For only the second time in the history of the J.D. Power initial quality study, a non-luxury brand has topped the list. Last year Porsche took home the dependability crown, but came in second this year to an unlikely competitor. For 2016, Kia ranks number one among automakers. According to Reuters, this year's study was the first one in 10 years where owners of non-premium brands reported fewer problems than owners of expensive cars. At the opposite end of the survey, Smart was at the bottom of reliability behind Fiat and Volvo.

The top 10 most reliable brands from the survey are in order as follows: Kia, Porsche, Hyundai, Toyota, BMW, Chevrolet, Buick, Lexus, Lincoln and Nissan. Another interesting result of this year's survey was that for only the second time ever, US brands earned better collective scores than their foreign rivals. For those of you who still think that Toyota is the most reliable brand, you may want to have a look at this latest J.D. Power survey. We said that Kia would need a sports car like the GT4 Stinger to compete with Lexus and Toyota, but it looks like Kia has already proven that it can win. At least in reliability, that is.