Volvo and Nissan earn Top Safety Pick+ Awards from IIHS

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Volvo and Nissan are the latest automakers to earn the coveted Top Safety Pick+ award from the U.S. Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) for specific vehicles in their lineups.

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To earn a Top Safety Pick award, a vehicle must achieve the highest rating of “Good” in crash tests that measure small front overlap on the driver and passenger sides, front moderate overlap, side crash, roof strength, and head restraints; as well as “Advanced” or “Superior” rating for available front crash prevention; and headlights rated “Acceptable” or “Good” must be available.

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Volvo and Nissan earn Top Safety Pick+ Awards from IIHS Back to video

To earn the highest Top Safety Pick+, those headlights must be standard equipment on all trim levels.

Volvo’s most recent inductees are the 2021 S90, S90 Recharge, V90, V90 Cross Country, and V60 Cross Country. Except for the V60 Cross Country, the ratings apply to models that were built after September 2020, when the appropriate headlights were added to them.

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This now brings Volvo to a total of 14 vehicles that have received the designation, the most among all automakers rated so far for the 2021 model year.

Nissan took the top award with the 2021 Murano, which earned it with new ratings for its improved headlamps and pedestrian crash avoidance. The IIHS said that in its tests, the Murano successfully avoided collisions at 12 mph (19 km/h) simulating a child and adult crossing in front. In a test at 25 mph (40 km/h) it avoided the adult dummy completely, and avoided the child dummy in four out of five test runs, while substantially slowing in the fifth. The IIHS said the “child scenario is more difficult and simulates a child emerging from behind two parked cars.”

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While not all 2021 models have been rated yet, the IIHS has awarded its Top Safety Pick+ to 56 vehicles across nine segments for the model year. Another 41 vehicles have earned a Top Safety Pick designation.

Both the IIHS and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) crash-test vehicles for safety. While NHTSA is a division of the U.S. federal government, the IIHS is an independent, non-profit organization dedicated to vehicle safety research and evaluation. It was founded in 1959 by three major insurance associations, and opened its Vehicle Research Center, where it performs its tests, in 1992. It began rating vehicles for their front crash prevention systems in 2013.