Students and drivers under 25 · Updated October 2026

The Cheapest Car to Buy Isn't the Cheapest to Own

Every list ranks college cars by sticker price. For a driver under 25, that is the smallest number in the equation — and picking on it costs thousands.

The number everyone optimises is the wrong one

Search "best cars for college students" and you get the same thing every time: a list of cheap used cars ranked by what they cost to buy. A Civic here, a Corolla there, maybe a Kia Soul for personality.

None of it is wrong. It is just answering a question that barely matters.

Here is what four years of car ownership actually costs a 20-year-old, using a $9,000 used car and 8,000 miles a year:

Insurance costs more than the car. For a driver under 25 it is the single largest line item, and it is not close — full coverage averages around $287 a month at that age. Four years of that is more than most of the cars on those lists are worth.

Which means the useful question isn't "what's cheap to buy?" It's "what's cheap to insure at my age?" — and the answer is genuinely surprising.

Boring wins, and it wins by thousands

The cheapest car to insure for a teenage driver is the Subaru Forester, at roughly $1,774 a year. Against a $3,444 average, that is $6,680 saved over four years — most of the price of the car itself, recovered by picking a different one.

The pattern in the data is consistent and slightly counterintuitive:

• Compact SUVs dominate. Subaru alone places five models in the twenty cheapest to insure.
• Not one sports car, luxury car or EV makes the list. Not a single one.
• The Subaru Impreza is the cheapest sedan at about $2,120 a year, and comes with all-wheel drive as standard — which matters if you're at school somewhere with winters.
• The Honda CR-V sits near the top at about $161 a month for full coverage.

The reason is unglamorous. Insurers price on claims history, repair cost and who typically drives the car. A slightly dull crossover with cheap body panels and a safe-driver reputation is a cheap risk. A three-year-newer hatchback with a turbo badge is not, even at the same purchase price.

But the cheap-to-insure cars aren't the reliable ones

Here is where it gets awkward, and where I have to argue against my own shortlist. The Subarus that are cheapest to insure are below average on repair costs:

So the Forester is cheapest to insure and costs $270 a year more to fix than a Corolla. That is a genuine trade-off, not a free lunch, and most guides would stop here and tell you to buy the Corolla.

Run it out four years and the trade-off isn't close:

The insurance advantage is roughly six times the reliability penalty. You would have to be very unlucky with repairs for the Corolla to win.

But there's a better answer than either. The Honda CR-V is near the top of the cheap-to-insure lists and ranks 2nd of 26 for reliability at $407 a year. It doesn't force the trade-off at all — which is why it's the pick I'd actually make, and it appears on almost none of the student car lists because those rank by purchase price.

What to actually do

Get insurance quotes before you buy, not after. This is the whole guide in one line. Pick three or four candidates, run each through a comparison site with your real age, postcode and licence history, and put the annual figures next to the asking prices. It takes twenty minutes and it is the highest-value twenty minutes in the entire process.

Your own numbers will not match the averages. Insurance pricing is intensely personal — age, state, postcode, credit in most states, whether you're on a parent's policy. The figures here are national averages and exist to show you the shape of the problem, not to predict your bill. A quote is the only real number.

Check whether staying on a parent's policy is possible. It is routinely the single biggest saving available to a driver under 25, often larger than any difference between cars.

Mileage matters less than history. A 110,000-mile car with full service records is usually a better buy than an 80,000-mile car with none. Ask for the records; walk away if there aren't any.

Then think about fuel. At 8,000 miles a year, the difference between 28 and 36 mpg is about $250 a year. Real, but small enough that it should never override insurance or condition.

The shortlist

Given all of the above, the cars that show up repeatedly across reliability and insurance data:

If you want one answer: the CR-V, because it's the only car on the list that doesn't make you choose between the two costs that matter.

Every one of them is a sensible, unexciting car. That is the finding, not a failure of imagination — the exciting version of any of these costs more to insure than the difference is worth at your age.

Will it fit you, and your friends?

Cost decides the shortlist, but you still have to fit in the car, and so do the friends you'll be driving around. Here are the cabin figures for the shortlist, from each manufacturer's own spec sheet:

The CR-V wins again, this time in the back seat. The 2017–2022 CR-V gives rear passengers 40.4" of legroom. The Corolla gives them 34.8", 5.6" less. On a road trip with four people that is the difference between comfortable and cramped.

The Forester has the most room up front. 41.2" of front headroom and 43.3" of legroom are the highest figures on this list, and it is also the cheapest to insure. Skip the moonroof if you can: Subaru says it costs 1.0" up front and 2.0" in the back seat, an unusually large back-seat loss.

Watch the sunroof. Honda fits one as standard from the EX trim up, and it costs headroom: the 2016–2021 Civic drops from 39.3" to 37.5", and the 2017–2022 CR-V from 40.1" to as little as 37.8". If you're over six feet, an LX without the sunroof is the better buy, and usually the cheaper one. The tall drivers guide has the full list of cars where this happens.

The Subaru Impreza isn't in the table because we don't have its manufacturer figures yet.

One real quote

National averages are useful for showing the shape of the problem and useless for predicting your bill. So, one actual data point: a 2016 Mazda 6, quoted by Progressive at $215 a month — about $2,580 a year.

That is 25% below the $287 average this guide has been using. One driver, one state, one insurer, and a car that isn't even on the shortlist. Which is exactly the argument for getting your own quotes rather than trusting anyone's average, including mine.

What this guide can't tell you

Insurance is the dominant cost and also the one number that is entirely specific to you. I can show you that a Forester tends to be cheap and a turbo hatchback tends not to be. I cannot tell you what you will be quoted in your city on your licence.

So treat the shortlist as where to start getting quotes, not where to stop thinking. The point of this guide is to move insurance from an afterthought to the first thing you check.

Where these numbers come from

Figures are US national averages as of 2026. Insurance data covers drivers aged around 17–20 and varies enormously by state, city and individual history. Repair costs are RepairPal's measured annual averages. The four-year model assumes a $9,000 car, 8,000 miles a year, 32 mpg and $3.90 a gallon — change any of those and the totals move, but insurance stays the largest line.

• MoneyGeek — cheapest cars to insure for teenagers
• MoneyGeek — car insurance for 20-year-olds
• Insurify — cheap car insurance for 20-year-old drivers
• Autoblog — 20 cheapest cars to insure in 2026
• RepairPal — Toyota Corolla reliability
• RepairPal — Honda Civic reliability
• RepairPal — Honda CR-V reliability
• RepairPal — Subaru Forester reliability
• RepairPal — Subaru Impreza reliability
• U.S. News — best cars for college students