How the Digest works.
The American Auto & Driver Weekly Digest is a small ownership-cost desk. We do not review new cars, we do not attend press launches, and we do not accept vehicles on loan. We collect repair estimates, service contracts, insurance quotes and dealer invoices, work the arithmetic, and publish the result — including the times the expensive option was the right one. Some links earn us affiliate commissions; the arithmetic answers to readers, not to the payout.
Our Methodology
We start from a document, not a topic.
A repair estimate, a declarations page, a service-contract booklet, an F&I menu, a recall notice. If we cannot put a document in front of the arithmetic, the piece does not run.
We show every assumption.
Labour rate, parts source, mileage, deductible, jurisdiction. A cost figure with hidden assumptions is a marketing claim wearing a number's clothes — and it cannot be checked against your own quote, which is the only thing that matters.
We read the exclusions page first.
Coverage products are defined by what they refuse. We read the exclusions, the wear-and-tear language and the claims procedure before the brochure, because that is where a policy either helps you or doesn't.
We publish the negative result.
A large share of what we run concludes that the product is not worth buying, the repair is not worth making, or the difference is too small to act on. Those weeks are the reason to trust the other weeks.
We date everything and we don't quietly rewrite it.
Prices and coverage terms move. Every dispatch carries the date its figures were gathered. Material corrections are marked in the piece, not silently patched.
- We don’t review new cars or attend press launches.
- We don’t accept vehicles, parts or services on loan.
- We don’t publish a live recall list — a static page cannot stay current, and a stale safety notice is worse than none.
- We don’t sell insurance, service contracts, repairs or leads, and we are not a broker for anyone who does.
Some links on this site are affiliate links: if you buy coverage or a service after following one, we may be paid a commission at no extra cost to you. That relationship never sets a cost figure, a conclusion or an ordering. When our analysis says a product isn’t worth buying, we publish that — including for products we could have earned on.
We also run a free weekly email. It is supported the same way and carries the same disclosure.
Contact & corrections
Currently on Issue No. 83Found a figure that doesn’t match your invoice, or a contract term we read wrong? Write to desk@aadwd.com. Corrections that change a conclusion get marked in the piece with the date they were made. Privacy questions go to privacy@aadwd.com.
The issue, in your inbox, before you need it.
One email a week. The week’s costed-out job, one contract read end to end, and the single number we’d act on. No affiliate blasts dressed up as reporting.
- ▸ The week’s repair-cost worksheet
- ▸ One coverage contract, exclusions first
- ▸ What the desk would actually do