The Complete Cost Of Maintaining A Honda

When you’re in the market for a new or used Honda, you’ll eventually wonder what a Honda generally costs in maintenance. In this blog, we’ve done our absolute best to give you a complete rundown of the costs and what you can expect for different models and model years. Let’s start with a quick answer:

Honda have an average annual maintenance cost of $428 per year. This is below the average $646 for all car brands. Honda is more affordable than many other car brands because it’s an Asian car brand that uses proven technologies that are easy to replace.

However, that certainly doesn’t tell the whole story. Below, we’ll start by looking at the annual maintenance cost of the most popular models and their corresponding model years. Furthermore, We’ll look at the eight most common service points and discuss what a Honda costs you in this regard. We’ll also compare the annual maintenance costs of a Honda to 23 other car brands and discuss why a Honda is considered cheap or expensive in maintenance. Read on!

How Expensive Are Honda Models To Maintain?

First of all, we feel it’s essential to understand how much each model, and different model years, cost per year in terms of maintenance. For this, we’ve taken data from Repairpal. We’ve compiled this data in the table below.

One thing that becomes clear immediately when we look at the table is that all of the model years of all specific models have annual maintenance costs in the range of $250 – $600. This immediately indicates that Honda is very affordable to maintain over the long run.

We can say that because we’ve examined numerous car brands so far and, typically, we expect to see annual maintenance cost in the $400 – $800 range.

Year	Pilot	Accord	CR-V	HR-V	Odyssey	Civic
2019	x	x	x	x	x	x
2018	$392	x	$251	$268	$438	$311
2017	$373	$316	$309	$260	$296	$290
2016	$457	$349	$326	$318	$384	$339
2015	$514	$380	$365	x	$465	$352
2014	$553	$426	$425	x	$535	$368
2013	$567	$447	$460	x	x	$387
2012	$596	$412	$452	x	x	$400
2011	$594	$414	$433	x	x	$392
2010	$568	$389	$442	x	x	x
2009	x	x	$404	x	x	x
2008	x	x	$401	x	x	x
2007	x	x	$349	x	x	x

Now, of course, this also depends on the vehicles we’re talking about. However, even when we look at a larger vehicle such as the Pilot, we can see that maintenance costs stay within the $370 – $600 per year range. Spending this amount for an SUV is very doable, and something Honda can be proud of.

On the other hand, there are the sedans such as the Accord and the Civic. Both of these are an absolute steal in terms of maintenance costs. The Civic doesn’t even cross the $400 mark, whereas the Accord tops out at $426.

Are Parts And Services Expensive For A Honda?

Furthermore, it’s essential to discuss the average cost of general maintenance tasks. This way, you know what to expect from your Honda, and you’ll be able to see if specific maintenance is more expensive than others.

Oil Change

An oil change on a Honda will generally cost you $99 – $123. On average, an oil change costs $40 – $60 for conventional oil and $60 – 120 for full synthetic oil for a car. Therefore, Honda are on the upper end of the spectrum for this. However, this is because most of the models manufactured after 2011 do indeed need synthetic oil.

Brake Pads

Replacing the brake pads on a Honda costs between $187 – $245 per axle. On average, brake pad replacement costs between $150 – $300 per axle. Therefore, most Honda are completely average in terms of cost. This is mainly because the vehicles are quite compact, which means they don’t need sizeable brake pads. This reduces costs.

Filters

Replacing filters is also a task you’ll encounter from time to time. The fuel filter is generally the most expensive filter to replace. Replacing a fuel filter in a Honda will cost between $192 – $554. Replacing a cabin air filter is $49 – $61 and replacing an air filter is $40 – $64.

Typically, replacing a fuel filter costs between $80 – $150. This means replacing the fuel filter on a Honda has incredibly high cost. However, this is because these filters are integrated into the fuel pump in newer generations of Honda; replacing them is therefore only needed when the pump fails (100,000+ miles); see this quote:

Regarding the fuel filter: Its non serviceable as its apart of the fuel pump itself and you need a special tool to remove the bracket that holds the pump housing in the tank. It will last as long as the pump does though so I would not worry at all.

Source

Replacing a cabin air filter costs typically between $60 – $80, meaning Honda is slightly more affordable than average. Replacing the air filter costs usually $50 – $70, which means Honda is once again somewhat more affordable.

Battery

The average price to replace a Honda battery is between $178 – $204. On average, replacing a car battery costs between $120 – $240. This means that Honda is quite average in terms of costs for replacing this part.

Timing Belt/Chain

Another replacement that you’ll come across when owning a car is a timing belt replacement. Timing belts need to be replaced around the 100,000 miles mark. However, replacing the timing chain on a Honda will cost $334 – $1,041.

How much this truly costs depends on the vehicle you have. For example, the Civic and Accord use a timing belt that can typically be replaced for $334 – $749. However, larger vehicles are much more costly. For example, the Pilot also uses a timing belt but replacing it costs $807 – $1,041. The Pilot uses a timing chain, and this is also a larger vehicle so expect around $1,000 to replace this.

