Accurate Automotive is a repair shop in Northglenn, Colorado. In addition to the services any family mechanic shop offers, it also shares advice and insights with its 397,000 followers on TikTok. When shop owner Alex Kacsh tried to define the shifting phrase “high mileage,” he touched on some major changes in the automotive industry.

How has the definition of “high mileage” changed over time?

When working on cars built through the 1960s and even 1970s, mechanics assumed an engine would need a full rebuild around 100,000 miles. But many cars built in the first couple of decades of the 21st century often run for 250,000 miles without so much as a transmission fluid change. Some mechanics warn that even more recent cars won’t last nearly as long.

Why didn’t old cars last as long? Materials weren’t as good and manufacturing wasn’t as reliably precise. Take, for example, the gap between an old engine’s piston rings and cylinder wall. It might vary between cylinders, and at least one piston ring often needed replacement by 100,000 miles. Today, consistent materials and manufacturing mean many engines with 100,000 or even 200,000 miles are running strong with good compression in every cylinder while burning minimal oil.

The result is that legendary vehicles such as the Toyota Highlander or Honda Accord are often still on the road with 200,000 or more miles. Kacsh explains, “If you asked the industry in 2014, high mileage was always considered above 200,000 miles. Always, always considered above 200,000 miles.”

You’d think that with continued improvements in engineering and manufacturing, that number would keep going up. But Kacsh feels it’s going down.

“In the last 20-ish years, the industry has recognized that higher-mileage vehicles need to be considered above, obviously I would say above 120,000, 150,000 miles.”

What happened to modern cars?

Kacsh argues that automakers began engineering cars to not last as long. For business reasons. “I truly feel like that there was a decision or a mindset made to have certain failures done on vehicles to get the car buying cycle to be shorter again.” In the electronics industry, this business strategy is often called “planned obsolescence.”

The shift in the auto industry may not be nefarious, though. I agree with Kacsh’s conclusion. He says, “I do not believe the intentions of newer manufactured cars are meant to go 300,000, 400,000 miles anymore.”

But that doesn’t mean automakers’ intentions are bad. They may simply have different goals: the high output customers expect and the high mpg the government requires.

For an example, let’s look at the Honda CR-V. The crossover’s third generation (2007-2011) is known for legendary reliability. It only came with naturally aspirated four-cylinder engines and a five-speed automatic transmission. Meanwhile, competitors of the era offered larger engines and automatics with more gears, or even CVTs. Honda chose tried-and-true technologies, and the result was better reliability and lower maintenance costs.

Fast forward to the 2022 redesign. The latest Honda CR-V’s most popular engine is a turbocharged 1.5-liter, and all CR-Vs now come with continuously variable transmissions. This powertrain offers a few more mpg but is also much more complex than the old CR-V. But there’s no proof Honda intentionally threw a monkey wrench into its own machine. That’s because the EPA requires it to hit higher mpg marks every year, and Honda is forced to use more complex and less reliable technologies to get there.

MotorBiscuit has reached out to @AccurateAutosInc for comment. You can see the original TikTok video embedded below: