Vehicles using 265/40R19 tire size:

• Cadillac DTS
• BMW M5
• Ford Five Hundred
• Jaguar XJ
• Porsche Cayman
• Volvo XC70

1. Bridgestone Potenza Sport - Best UHP tire

Let’s kick this list off with one of our favorite dedicated ultra-high-performance tires, the Bridgestone Potenza Sport. The Potenza Sport is designed to deliver the best of both worlds: reliable traction and quiet, refined ride quality, along with a confident, exhilarating driving experience on wet or dry roads. Bridgestone designed the Potenza Sport with a sticky silica-rich tread formulation that offers excellent adhesion and mechanical grip with the pavement. It’s then molded into a performance-oriented tread pattern that’s redesigned to put the most rubber possible in contact with the road. Four wide circumferential grooves route water through and behind the contact patch to resist hydroplaning and enhance wet–weather performance. For cornering response and wet-weather traction, the Potenza Sport’s tread has a network of 3D sipes that enhances tread stiffness, and a tuned tread pitch helps ensure low noise on the highway by canceling certain resonances and frequencies. Running through our calculations, that comes out to a SimpleScore of 9.9 for handling and 9.9 for traction. The Potenza Sport does suffer a little in the rankings regarding longevity, with a SimpleScore of 7.3. The Potenza Sport does not come from Bridgestone with a mileage warranty (most UHP tires don’t) and isn’t a good tire choice for winter conditions. On tires like this, their softer, stickier tread formulation will stiffen up and lose traction in colder weather. Like all UHP and summer tires, the Potenza Sport shouldn’t be used for temperatures below 40-45 degrees F.

2. Continental ExtremeContact Sport 02 - Best Summer tire

Designed for sharp performance in warm weather, the Continental ExtremeContact Sport 02 is a next-generation summer tire that delivers a perfect balance of tread life, handling properties, ride comfort, and low noise. The ExtremeContact Sport 02 employs Continental’s +Silane tread compound for confident grip and handling in wet weather, with deep circumferential grooves that resist hydroplaning by providing a route for standing water to be channeled away from the tire’s contact patch. SimpleScore for traction is a very strong 9.8. SimpleScore for handling is almost equally strong at 9.6 – thanks to a ribbed, asymmetric tread pattern with a solid center rib for enhanced road feel and steering response, wide tread blocks, and a reinforced shoulder for tenacious lateral grip while cornering. Unlike many summer-only tires, the Continental ExtremeContact Sport 02 is covered by a 30,000 mile warranty. With a tough and stable polyester casing, two steel belts, and a nylon cap ply layer, the ExtremeContact Sport 02 gets a SimpleScore of 8.5 for longevity.

3. Pirelli P Zero All Season Plus 3 - Best UHP All-Season tire

The Pirelli P Zero All Season Plus 3 is a UHP all-season tire that’s designed to deliver consistent traction year-round along with performance that’s immediate and sharp. The P Zero All Season Plus 3 offers durability and great wear properties, with a new polymer-enhanced tread formulation, a polyester casing, a twin steel belt package, and polyamide reinforcement plies for a 50,000 mile limited manufacturer tread life warranty. In light of that, we give the Pirelli P Zero All Season Plus 3 a very respectable SimpleScore of 8.9 for longevity. Dependable traction year-round is a strong point with this tire, with an asymmetric tread pattern that’s designed to put more rubber in contact with the road thanks to its flat footprint and a minimal void area. A variety of sipes, including full-depth 3D sipes in select tread blocks, help deliver great performance in wet or wintry conditions, for an outstanding SimpleScore of 9.9 for traction. Larger pitch-sequenced tread blocks and reinforced shoulders give the Pirelli P Zero AS Plus steering response, braking, and cornering for a SimpleScore of 9.9 for handling.

4. Firestone Firehawk Indy 500 - Great UHP tire

Next up is another great choice in a summer/UHP tire, the Firestone Firehawk Indy 500. The Firehawk Indy 500 comes to the game with an overall average SimpleScore of 8.2, with SimpleScores of 8.7 for handling, 7.6 for longevity, and 8.5 for traction, so let’s unpack that all a little bit. The Firehawk Indy 500 is designed for steering and handling that are very light and nimble, with an advanced rubber formulation, wide shoulders for added rigidity, and an asymmetric tread. Firestone’s innovative Pulse Groove tread design helps this tire deliver better control and resistance to hydroplaning on wet roads. The Firestone Firehawk Indy 500 is designed as a summer/UHP tire but is a bit more versatile in its performance than many tires in that category.

5. Toyo Proxes R88R - Best Competition tire