All-season tires make a great, versatile jack-of-all-trades choice for most drivers of sedans, coupes, and minivans, and for a pretty solid set of reasons. All-season tires are just good at lots of things: they offer long, even wear, a quiet and accommodating ride, nice stable road manners at highway speed, handling that’s predictable and confident, and dependable, consistent traction in just about every kind of road conditions you can think of other than heavy snow. Of course, light trucks, SUVs, and crossovers are now the vehicles that have taken over the family car and daily-driver role that used to be performed by sedans, minivans, and station wagons, so it would just figure that those vehicles should have their own all-season tires too.

With so many options out there in the world of all-season tires, it just makes sense that you can find them at every conceivable price point, from premium tires (at premium prices) to affordable tires from lesser-known brands. In most cases, there’s a direct tie-in between a tire’s price and the quality you can expect, but not in the case of the SuperMax TM1. The SuperMax TM1 is a budget-priced all-season tire that comes with features that were once only reserved for much more pricey tires and checks a surprising number of boxes for its price point. Let’s get in there and get a closer look with this SuperMax TM1 tire review:

Features and Benefits

Here are some of the great design features and innovations that make the Supermax TM1 a great value and an outstanding performer in the world of all-season tires:

• All-season tread designed with wide circumferential grooves that discourage any tendency toward hydroplaning by quickly routing standing water away from the tire’s contact patch
• Redesigned contact patch keeps the most rubber in contact with the road for better wear properties, improved braking, handling, and overall traction
• Continuous center rib helps to deliver solid, stable road manners, and steering response that’s quick and direct
• The rounded profile encourages even wear along with predictable, capable handling
• Tread pitch and design of slots and grooves help to negate certain frequencies and overtones for a quiet, peaceful ride on the highway
• Enhanced rubber formulation is optimized for long wear and great traction on wet or dry pavement
• Full-depth sipes multiply the tread’s surface area and traction with hundreds of tiny hair-thin slits to slice through standing water or slush

Pros and Cons

With the Supermax TM1, this is a tire where the Cons are far outweighed by the Pros:

PROS:

• Very affordable price point
• Dependable traction and handling properties
• Ride on the highway is muted and forgiving
• Great wet-weather performance and traction

CONS:

• Not good off-road
• Not good in heavier snow
• It can get a little noisier on some pavement surfaces
• No limited manufacturer’s tread life coverage

SimpleTire’s view on SuperMax TM-1 tires

Are you familiar with SimpleScore? SimpleScore is the proprietary ratings system that we here at the SimpleTire team developed to give you a quick at-a-glance idea of a tire’s strengths and weaknesses. We take into account the tire’s technical information, manufacturer info, specs, customer reviews, and other data points, then we distill all that to a 1-10 numerical score for the categories of traction, handling, and longevity, along with an overall average SimpleScore number. For the Supermax TM1, the SimpleScores break down this way:

Supermax TM1

• Traction: 7.6
• Handling: 8.1
• Longevity: 9.0
• Overall average SimpleScore: 8.2

With an all-season tire like the Supermax TM1, you probably shouldn’t expect the kind of cornering ability and steering response that you’d get with a summer tire or UHP tire. Still, the Supermax TM1 is agile and quick. One of the biggest factors in the handling behavior of any tire is its rigidity; as you enter a corner or round a curve, the vehicle’s momentum tries to keep pushing the car in a straight line. Changing direction puts a lot of stress on the tire’s shoulder and sidewall, and a mushier tire will show deformation and “tread squirm,” sometimes with the tire’s inboard side leaving the pavement altogether. The reinforced shoulder blocks of the Supermax TM1 resist tread squirm for cornering that’s crisp and predictable. With its solid center rib, response to driver input is light and direct but never overly sensitive or twitchy, and straight-line cruising at highway speed is solid and stable without being numb or sluggish.

On wet pavements, the groove setup of the Supermax TM1 delivers satisfying traction and resists any tendency towards hydroplaning, with confident braking performance and handling thanks to the combination of small tread blocks and lateral sipes. Ride quality is forgiving (although it can get a little firm but controlled on rough pavement), and the Supermax TM1 doesn’t start to get jittery or squirrelly over broken pavement or irregular surfaces. It’s true that the Supermax TM1 doesn’t come with a limited manufacturer’s tread life warranty, but many tires at this end of the price range (or even much more expensive ones) don’t come with a mileage warranty. And the Supermax TM1 is definitely affordable, with SimpleTire’s prices running from $43.96/tire to $133.97/tire.

In many cases with tires at the more affordable end of the price range, you’re going to get what you pay for, and most drivers know that right out of the gate. With the Supermax TM1, though, this is a tire that’s capable of handily beating expectations in terms of features, performance, and overall value. It would be an especially good option if you have an older vehicle that needs tires, but you don’t want to empty out a bank account to do it. All in all, the Supermax TM1 is a great value and great performer, and we folks here at the SimpleTire team have taken away a pretty good impression of it.

Vehicles the SuperMax TM-1 is a good replacement tire for

While the Supermax TM1 isn’t featured as OEM on any vehicles, it would make a great replacement tire for cars, minivans, and CUVs such as these:

• Buick Encore
• Chevrolet Sprint
• Chrysler Pacifica
• Dodge Caravan
• Fiat 500
• Ford Focus
• Honda Civic
• Kia Sephia
• Mazda 6
• Nissan Rogue
• Subaru Outback
• Toyota Camry
• Volkswagen Atlas
• Acura TSX
• Audi A6
• Buick Lacrosse
• Cadillac CT5
• Chevrolet Cruze
• Chrysler 200
• Ford Mustang
• Genesis G80
• Honda Accord
• Hyundai Sonata
• Kia K5
• Mazda3
• Nissan Altima
• Tesla Model 3
• Toyota Supra
• Volkswagen Passat
• Ford Explorer
• Buick Enclave
• Chevrolet Uplander
• GMC Acadian
• Jeep Grand Cherokee
• Honda Ridgeline
• Toyota 4Runner
• Nissan Pathfinder
• BMW X5
• Dodge Journey
• Genesis GV70
• Hyundai Tucson
• Jaguar F-Pace
• Lexus RX350
• Mazda CX-7
• Tesla Model X
• Toyota RAV4
• Volkswagen Taos