2023 Mercedes-Benz C-Class Earns IIHS Top Safety Pick+ Rating
The 2023 Mercedes-Benz C-Class has once again earned a Top Safety Pick+ award from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, this time when equipped with an optional front crash prevention system.
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The C-Class won a Top Safety Pick+ award back in November thanks to its LED headlights, but that was before the guidelines changed for both the Top Safety Pick and Top Safety Pick+ awards. The IIHS has made the requirements tougher since then, with vehicles now needing to have good- or acceptable-rated headlights across the entire lineup to earn either award. Vehicles must also earn a good rating in the side-impact test, which now uses a heavier barrier to strike the vehicle at higher speeds, in order to receive a Top Safety Pick+ rating; an acceptable or good rating is required for Top Safety Pick winners. The IIHS also introduced a new nighttime vehicle-to-pedestrian crash prevention test in which a vehicle must have an advanced or superior rating to qualify for Top Safety Pick+ status; the Top Safety Pick award only requires an advanced or superior rating for the daytime test.
To earn either accolade from the IIHS, a vehicle must earn good ratings in the driver-side small overlap front, passenger-side small overlap front and original moderate overlap front tests; the head restraint, roof strength and vehicle-to-vehicle front crash prevention assessments are no longer required for the awards.
The 2023 C-Class meets all criteria for the Top Safety Pick+ award when equipped with an optional front crash prevention system, which is bundled into the $1,700 Driver Assistance Package. The standard LED projector headlamps earned a good rating, while the optional curve-adaptive LED headlights got an acceptable rating. The optional front crash prevention system helped the C-Class earn superior ratings in the daytime and nighttime vehicle-to-pedestrian front crash prevention tests.
Meanwhile, the standard crash prevention system qualified for the lesser Top Safety Pick award. This system earned an advanced rating in the daytime vehicle-to-pedestrian crash prevention test, but only a basic rating in the nighttime test.
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