Michelin Latitude Tour Review & Rating for 2024

There’s a reason why Michelin, which has been making tires all the way since 1889, is the second-largest tire manufacturer in the world. It has been making quality, durable tires for all sorts of vehicles and shows no signs of slowing down after almost one-and-a-half century of its inception.

Having said that, like other tire makers, Michelin also has its fair share of dodgy models over the years. These were tires that didn’t do what they claim to do, and so their manufacturer had no choice but to recall them to save its reputation.

So what can we say about the Michelin Latitude Tour? Is it one of those models which make the user immediately regret their purchase? Or is it what it claims to be: an all-season tire which you can keep on using for years underneath your vehicle?

To find out the answer to these questions, we reviewed this tire. Read on to know what we found.

Michelin Latitude Tour Review: Test Drive

What do all the above-mentioned features mean in real terms? Do they make their presence felt in real-life conditions? To have a foolproof answer to these questions, we took the Michelin Latitude Tour on a test drive.

Treadwear and Durability

Of all the Michelin tires we have taken out for a test drive, only a few of them come close to rivaling the 105,000 km treadwear warranty of the Latitude Tour. This gives us a glimpse of how much trust Michelin reposes in the durability of this tire.

Unfortunately, the confidence is misplaced.  Like other users who have used it before, we are adamant that this tire’s treadwear could be better. And we aren’t saying it after ignoring other factors which might affect tread life, like your driving style, the roads you drive on, and how well you maintain the tire.

Instead, for the one month that we carried this tire through county roads, we made sure that nothing from our side could give it an excuse to justify its treadwear. Still, as our experts concluded at the end of the testing period, the tread life of the Latitude Tour could be definitely better.

Dry Performance

Although we were disappointed at this model’s less-than-stellar treadlife, its dry performance lifted our spirits. Our main focus was on checking this tire’s fuel efficiency as Michelin claims that the presence of Green X technology helps this tire decrease your vehicle’s fuel consumption.

Michelin is right on this count. Compared to our previous rides with other tires, this tire consumed 3% less fuel on a 1000mile trip. You might not think too high considering that it’s ‘only’ three percent but extrapolate it to this model’s shelf life, and the fuel savings start to sound way more significant.

As well as offering fuel economy, this tire offered extreme traction on dry roads and performed brilliantly when we were cornering or applying abrupt brakes to test its mettle. That means that if you drive on highways most of the time, you cannot go wrong with the Latitude Tour.

Wet Performance

There are two factors that help us differentiate tires who are made for wet roads from those who aren’t. First, average tires don’t have much gripping power, and so they skid on wet roads. Second, their capacity to channel water and prevent hydroplaning is, well, average.

Luckily, the Latitude Tour performed decently on both these counts. Thanks to its very wide tread widths, it encountered no problems when rolling on roads which had received heavy showers only a few minutes earlier and provided excellent grip.

Equally impressive was its performance under the rain. We deliberately maintained a higher-than-average speed to check whether it showed any signs of slippage – there were none. If anything, these tires’ performance on wet roads isn’t any different from how they roll on dry surfaces.

Noise and Comfort

Michelin is one of the few tire manufacturers who provide its models with dedicated technologies to fend off road vibrations and noise. It has equipped the Latitude Tour with Comfort Control Technology which, thanks to its computer-optimized tread design, fights road vibrations.

Hence the reason why none of the four passengers in our vehicle complained about vibrations during the journey. Similar was the case with road noise. Our journey mostly consisted of country roads, and apart from the loud honking of horns, there was nothing to wake one of our sleepy co-passengers up.

Snow Performance

As we were traveling on light snow, the Latitude Tour didn’t leave much to be desired. The moment ice became hard, however, the performance of this tire immediately made us aware that while good on light snow, it isn’t a dedicated winter tire.

Wondering why that’s the case? Remember its wide tread widths which increase this model’s traction on dry and wet roads? They are the culprits here. Their extremely wide size restricts the level of grip the Latitude Tour can provide on deeper snow.

To summarize, the Latitude Tour tires would perform well in areas with moderate winter conditions. However, the moment the snow becomes thick, you’d need to take out some real-winter tires (with flexible rubber compounds) to run an errand.