Insurance Institute for Highway Safety names the 21 Best Booster seats
It’s good to see that the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety is doing their job by providing us with some very good equipment aimed at keeping our kids safe. The IIHS recently tested 72 booster seats and out of those, 21 come highly recommended as Best Bets, 7 were put down as Good Bets and 8 were simply not recommended at all. As for the other 36 seats tested… we’re actually not sure what happened to those, but have no fear as we’ve got a list of the ones available for purchase. Up until 2008 there was no federal standard as to how children were supposed to be belted into booster seats, nor were they evaluated in crash tests by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). Thankfully the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety stepped in and has become the benchmark for booster seating testing.
From the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety’s website:
The Institute in 2008 began evaluating boosters to help make selecting appropriate ones less of a guessing game. Since then some manufacturers have adopted the Institute’s test protocol and booster seat fixture to help evaluate belt fit on the new boosters they’re designing.
Below are the 2010 IIHS BOOSTER EVALUATION RESULTS:
• BEST BETS
Britax Frontier 85 (combination highback)
Chicco Keyfit Strada (dual highback)
Clek Oobr (dual highback)
Cosco Juvenile Pronto (dual highback)
Cybex Solution X-Fix (highback)
Eddie Bauer Auto Booster (dual highback)
Evenflo Big Kid Amp (backless)
Evenflo Maestro (combination highback)
Graco TurboBooster Crawford (dual highback)
Harmony Baby Armor (dual highback)
Harmony Dreamtime (dual backless)
Harmony Dreamtime (dual highback)
Harmony Secure Comfort Deluxe (backless)
Harmony Youth Booster Seat (backless)
Maxi-Cosi Rodi XR (dual highback)
Recaro ProBOOSTER (highback)
Recaro ProSPORT (combination highback)
Recaro Vivo (highback)
Recaro Young Sport (combination highback)
Safety 1st Boost Air Protect (dual highback)
The First Years Pathway B570 (highback)
• GOOD BETS
Britax Parkway SG (dual highback)
Combi Kobuk Air Thru (dual backless)
Combi Kobuk Air Thru (dual highback)
Evenflo Symphony 65 (3-in-1 highback)
Graco TurboBooster Sachi (dual highback)
Graco TurboBooster Wander (dual highback)
Maxi-Cosi Rodi (dual highback)
• NOT RECOMMENDED
Eddie Bauer Deluxe (combination highback)
Eddie Bauer Deluxe 3-in-1 (highback)
Evenflo Express (combination highback)
Evenflo Generations 65 (combination highback)
Evenflo Sightseer (highback)
Harmony Baby Armor (dual backless)
Safety 1st All-in-One (3-in-1 highback)
Safety 1st Alpha Omega Elite (3-in-1 highback)
[Source: Insurance Institute for Highway Safety]
