New Shoes for my Polestar 2: Pirelli Cinturato WeatherActive

I bought my 2021 Polestar 2 a year ago with about 25K miles. It still had the original tires on it, Michelin Pilot Sport All-Season 4, that were still in good condition.

But after a year and about 10,500 miles, the tires had reached about 3/32” tread depth and were ready for replacement at nearly 36,000 miles. I know people like to complain about EVs wearing out tires quickly, but I think that 36K miles on the original tires is pretty good. My 2016 Corolla wore through its original tires in fewer miles.

I knew tires were in the cards for early this year, so I had been researching replacements. You might think that I should get EV tires for an EV, but that is just not necessary. Sure, EV tires will likely be more efficient and improve range, but you will almost certainly get worse performance and traction.

I live in Maine and we do get our fair amount of terrible winter driving conditions with cold, snow, ice and slush. After reading and watching reviews at Tire Rack and TyreReviews, I decided that I didn’t want to get another set of Pilot Sport tires and instead wanted an all-weather tire.

My Polestar 2 was originally from the New Jersey area, which made more sense for the Michelin Pilot Sport All-Season 4 tires, but those tires really did not behave well in any sort of snow. It turns out for Maine, an all-weather (3PMSF, 3-peak mountain snowflake) tire is more appropriate than an all-season tire.

Although you might think the names mean the same thing, an all-weather tire is better rated for snow conditions, whereas an all-season tire is probably best for areas that can get cold, but don’t really see much, if any, snow.

To be fair, I work from home so I don’t usually need to head out in the snow, but you never know and I really wanted something that would give me confidence if I did have to do so.

We had previously put Michelin CrossClimate 2 tires on my wife’s RAV4 (and that Corolla), and although they are great tires and very popular I didn’t really want them on my Polestar 2.

I had a few reasons and one was just vanity: I didn’t like the way they looked with their odd tread pattern. The tires are also rather pricey and I was concerned about noise.

After watching and reading more reviews I decided to get the Pirelli Cinturato WeatherActive tires. These all-weather tires had really good general-purpose performance, but also worked well in the snow. By all accounts, they are not as good as the CrossClimate 2 in the snow, but I felt that their performance in wet/dry and general quietness were worth that tradeoff.

At the end of March I ordered a set of these Pirelli’s from a local tire shop (Sullivan Tire). The tires were $290 each with a $100 discount when buying four, getting them down to $265. That’s a better price than Tire Rack so I can’t complain! (The CrossClimate2 were $318 each, over $200 more for all four.)

One thing that is unusual about Polestar 2 is that the wheels in the back are wider than the ones in the front. I had to give the shop specific instructions to make sure they put the wheels back in the same positions. I even marked them with some white duct tape so I could verify afterwards!

Sullivan Tire did a great job, installing the tires in about two hours. They also checked the alignment and did do a slight alignment to the front passenger wheel, which they did for free!

I did check and adjust the tire pressures at home (after giving them a chance to cool). I did need a few pounds of pressure in three of the tires to get them up to spec.

The next day I did get a tire pressure warning in the driver console, but I went to the Car Status screen in the infotainment to Store Pressures and that quickly went away.

I think the tires look pretty great:

And here’s a closeup:

After putting about 100 or so miles on these tires, there are several things I really like about them.

First, is that they have dramatically improved the ride. I always felt my Polestar 2 had a rather stiff ride, even though I don’t have the Performance Pack. I just figured that was the way this drove, being a sports sedan. Well, with these tires things have softened dramatically. The ride is so much more comfortable. The Michelin tires would crash and bang over bumps and potholes, but these Pirelli tires are smooth and quiet.

And speaking of quiet, they are also seem quieter in general with less road noise.

And lastly, they seem to have tighter handling. Steering feels more responsive with them.

Certainly a lot of these things could be just because they are newer and have more tread on them than the Michelin’s had from 25K-36K, so I guess we will see as I put more miles on them. But so far, I am incredibly pleased.