Should You Rotate Your Tyres, and How Often?
Front and rear tyres wear at different rates on most cars, and rotating them periodically is a simple way to even that out, extending the useful life of the full set rather than replacing them in a staggered, more expensive pattern.
Why front and rear tyres wear differently
On a front-wheel-drive car, the front tyres handle steering, most of the driving force, and most of the braking, which wears them noticeably faster than the rears. Left unrotated, front tyres can need replacing well before the rears are anywhere near worn out.
The typical rotation interval
Commonly recommended every 5,000 to 8,000 miles, or roughly at every other oil change if that's an easier schedule to remember. Some manufacturers specify their own interval in the handbook, worth following if given.
What rotation actually achieves
Moving tyres between positions, front to back and sometimes side to side depending on the pattern, spreads wear more evenly across all four, meaning they tend to need replacing together rather than in a staggered, more expensive pattern of replacing two at a time repeatedly.
When rotation matters less
Directional tyres, which are designed to rotate in one direction only, limit how they can be rotated, usually just front to back on the same side rather than crossed diagonally. Worth checking your tyres' sidewall for a directional arrow before assuming a full rotation pattern applies.
Check a car's MOT history for uneven tyre wear noted across past tests.
Check MOT history