The score
How the CAR Confidence Score works
The CAR Confidence Score is one figure out of 100 for a car you’re thinking of buying. It tells you how much confidence the car’s record supports, so you can compare cars quickly and know what to ask before you view one.
What is the CAR Confidence Score?
The CAR Confidence Score is a figure out of 100 that sums up how much a used car’s record lets you trust it. It weighs the latest MOT, the MOT record, age and mileage, ownership and the asking price. A serious legal problem, such as a theft report, limits the score whatever the record says.
What goes into the score
Five factors, each read from the car’s own record.
- Latest MOT: the condition the most recent test found the car in. Safety and rust items count for more than worn tyres or wiper blades.
- MOT record: how the car has done at its tests over the years, including any problem that keeps coming back.
- Age and mileage: how far the car has travelled for its age.
- Ownership and records: how many keepers it has had and whether its mileage readings tell one consistent story.
- Price: the asking price you enter, set against what similar cars sell for.
Your report shows each factor with the evidence behind it, so you can see why a car scored as it did.
What a legal problem does to the score
A theft report, an insurance write-off and finance still owed to a lender are not traded off against the other factors. A car with a serious legal problem on its record can’t score well, however good its MOT history is. The report says so in plain words and names the problem.
How to use the score
- Run the free check on every car you like the look of. It rules cars out early.
- Get the score for the car you’re close to buying. Enter the asking price so that price is part of it.
- Open the factors. A good score with one weak factor tells you exactly what to ask the seller about.
- Compare the cars on your shortlist side by side in your garage.
- Treat the score as what the record says. Then go and see the car.
See what each report includesHow to use CAR Confidence, step by step
What the score can’t tell you
The score reads records. It can’t see the car, hear the engine or know how it was driven last week.
A high score means the record gives you good reasons for confidence. It isn’t a promise about the car and it isn’t a mechanical inspection. For an expensive purchase, have a mechanic look at the car as well.
Why the Car Health Check shows a rating instead
The Car Health Check doesn’t run the legal checks, so it doesn’t give a score. It gives a risk rating in words: low, medium or high. For the score itself you need the full CAR Confidence Score report.
FAQ
Questions people ask
What is a good CAR Confidence Score?
There is no pass mark. A higher score means the record gives fewer reasons for concern. Read the factors behind it, because two cars with the same score can have different weak points.
Why did a car with a clean MOT history score low?
Usually because of something outside the MOT record: a legal problem, very high mileage for its age or an asking price well above the market. The report shows which factor pulled the score down.
Is the score on the free check?
No. The free check shows the public record for you to read yourself. You get the score in the full paid report.
Does AI decide the score?
No. The score comes from fixed rules applied the same way to every car. George, the AI voice, explains the result. He doesn’t set it.
Can a car’s score change?
Yes. The score reads the record on the day of your report. A later MOT test or a different asking price would give a different result.
Guides
More checks before you buy
Free car check
Check it before you go and see it
DVLA details, tax and MOT status, mileage and the full MOT history, free for any UK registration.