I looked at had *something* wrong with it, so its hard to get a good picture of reliability from the forums. Acura has a great reputation though. I decided to pony up $6K more than I had intended to spend to ensure I would not have buyers remorse. Nine days after the purchase I totally regret buying this car. The lack of quality is a joke. A very bad joke. Im ready to eat $1000 if the dealer will buy the car back from me. My previous two cars - a 92 GMC Sonoma and 00 Mustang GT - didnt have ONE problem in the first year, let alone 3-4 in the first 9 days like this TL. :(

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  Great car, but... - 2005 Acura TL
  By jimh615 - June 29 - 12:58 am

  My TL is nice to drive, hampered only by seemingly constant nit-picky little problems like the auto window up stopped working, the check engine light came on, the brake rotors warped (I have the Brembo brakes), a rear seat belt was installed wrong, third gear was hard to get into (a new lubricant solved that), rear part of roof liner came loose, clutch pedal became rough and ratchety. The navigation system software (algorithms) are horrible. No matter what setting you use, it will take you all over the place before getting you there. The trip computer has a number of miles to empty its worthless!! When it reads 0 miles left, you can still go 70 miles on the highway and have fuel.

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  2003 Acura TL Type-S - 2003 Acura TL
  By vman - June 25 - 10:34 pm

  Upscale Accord. Wish I chose the G35 or 330i which had better resale and reliability. Ride is jittery, stiff and not comfortable on city trips. Leather is low quality and went out of shape. Good room inside and seats are OK on long trips. Very thin paint. Squeaks and rattles appeared after first year. CD player broke 4 times. Like any big FWD sedan, the TL eats up front rotors on a regular basis coz they are nose heavy cars. I had tranny issues covered by the P/T warranty. Acura extended the trans warranty but long-term use became doubtful. Resale value took a big hit due to the tranny recalls of TLs and other Hondas. This could have been a good car if they offered it in stick.