How CarCody orders a chart

Every chart on CarCody is ordered by a rule written down here. The rule is the same for every car or tool on a chart.

Fuel-economy charts

Each car chart is named for one official figure from the US Environmental Protection Agency, published on fueleconomy.gov: rated range for the range charts, MPGe for the efficiency chart, combined MPG for the MPG charts. Cars are ordered by that figure, highest first. One row is one model year, version and drivetrain, exactly as the EPA lists it.

When two cars share a figure, the next EPA figure settles it: on a range chart, efficiency (MPGe) and then the yearly fuel cost; on the efficiency chart, range and then fuel cost; on an MPG chart, highway MPG, then tailpipe CO₂, then fuel cost. A car with no figure on record goes last. CarCody gives no made-up score to a car: its figure is its score.

Every make, every year

A make's chart lists every model year it sold in the US since 1984, newest year first, then by model name. Nothing is ranked there; it is the record.

Software charts

Tools for repair shops, dealers and fleets are ordered by the CarCody score, built only from what each maker publishes and when we read it: where the research places the tool in its category, a free plan, a free trial, open source, the platforms it runs on, prices published on its own site, how much of it is on record, and a logo on file. Only a tool with every part reaches the top of the scale, and a tie keeps the research's order.

Paid places

Makers and dealers can buy a place on a chart: #1 to #5 on one chart, by the month, the year or once (#1 is $149/mo). A paid place puts that car or tool at the place bought and moves the others down one. Whatever it shows is its own (its official figures or its real CarCody score, or nothing where it has none on that chart), never a number made up for it. Paid places are sold on the advertise page; the disclosure says how CarCody is paid for.

Where the numbers come from

Car figures come from fueleconomy.gov, with the date each was read on the car's own page; your own results depend on how and where you drive. Photos come from Wikimedia Commons and are credited where they show. Software facts and prices come from each maker's own pages, with the date they were read.