Tires Nokia or OEM Toyota

Ditto on the Nokians. On three Touaregs, I've had Dunlops, Pirellis, Falkens, Hankooks and am on my second set of Nokians. It's night and day.

Ride is better than the Michelins they replaced, and traction seems to be excellent, but at 50 lbs. inflation there was a little sidewall flex on fast cornering. Noise is roughly the same as the Michelins; maybe a little quieter. Gas mileage on the trip was 20.2

safest choice... the NOKIAN WR or WR G2 all-weather plus, year rounders that qualify for severe service emblem. the g2 has low rolling resistance. you can see about a 6% savings in fuel w/ this guy.

Nokian. Don't consider anything else. I have been using the Hakka RSi's for years and they are fantastic tires. With two differend FWD cars (current A3 and old Jetta VR6), I was passing sport utes which couldn't even get up hills in 4WD. The only issue is that the RSi's are very soft and don't last long. For that reason, I will go with the WR's which can be run all season. I would recommend going down to a 16" for potholes and such. Check with Rim and Wheel Works in Waltham. They are a Nokian dealer and can find you some good Rims. I bought some Ronals, but you can't buy them anymore, but in retrospect, I shoulda just gotten some cheap steelies for $50 a pop.

I run 155/80/13 Nokian Hakkapeliitta 5 and haven't been stuck yet. Those tires are the best hands down and are studdable.

Just got my Nokian Hakkapeliitta R's installed. Bring it on!

We've just been through the worst winter in many years and our matrix has done very well with the factory tires. If you're not going off road fwd is fine. The deepest unplowed snow I drove through was about 8 inches and I felt like that was pushing it.

From what I can tell (never owing a set) the Nokians are the best.

I'm at over 50,000 miles on my WR SUVs and still have a lot of treadlife left.

I had the WRs for 50 K until I got too many flats on them that they could not be repaired anymore. Anyway they were great for 50K and awesome in the snow.