These features can be a bonus, but they are ultimately not required for a quality infant car seat. Installing the base of the SnugRide SnugFit 35 DLX is intuitive, with guides and instructions incorporated into the base itself. One such guide is a liquid-filled bubble level indicator (like a carpenter’s level), which shows you how much to adjust the foot of the base once it’s on your car seat.
It’s not confusing—and Clek has good videos online for how to install the seat (though we found the owner’s manual to be sufficient). If you’re planning to transfer the seat between positions or cars frequently in the rear-facing mode, then one of our other picks may be a better option. The Foonf does require more assembly than its counterparts, graco convertible car seat with a separate headrest, an anti-rebound bar, a base for rear-facing install, and manually threading harness straps. However, we didn’t find dealing with any of these pieces to be particularly onerous. The only thing that stumped us was how to remove the rear-facing base in order to switch the seat to forward-facing mode.
When you press down on the key and turn it clockwise, the bottom of the seat lifts up, opening to reveal the guts of the operation. You then weave both the lap and shoulder portion of the vehicle seat belt through the appropriate slots—they’re labeled for either the rear- or forward-facing position, depending on which you’re using. Finally, you push the seat bottom closed; you’ll know the lid is secure when you hear a satisfying click. Before selecting a model best suited for your needs, make sure to acknowledge the safety features and measurements to find the right fit for your family. For the car seat to properly install, measure the back seat of the car you will be using to determine how much room is available.
Because the Liing lasts for nine years before it expires—two years more than our top-pick seat from Graco and three years more than the Chicco KeyFit 30 or KeyFit 35—it’s the most hand-me-down-worthy of our picks. It also has a three-year warranty, if you register it within 90 days of purchase, or a one-year warranty, if you don’t. The sun canopy on the Liing is made from a stretchy material that unzips to expand, providing more coverage than the sunshade on any other infant seat we tested. At the rear of the shade is a peek-a-boo flap that opens to a mesh window, so you can check on your baby through the canopy. Note that in 2021, Clek issued a recall on the Liing concerning a canopy stay that could be forcefully broken and introduce a choking hazard.
We’ve installed the 4Ever in a number of vehicles over the years and discovered that this recline position can be a bit tricky because 80% of the 4Ever’s base must be on the vehicle seat. In addition, the entire base must be flat on the vehicle seat but there can be a gap between the back of the 4Ever and the back of the vehicle seat as long as the car seat is installed correctly with less than one inch of movement at the belt path. This seat works for babies ranging from 4 pounds up to 30 pounds or 30 inches; like our other picks, it can accommodate most preemies who are able to travel in a car seat.
Find car seats for your child by brand, or look up the details of a specific car seat model. However, it can be carried into the aircraft only when it is compact enough to fit into the overhead bin or under the seats in the airplane graco car seat (4). “The 4Ever DLX Grad 5-in-1 Car Seat is the first product on the market with five true modes of use, offering the versatility, customizability and longevity needed for first-time parents and growing families alike.”
Remove the top tether from the storage spot on the side of the seat’s shell and loosely connect it to the vehicle’s top tether. To install the 4Ever rear facing with the vehicle seat belt, makes sure that the lower anchors are stored in the forward facing storage locations on the seat’s shell, then set the car seat on the vehicle seat with the harness facing the back of the vehicle. We know that when rear facing, the space that a car seat takes up can be a challenge in tight spaces. In rear facing mode, the 4Ever is compact enough that it can work even in a small sedan. The headrest extends up from inside the shell so as the child grows and the headrest is extended, the seat still fits well in most seating positions. There are no restrictions on which of the first three recline positions must be used in rear facing mode.
It has one of the best crash test analysis results in the group, is easy enough to install, and offers many comfort features. With features like dual cup holders and a padded headrest, this seat is sure to please. It’s made for older kids who still need a booster, but it looks more grown-up. It has a 50-pound minimum, so it’s definitely geared towards older kids, and the 60″ height maximum is the highest that Graco has ever had. We love to see this as, in reality, we have found that only around 50% of kids pass the 5-Step Test at 57″.
In several ways, the Chicco KeyFit 35 is an even better infant car seat than its close relative, the Chicco KeyFit 30, our runner-up pick. But the KeyFit 35 has the added safety feature of an anti-rebound base, a European belt path (especially important for families that use their seat frequently without the base), and a convenient no-rethread harness. This seat is half a pound heavier than the KeyFit 30, though, and it’s slightly more expensive. Christina Szalinski, the current author of this guide, is a science writer with a PhD in cell biology whose reporting on health has appeared in Scientific American, Undark, and more.
The portion of the cover that’s most likely to be a casualty of a classic up-the-back-of-the-diaper blowout is actually a separate piece that you can unsnap, wash, and put back on without taking off the rest of the cover. We were not nearly as successful in installing this seat without the base—that is, using just the bucket portion of the seat and the car’s seat belt. Like the Chicco KeyFit 30, our runner-up pick, the SnugRide SnugFit 35 DLX uses an American belt-path configuration, which requires the seat belt to be routed through guides across the top front of the bucket, above the baby’s legs. This configuration makes it hard to get a super-secure install because it’s tough to push down on the seat with one hand and remove slack from the belt with the other—and the belt tends to slide through the guides if there’s any slack. Based on the criteria above, we narrowed our list of contenders to 12 infant car seats to test (or in some cases retest) in 2022.