Tire Rotation And Replacement

Replacing a set of tires on a Honda will cost $200 – $600. Most Honda sedans will have tires available for as little as $200 – $250 per set. However, the Pilot and HR-V typically cost no less than $400 per set and can go up to $600 per set.

Spark Plugs

Replacing a set of spark plugs costs between $108 – $344 per set for a Honda. On average, it costs $75 – $250 to replace a set of spark plugs. This means that replacing spark plugs on a Honda has an average cost, although larger vehicles such as the Pilot and HR-V are more costly than the average.

Headlight Bulbs

On average, it costs between $46 – $63 to replace a set of headlight bulbs on a Honda. On average, replacing headlight bulbs costs between $100 – $150 for a set. Honda, therefore, are below average in terms of costs for this replacement.

Are Honda More Or Less Expensive Compared To Other Brands?

Knowing everything we know now, it’s essential to have a final look at Honda as a brand and get information from folks other than a dealership. For this, we’ve compiled data from 23 other carmakers. The average annual maintenance costs of each carmaker are in the table below. By comparing all brands to each other, we understand how expensive a brand truly is in maintenance.

What we see immediately here is the fact that Honda tops the list of all carmakers that sell cars in the United States. This is a very strong sign that Honda’s cars are indeed very cost-effective in the long run.

What’s even more interesting is that Honda also beats out many of its Asian competitors. As you can see, Asian brands make up the complete top nine. However, Honda beats out rivals such as Toyota and Mazda. Even though the difference may be small, this does indicate the image of reliability that Hondas carry is indeed correct.

Brand	Average Annual Maintenance Costs
Honda	$428
Toyota	$441
Mazda	$462
Hyundai	$468
Kia	$474
Nissan	$500
Acura	$501
Mitsubishi	$535
Lexus	$551
Buick	$608
Chrysler	$608
Subaru	$617
Dodge	$634
Jeep	$634
Infiniti	$638
Chevrolet	$649
Volkswagen	$676
GMC	$744
Volvo	$769
Ford	$775
Cadillac	$783
RAM	$858
Lincoln	$879
Mercedes	$908
BMW	$968

Why Is Honda So Cheap?

We have to answer the final question: why does Honda end up on top of the list? Looking at the data and making some logical assumptions, we can identify the factors that are important here.

It’s An Asian Company

First, as was already kind of revealed in the previous subheading, Honda is an Asian brand. This means the company can leverage Asian resources (both in terms of materials and manpower).

On average, resources from the Asian continent are cheaper than resources gathered in the North American market. This also perfectly explains why eight other Asian carmakers complement the top nine most affordable car brands in the United States.

They Have A Huge Network Of Suppliers

One of the unique features of Honda is the fact that it’s a huge company. This means that they’re capable of buying resources at scale (which lowers the price) and that they’ve taken matters into their own hands.

For example, Honda has more than 620 OEM manufacturers in the United States alone. Within the United States, they also buy around $23.5 billion worth of parts every year. Besides that, we must not forget that Honda is also the largest motorcycle and combustion engine manufacturer in the world. This means knowledge from one division can be passed down to the other division which lowers research costs as well.

Of course, every mainstream car manufacturer is a huge company. However, Honda, together with brands like Toyota and Hyundai, are in a league of their own in terms of scale.

Half Their Line-Up Consists Of Sedans / Small SUVs

Another reason why Honda is so cheap when we look at the company from a brand perspective is that a large part of its line-up consists of sedans or smaller SUVs. As a general rule of thumb, sedans / compact SUVs are more affordable in maintenance compared to the other popular alternative (large SUVs).

This mainly has to do with the size differences between the classes of cars. The larger the car will be, the more it costs to maintain. This is also why it’s not entirely fair to compare brands like GMC (which only makes large SUVs) to Honda (which sells sedans and crossovers/SUVs).

Nevertheless, the research we’ve done on this website has indicated time and time again that Honda are also very, very reliable (unlike GMC or many other American brands), which means we can’t totally dismiss the comparison between American brands and Asian brands.

It’s Not A Luxury Brand

Finally, we have to discuss another point that heavily influences a car’s maintenance costs. This is the fact that Honda is not a luxury brand. In general, you’ll always see that luxury brands (whether that be Lexus, Acura, BMW, Mercedes, and so on) are more expensive than their non-luxury counterparts.

This has to do with the fact that luxury cars always push the edge of what’s possible in terms of electronics, comfort, and performance. However, this also means the technologies used are less reliable and cost a lot to fix.

On the other hand, there’s Honda, a carmaker that builds reliable cars with proven technology that’s widely available and that’s very easy to fix when it breaks. In the end, it depends on what you’re looking for and what your budget can handle in the long run.

Sources

• https://repairpal.com/honda
• https://hondainamerica.com/parts-suppliers/