Before You Pay For Car Service, Know This Chain Got The Lowest Customer Satisfaction Scores In 2026

Vehicle maintenance is a necessary part of owning a car, but how much you pay and the level of service you get can depend entirely on where you go. Just as you may save money and stress by avoiding a certain car model with many customer complaints, it can pay to know how pleased your fellow drivers are with different automotive shops. According to JD Power's seventh-annual U.S. Aftermarket Service Index (ASI) Study, Mavis Discount Tire — also known as Mavis Tire & Brakes — scores dead last in customer satisfaction. The national chain also scored terribly in tire replacement, coming in last. The JD Power study based its rankings on a 1,000-point scale (accumulated from the responses of 10,572 vehicle owners), and, unlike most other full-service mechanic brands that were included, Mavis scored under 800. 

A deeper dive of Mavis' performance, via Consumer Reports (CR), reveals a larger pattern of disappointment. Mavis sits near the bottom of Consumer Reports' 2026 tire center rankings, with only Pep Boys and Walmart ranking worse. Don't be fooled by the discount name either, as Mavis' prices were found to be mediocre at an average $187.38 per tire, plus installation fees. While the CR list only looks at tire services, Mavis performs a host of other basic vehicle maintenance as well. If you have the car brand that costs more in maintenance, it could be in your best financial interest to pick somewhere else to take your vehicle.

If you're looking to avoid Mavis for auto service, it may be harder than you think depending on where you live. Mavis has over 2,100 locations, making it one of the biggest auto mechanic chains in the United States. This amount expands to over 3,500 if you include Midas, which Mavis acquired in 2025 – as well as the several other brands under the Mavis umbrella. Mavis' footprint is poised to get even bigger thanks to a June 2026 announcement that the company will buy rival Pep Boys for $700 million. But does this mean that you're bound to get poor service at any Mavis-owned location? Not necessarily. 

While opting for well-known name brands can cost you more, customer satisfaction ratings are often highly individual and tied to personal experiences at specific locations — especially considering many of these kinds of automotive shops are franchises with different owners. Also, both Midas and Pep Boys performed better than Mavis in JD Power's 2026 survey, with the three still counted as separate brands. So, whether or not your Pep Boys' customer experience will suffer under Mavis' leadership remains to be seen. That said, it may be best to consider each individual location separately, rather than assuming a name brand will help or hurt the experience.