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SUVs might be the preferred body style of choice in Australia and across the world, but depending on the scenario, they could prove more dangerous in an accident.
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One of the main reasons cited for purchasing an SUV over a passenger car is improved safety, but leading researchers believe this is not necessarily true.
Australians have clearly voted with their wallets in favour of high-riders over hatchbacks and sedans, with 365,205 SUVs sold in 2025 so far, compared with 81,662 conventional passenger cars.
And – in most cases – with more storage capacity, legroom, and an elevated view of the street, it makes practical sense why many opt for this kind of vehicle.
However, the notion that SUVs are safer than smaller cars ultimately comes down to who it is safer for in event of a collision – passenger or pedestrian – according to experts.
What are the experts saying?
Monash University Associate Professor David Logan, who leads research teams on vehicle safety, told Drive a larger vehicle will not directly translate to a safer one.
“The important thing is when you're talking about ‘safer’, there's either safer for the occupants of the vehicle itself or safer for those other road users that might be crashed into by the vehicle, whether they be pedestrians or other vehicles,” Logan told Drive.
“The short answer is that larger cars are not necessarily safer than smaller cars for their occupants, and they're definitely less safe for other road users.”
Logan explained differing car sizes leads to unequal crash protection – people are at risk, in particular, of severe head and chest injuries when a larger car hits a smaller car.
“Larger cars are invariably less safe than smaller cars [for other occupants] when it comes to running into other vehicles, because SUVs are heavier,” Logan said.
“They [SUVs] usually have quite aggressive frontal profiles, which means that they're often quite high and quite stiff at the front, especially with some of the utes.
"When people start to fit bull bars to them, that makes it even worse. They're quite aggressive towards other vehicles.”
APV-T Test Centre General Manager Carl Leirsch, who oversees some Australasian New Car Assessment Program (ANCAP) crash testing, said SUVs and larger vehicles could be even more dangerous than a passenger car under certain crash scenarios.
“There are many other things about larger cars, which certainly make them less safe for others,” Leirsch said. “It always depends on the scenario, the test scenario – there are certainly cases where a larger car is not safer.
“We've done some tests on SUVs where the vehicles have rolled over, where that doesn't happen to a smaller vehicle.
“A larger vehicle carries greater mass, and so if it hits a tree, for example, side on, it's going to probably have greater intrusion into the side of the vehicle, simply because the momentum of the vehicle is trying to wrap itself more around the tree.
"It's debatable as to whether that's less safe or not, because generally in a larger vehicle you have more room between the side of the car and the driver or the passenger.
"So it's really difficult to say whether they're safer or not.
“Of course, if a bigger car hits a little car, the little car's not going to come off real well."
Looking at the most recent ANCAP crash data under the latest standards, the safety organisation has assessed only 13 passenger cars (light, mid-size, large, and sports cars), while scoring 47 utes and SUVs.
Of the 13 passenger vehicles, four (or 31 per cent of tested models) fell short of the maximum five-star score – Suzuki Swift, MG3, Hyundai i30 Sedan, and MG5.
ANCAP has assessed 47 SUVs (across small, medium, and large sizes) and one-tonne utes, with eight (or 17 per cent) failing to achieve five stars – Mahindra Scorpio, Jeep Avenger, Hyundai Inster, Cupra Tavascan, Honda CR-V, MG ZS, Honda ZR-V, and Hyundai Kona.
This data would indicate that SUVs and utes perform better in ANCAP crash testing when compared to passenger vehicles, but individual results for adult occupant protection, child occupant protection, vulnerable road user protection, and safety assist examinations vary greatly.
Vehicle safety features are designed for one of two things: either avoiding the accident in the first place – with advanced driver assistance systems – or protecting the people inside the vehicle as much as possible, according to the experts.
The severity of each accident also depends on the “the fitment of accessories,” as Leirsch describes.
“We can be talking about bull bars, roof racks, those sorts of things.
“If they're not well designed or well fitted, they can become a greater danger to others around them.”
In the event of an accident, a larger car may protect its occupants more than those outside of that vehicle – thus making the debate of size vs safety endless.
“Strangely, some of the larger SUVs are no safer than smaller vehicles when it comes to single-vehicle crashes, which is a very common crash throughout Australia,” Logan said.
Many problems arise when there is a large mix of people sharing the road.
A report from the University of Melbourne details these trends nationally and points out the "growing dominance of SUVs" to be a contributor.
It states that "SUVs were associated with significantly higher fatality rates in crashes involving vulnerable road users, compared to smaller cars".
"The effect was particularly pronounced for children."
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Ilana is a Melbourne-based journalist who was previously a copywriter in the Big Apple. Having moved to Melbourne for her Master of Journalism, she has written articles about food, farm machinery, fashion, and now the fast and furious. Her dream car has been a Mini Cooper since the fifth grade, eyeing its style and petite size.
