Subaru, which has quietly grown its sales in the U.S. over the last 10 years, is now winning praise for the quality and reliability of its cars and crossover utility vehicles.

The Japanese automaker climbed three spots, to second place, in Consumer Reports' 2016 Brand Report Card, released Tuesday.

The annual ranking of auto brands, which is based on the predicted reliability of dozens of models and road tests, is considered to be one of the most important independent evaluations of vehicles. (See the full list below).

"When you drive a Subaru, they actually drive extremely well. They ride well, they handle well, they are reliable, they do have a lot of the features including a lot of advanced safety features that you really only normally see in higher-priced cars," said Jake Fisher, Consumer Reports' director of automotive testing.



The only brand to top Subaru was Audi, which also rose three spots from last year's rankings. Both automakers had 100 percent of their tested models recommended by Consumer Reports.



The ratings organization this year changed its methodology, including giving higher weighting to models that come with collision-mitigation systems, such as auto emergency brakes. This helped Audi, in particular.