How Wide Can My Tires Be On Honda Accord?
A tire and wheel combination isn’t just about looks as it can affect your car’s performance, safety, and efficiency to a great extent. So, if you want to lower your fuel efficiency, the best thing you can do is go for lightweight wheels and a set of relatively narrow tires with low rolling resistance. On the other hand, if you want more traction and stability, a set of low-profile wheels and wide tires are your best option.
The Honda Accord isn’t a performance car from the factory, but many people tune and customize their Accord models in order to make them drive better. So, how wide can my tires be on Honda Accord? If you are interested in buying a new set of tires for your Honda Accord, now is the right time to check out our Top 11 Best Tires For Honda Accord article.
How Wide Can My Tires Be On Honda Accord?
It depends on a few different factors, primarily the fitment and the size of your rims. However, fitting up to 20 millimeters wider than stock on an OEM rim is widely regarded as the safety standard. This means that fitting tires that are more than 20 millimeters wider on stock rims is not always a good idea and therefore should be avoided.
If you want to go wider than that, you will have to invest in a set of new rims. If you increase rim width by about half an inch, the tire section width will also change by approx. 2/10”. Before you decide to mount wider tires on your car, be sure to consider all the changes that come with wider tires. Also, you need to make sure that the wider tires can actually fit inside the car’s wheel wells.
What Are The Benefits Of Wider Tires?
- Better traction and grip
- Better handling and cornering
- Better braking performance
- Aesthetics
Do Wider Tires Offer Better Traction?
By widening the tire section, you are essentially increasing the available tire contact patch which means that the car distributes its weight better on the road. This primarily benefits traction and grip which means that the car has a greater surface with which it hangs onto the pavement. This means that the pressure per square inch is lower and therefore the car communicates with the road better.
If you own a high-horsepower car, especially one with a RWD system, you will immediately feel the benefits as the car will not spin its wheels after takeoff. These benefits are primarily reserved for dry environments which means that wet roads aren’t exactly the best for wide section tires.
Do Wider Tires Offer Better Cornering?
Wider tires are comparatively larger objects than narrower tires which means that they are better at cornering as well because the tire is more durable. While turning, the car transfers its weight onto the outer tires which need to be stronger in order to corner better. As such, wider tires are beefier and can withstand cornering stresses better which leads to better handling.
Do Wider Tires Offer Better Braking Performance?
A set of wider tires also improves your stopping power because the car now essentially has bigger claws to grab onto the road while braking. The wider the tire, the easier the tire is going to resist forward motion which leads to improved stopping performance.
Do Wider Tires Look Better?
Even though everyone wants their car to perform better, the main reason why people opt for wider tires is that they look nicer. Just imagine an athlete with skinny legs as that is basically the same look you get if you mount skinny tires on a fast car. Indeed, beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but pretty much every beholder agrees that wider tires are the way to go.
What Are The Drawbacks Of Wider Tires?
- Worse fuel economy
- Slower acceleration
- Software corrections
- The price
Do Wider Tires Affect Gas Mileage?
An increase in rolling resistance that comes with a set of wider/larger/heavier wheels will negatively affect your fuel economy. Sure, these discrepancies aren’t all that big, but these do add up in the long run. The smaller the contact patch, the easier it is for the engine to turn the tire. So, if you mount wider tires, your engine will have to exert more energy to turn them.
Do Wider Tires Affect Acceleration?
We have already talked about wider tires offering more traction which benefits acceleration, but we also need to mention that wider tires are heavier and thus the car needs to work harder to accelerate. So, even though you are able to put the power down more continuously, your car will work harder to put the power down in general.
Do Wider Tires Affect The Speedometer?
Whenever a car leaves the factory, the engineers make sure that the car’s software side of things is properly calibrated for the tire and wheel size the car comes with. So, if you decide to change any of this, you will have to re-calibrate your speedometer and a few other software features. How systems such as ABS, ESP, and traction control respond is also tied to the size of your wheels. As such, these need recalibrating as well.
Do Wider Tires Cost More Money?
Wider tires use more material during production which inevitably increases production costs. Moreover, wider tires are heavier which leads to more expensive shipping costs as well. The cost of installing wider tires also tends to be more expensive and so do all the accessories that come with them. All in all, wider tires are always more expensive than narrow tires.
Conclusion
At the end of our “How wide can my tires be on Honda Accord” article, we can safely say that you can mount tires that are up to 20 millimeters wider on an OEM rim if the fitment is correct and if the wheel and tire combo sits comfortably within the wheel wells. If you go over the 20-millimeter threshold, you will alter the way your car drives and how safe it is which certainly isn’t something you should do.
Either way, you ought to educate yourself about all the benefits and drawbacks that come with a set of wider tires as you don’t want to find out about these after you mount wider tires on your car. If you want to know more about wheel and tire combinations, be sure to check out our comprehensive Wheel and Tire Setup Guide: Everything You Should Know.