Windshield Wiper Blade 2020 Test: Which Brand Wins?
In our 2020 test we compared 8 windshield wiper blade options head to head. Bosch ICON came out on top. See the measured results, the runner-up, the budget pick, and a link to the full test video. Shoppers cross-shopping windshield wiper blades, autozone windshield wipers, autozone wiper blades and windshield wipers for my car land here for the head to head that settles it.
Bosch ICON
Price shown in test: $18.94
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Rain-X Silicone Endura
Price shown in test: $24.97
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Aero Quality All-Season
Price shown in test: $16.98
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The quick take
The short version of why each pick lands where it does, built straight from the measured results.
“So, it's Bosch ICON for the win. In light rain conditions at 55 mph, the type of wiper blade I used didn't seem to make that much of a difference. However, in heavy rain conditions under slower speeds, it made a huge difference and the Bosch ICON really stood out.”
The measured results
Every number below is read straight from the test. Products are listed in the order they finished.
Country of manufacture
- 1Bosch ICON (ClearMax 365)
China
- 2Rain-X Silicone Endura
Indonesia
- 3Aero Quality All-Season
China
- 4PIAA Silicone Advantage
Indonesia
- 5Michelin Silicone
Vietnam
- 6Valeo 600 Series Premium
not stated on the packaging
- 7Trico NeoForm
Mexico
- 8AutoDrive High-Performance All-Season
Vietnam
1-year UV exposure condition
- 1Bosch ICON (ClearMax 365)
no visible deterioration of the coating
- 2Rain-X Silicone Endura
held up really well over the past year, seemed about the same as the new blade
- 3Aero Quality All-Season
coating in great shape when new, without fractures like the AutoDrive or Valeo; UV exposed blade coating appeared to be breaking down a little
- 4PIAA Silicone Advantage
held up about the same as the Rain-X over the past year
- 5Michelin Silicone
no visible deterioration despite UV exposure
- 6Valeo 600 Series Premium
coating similar to the AutoDrive when new; UV exposure caused the coating to break down some
- 7Trico NeoForm
definitely more faded than the AutoDrive after UV exposure; new blade coating looked new, UV exposed coating appeared to be wearing away
- 8AutoDrive High-Performance All-Season
protective coating on the new blade already showed small cracks; the UV exposed blade had many more cracks and had worn off in some areas
Noise (new vs UV exposed)
- 1Bosch ICON (ClearMax 365)
a very small squeak new, about the same amount of noise after UV exposure
- 2Rain-X Silicone Endura
definitely quieter than the Michelin silicone
- 3Aero Quality All-Season
a slight squeak new, UV exposed blade squeaking even more
- 4PIAA Silicone Advantage
new and UV exposed blades seemed to make about the same amount of noise as the Rain-X
- 5Michelin Silicone
quite a bit more squeaking compared to some of the other brands
- 6Valeo 600 Series Premium
definitely noisier than the AutoDrive when new; UV exposed blade about the same noise as the new blade
- 7Trico NeoForm
both new and UV exposed Trico blades were noisier than the AutoDrive
- 8AutoDrive High-Performance All-Season
no squeaks on the new blade, a slight squeak after a year of UV exposure
55 mph light rain sweep test
- 1Bosch ICON (ClearMax 365)
did the best of all brands, managed water well on both left and right sweeps while every other brand had some spillover
- 2Rain-X Silicone Endura
seemed to perform just as well as the Bosch ICON
- 3Aero Quality All-Season
did a great job on both sweeps, with a small amount of water spilling over near the end of the right sweep
- 4PIAA Silicone Advantage
performed very well, small amount of water spillover on the right sweep
- 5Michelin Silicone
experienced more water spilling over the top of the wiper than the Bosch ICON, but still did a great job
- 6Valeo 600 Series Premium
did a great job on both sweeps, less water spillover than the AutoDrive
- 7Trico NeoForm
performed very well on both sweeps, beam style design let very little water spill over compared to the AutoDrive in a direct side-by-side comparison
- 8AutoDrive High-Performance All-Season
performed well on the left sweep but water spilled over the top of the wiper element on the right sweep
Heavy rain at low/stopped speed test
- 1Bosch ICON (ClearMax 365)
did the best yet, no water streaks on the left sweep and very minimal water on the right sweep; beat Aero, Michelin, Rain-X, and PIAA head to head in direct side-by-side comparisons
- 2Rain-X Silicone Endura
did fairly well but left a streak on the sweep to the left and more water on the right sweep than the Bosch ICON
- 3Aero Quality All-Season
did the best so far at that point in the sequence (before Bosch ICON was tested), with just one water streak on the left sweep and less streaking than other brands on the right
- 4PIAA Silicone Advantage
performance looked nearly identical to the Rain-X, small streaking on the left and several streaks on the right; left behind more water than the Bosch ICON
- 5Michelin Silicone
did a pretty good job on the left sweep with a small amount of streaking, but not as well as the Bosch ICON on the right sweep
- 6Valeo 600 Series Premium
more water streaking than the Trico on the left sweep in a direct side-by-side comparison; both brands streaked quite a bit on the right sweep
- 7Trico NeoForm
quite a bit of streaking on the left sweep, a little less than AutoDrive on the right sweep, but more streaking near the bottom of the windshield than AutoDrive
- 8AutoDrive High-Performance All-Season
quite a bit of water streaking on the left sweep and even more on the right, the most streaking of any brand in the direct comparisons shown
How it was tested
- physical inspection of coating cracking/wear on a 1-year UV/roof-exposed blade versus an unused blade of the same brand
- noise level comparison, new versus 1-year UV exposed blade
- 55 mph light rain simulation using a truck-mounted rain simulator
- heavy rain simulation at low/stopped vehicle speed
“So, it's Bosch ICON for the win. In light rain conditions at 55 mph, the type of wiper blade I used didn't seem to make that much of a difference. However, in heavy rain conditions under slower speeds, it made a huge difference and the Bosch ICON really stood out.”
Data notes and caveats
Follow-up to an earlier windshield wiper video (hybrid-style blades tested previously performed poorly and were dropped from this retest). Rain performance was demonstrated largely through sequential head-to-head side-by-side pairings (e.g. Trico vs AutoDrive, Valeo vs Trico, Aero vs Trico, Bosch vs Aero, etc.) rather than one single simultaneous ranking, so the products list above orders all eight by a composite of the explicit winner/runner-up/budget-pick statements plus their relative showings across those pairwise heavy-rain comparisons; individual pairwise results are preserved in each product's own notes/results fields. Meta chapters only distinctly cover 2 of the 8 products (AutoDrive, Aero), so chapterMap is false.
