So is there a best battery consensus? Interstate, Optima, Duralast??

Walmart AGM

Buy once/cry once

Batteries like anything have jumped in price

[img]https://i5.walmartimages.com/asr/58...=2000&odnWidth=2000&odnBg=FFFFFF[/img]

I put a Costco Interstate in my Taco.
Works

Gave up on Interstate. Last 2 barely made it to warranty.

I like the Napa line of batteries. I think they are Exides.

My new 2018 4Runner would go dead if I left the lights on a bit. In 2019 the dealer said battery was not covered, and it had a typical dealer price. So I replaced it with a higher amp walmart battery, and had zero issues since.
Had a walmart battery in my 2014 outback for 2 years, and it also is reliable.
Same with my 2001 Corvette with the typical parasitic draw. I killed that battery many times and it kept on taking a charge for years. I did eventually kill it, replaced it with a new walmart battery before I sold it. Prior to that I had a $$$ optima AGM, from sears, and it killed that pretty quick. Sears jacked me on the warranty, and that was the last time I entered a sears.

MOst automotive batteries are made by one or two manufacturers in the US.

Walmart's Everstart brand is made by Clarios, formerly known as Johnson Controls. They make more than 50% of the US aftermarket batteries. Most of the rest are made by Exide or East Penn.

A few years ago at work I asked a few team members about their visit to JC for starter batteries. They said that the production line split towards the end. One side got Interstate stickers, the other got Duralast (or some other store brand).

The battery warehouse where we get our batteries has a rack full of sticker rolls. They just grab a roll of whatever the company that bought a pallet or batteries wants them labeled as and then slap em on. Or sometimes they forget to and we get a bunch of batteries that just have the size and ratings on the top. We call em and they come over and slap labels with our company name on them.

I wouldn't worry too much about brand, get one with the correct size and CCA ratings and keep them charged and you should be good for 5-6 years or more.

Thanks, I learned some things about batteries I did not know. I think I'll go with 358Norma's advice.

All I can tell you for sure is avoid an O'Reilly brand battery. I believe they are Super Starts.

Bought one for my daily driver Feb '22. September '22 had a bad battery. Brought it in and they were going to charge me 25-30 bucks for my warranty replacement and their reasoning was "Inflation". Boy I was pissed off, charged it to my CC and disputed it and won.

I haven't used a Costco starting battery. However, I have 6V golf cart batteries in our camp trailer. The Interstate GC batteries Costco sells are not the same as the ones sold at the Interstate stores. Look at the labels. Power storage in deep cycles is measured as Reserve Capacity, RC. This is the number of minutes a fully charged battery at 80 ° F will discharge 25 amps until the battery drops below 10.5 volts. The RC on Costco's version is about 110 min. On the green top Interstates, RC is over 400 min. That's a huge difference. They'll cost 50% more but give you 400% more storage.

Huh. This shows a RC @ 25A of 383 minutes.

2018 and already needing a battery!
That means I am likely to be really unhappy in the near future!