A Complete Guide To Adventuremobile Buying In 2025

The best cars, trucks, and SUVs for drivers who go off-road, visit remote areas, like camping, and drive in snow

Some version of “what car/truck should I buy” is by far the most frequent question you guys ask me. It’s also a question I’m uniquely qualified to answer, if your end use involves either adventurous driving or winter weather. Here’s a rundown of all the advice I can come up with.

Who am I to give this advice? Being a car journalist was a childhood dream, but one I found very one-dimensional once I’d achieved it. I enjoyed a career in that space that is still the envy of many, so have the opportunity to dabble occasionally if I feel compelled to right a wrong, go drive something new that I’m really excited about, or just think there’s a gap in good information, which is the driving force behind this piece.

I also walk the walk. Where most car journalists have a background and interest in sports and luxury cars, I use my trucks to take my wife and three dogs on camping trips. We live in Montana, where weather is often extreme, normal driving takes us through very remote areas, and we travel to even more challenging environments. We spent three months in Baja last year, for example, using my heavily-modified Ford Ranger to reach remote beaches and tackle challenging trails through the mountains. And we spend every Christmas at our place bordering Glacier National Park, where snow is measured in feet and temperatures are usually around -40F.

Do I have biases that will be reflected in this article? Yes. I strongly prefer the genuine utility offered by vehicles at the more affordable end of the spectrum to the too-often diminishing returns created by spending up to fancier badges. I need tools, not toys, and think both fashion and flaunting are stupid. I also reject the groupthink that informs most automotive culture here in the U.S., where most consumers are vastly ignorant about driving and operating their vehicles. In short, if you want real, actionable information about reality, I am your guy. If you are going to get offended because someone who knows more than you do doesn’t want to validate the purchase decisions around which you base your entire personality, look elsewhere.

There’s a lot cover here, so I plan to be brief, and link out to existing work around complex topics. Please consult those links before jumping into the comments section with insults. I do encourage readers to ask questions, and look forward to engaging with you below.

Let’s start with some questions that will help define your needs.

Do you really go off-road?

There’s a big difference between a really simple forest service road and an actual challenge. But I’m not going to give you the advice you think you’re going to get here. While virtually any normal car can tackle a simple dirt road up to a popular trailhead, taking a basic economy car like a Subaru or similar over washboard, through mud puddles, or even just trying to use one in winter weather is a bad idea. Reasons for that are:

• Wear and tear: It’s not sexy, so people don’t talk about it, but important components like suspension bushings, wheel bearings, CV axles, and tires are typically spec’d to the anticipated use of the vehicle in question. On an economy car, all of that is going to made with cost as the primary decision, and will not be designed to stand up to even the bumps inherent to driving on unpaved surfaces. So by using something like an Outback or a RAV4 or any other normal car, you’re just setting yourself up for problems. And most owners of those vehicles don’t have the experience it takes to fix that stuff themselves, or money to burn paying other people to handle it.

• Getting stuck: The reality of most adventurous driving is that it’ll be 99 percent easy, with the occasional crux presented by a real obstacle. And you never know when you might meet that obstacle. This is where people get into trouble. They have a bunch of trouble free miles, develop false confidence, then pop a tire 50 miles from cellphone signal and find themselves with no ability to fix it. This problem is exacerbated by automaker marketing, which promises that badges deliver real off-road capability. In reality, most all-wheel drive systems actually reduce traction when compared to 2WD, and most of the tires that come on new vehicles are grossly inadequate on anything beyond dry, warm pavement.

• Time is money: There’s a popular lake near our home in Bozeman that also serves as a trailhead for a bunch of high-elevation national forest land. Most people in normal cars make it up the 5-mile trail just fine so long as there’s no snow, but the drive probably takes them 30 minutes ore more, just from where they turn off-pavement. While they’re slowly damaging their vehicles at 10 MPH, I’m safely and respectfully passing them at 30 to 45 MPH, without running the risk of a puncture or tearing my truck apart. So I’m reaching that trailhead in under 10 minutes. And after work, racing the sunset for a hike, that’s a big difference.

• You’re missing out: People that talk my wife and I into taking them camping, or who take my advice and buy their first real 4x4 are often absolutely floored by just how much public land is out there, totally empty of other humans, right next to the places where you live. Could you hike to those same places? Maybe, if you have unlimited time and plenty of patience. But I’m hiking and backpacking too, just from trailheads further into the mountains than most people will ever walk, and enjoying wild places people without 4x4s will never see.

Your Takeaway: If you have the budget, spending up from a crossover or to a real truck or SUV will buy you peace of mind, a more adventurous lifestyle, and add an immense amount of safety.

What about winter?

You’ve seen or read “A Hundred Words For Snow,” right? They’re not wrong, but to that add an equal variety for ice, slush, or just deep cold. And the tires that come on most new vehicles are designed for none of that. “All Season” tires begin to lose grip, even on dry pavement, at about 45 degrees Fahrenheit. So, if you plan to drive in winter conditions, you need to swap over to tires designed for them. This is true no matter how many “AWD” or “Wilderness” badges your car comes with. While traction systems can help make the most of the grip provided by appropriate tires, they are unable to work without them.

But tires cost money, so you’ll want to budget for that when shopping. I’ll explain more about traction systems in my individual recommendations.

I’m going to drop a paywall here, to encourage my tens of thousands of free subscribers to sign up for a paid subscription, which costs $15/month. Sign up for a year and I throw in a month for free. Doing so supports my work covering important topics like public lands, and buys personal access to me for help planning trips, buying gear, or figuring out all this vehicle stuff so you and your family can safely get the most out of the great outdoors. You can read more about the value proposition I think I’m offering at this link.