Working with an experienced installer is central to having a positive solar experience. Horowitz offers these best practices for vetting companies: Get at least three bids. Start by looking at companies recommended by neighbors or others in your area who have had good experiences. Go local. Find companies that have already been established in your…
The best folding treadmills offer many of the same features as pricier nonfolding machines. That includes heart rate programs, where you choose a target heart rate zone and the treadmill adjusts its speed and/or incline to automatically let you reach that goal; heart rate monitoring, either via grips or a chest strap (the latter is…
Consumer Reports’ test engineers spend about 30 hours testing each dishwasher. To evaluate cleaning performance, dishes are put through a proprietary test that uses photo imaging to determine precisely how clean they are after a standard cycle full of dishes with baked-on food. For cleaning performance, we consider how well dishwashers clean dishes on both…
The primary benefit of a rotating car seat is that the portion of the seat that holds the baby, known as the shell, rotates on a separate base. While the revolving shell may not always come completely off the base (it depends on the model), its ability to swivel offers one key advantage: easier access for harnessing. …
That’s why Consumer Reports tests all the sedans on the market and gives them an Overall Score, which is a weighted composite of a vehicle’s performance in our road tests; the latest reliability and owner satisfaction results from CR’s exclusive Auto Surveys; the results from government and insurance industry crash tests; and the availability of automatic…
When you set up kids mode, you’ll be prompted to put in your child’s name and their birthday, which allows Amazon to recommend books appropriate for their age. You can make multiple kid profiles, but you’ll need a PIN or passcode to switch off kids mode and return to regular Kindle mode. I set up…
Three to four days in the fridge—that’s the max for cooked foods, says James E. Rogers, PhD, director of food safety research and testing at Consumer Reports. “That means no week-old turkey sandwiches,” he says. After that, their taste and safety may suffer. If you don’t think you’ll get through everything during that time, you…
“We’ve even seen models that give you the capability to convert some compartments from freezer to fridge and vice versa,” says Breann Chai, who oversees CR’s refrigerator testing. To help you find the best refrigerator for you, we organize our ratings for each subcategory by the width of the appliance. (After all, the best refrigerator…
2. A Tight-Fitting Mattress Any bassinet that you buy should come with a snug-fitting mattress. When the mattress is centered in the bassinet, you should see no gaps between the edge of the mattress and the bassinet walls any larger than one-half inch, or about a finger-width. “A mattress that doesn’t fit tightly may shift…
There are a few things to consider when shopping this time of year: Dealerships tend to be more eager to move leftover models (2025s) now because they have likely been financing them for a while, and they are eager to make way for the 2026s. This is to the shopper’s advantage, if 2025s are available….
