THE BEST USED CARS YOU CAN BUY

Our annual Used Car Awards can help you choose the right car by revealing the stars in nine popular categories and an overall winner, plus the best warranty

- Photography: John Bradshaw

WITH SALES GETTING back to pre-pandemic levels, the used car market is experiencing a period of robust health. This is a good time to sell a car, when demand is high. But that also means prices are likely to go up from here, so there's no better time to buy your next used car.

Petrol remains the dominant fuel type, but 2024 saw sales of used electric vehicles (EVs) grow by 40% year on year. However, that increase in demand was at least partly fuelled by the fall in used EV prices that had occurred during the previous couple of years. The prices of EVs from some well-known brands, including Tesla, have sunk to unbelievably tempting levels.

Despite this, the biggest-selling used cars were much more conventional; the combustion-engined Ford Fiesta, Vauxhall Corsa and Volkswagen Golf hatchbacks were the top three. What's more, most people still bought their used cars in relatively conservative colours – black and grey being the most popular.

So, which cars should you be buying? Here, in our annual awards, we've made things easier for you by selecting one car in each of the most popular categories that we believe offers all the factors we look for in a used car. It should, of course, be a good car to start with – one that fulfils its intended brief, whether it's a sports car or an SUV. It should do what it does better than its closest competitors.