The best sites for buying a new or used car in 2026

Researching and buying a car has never been easier, thanks to the power of the internet. All the information required to make an informed purchase of a new or used car is available online: consumer car buying advice sites like The Car Expert; owners’ forums where other people discuss the good and bad points of their cars; manufacturer sites with all the technical information for the latest models; and sites where you can buy a new or used car online, without having to set foot in a car dealership.

The days of buyers rocking up at a dealership to kick a few tyres and be sold a car by a suited salesperson are pretty much over. Very few customers these days visit more than one dealership once they’re serious about buying a car, meaning they already know what they want before setting foot on a dealer’s forecourt.

If it’s a used car, a buyer can find out what the dealer has in stock, how vehicles are priced compared with the rest of the market, what they can get for their part-exchange and how much the purchase is going to cost if they opt for a finance deal – right from their computer or smartphone.

New car customers are similarly empowered. Simple online research will show which new cars a dealer has in stock, how much a personal contract purchase (PCP) or personal contract hire (PCH) deal will cost per month, and how much they can expect to receive for their trade-in.

Online car sales rocketed during the pandemic-enforced lockdowns, and all indications are that they’ve not really dropped off since. As such, we’ve been regularly updating our round-up of the top sites for you to buy a new or used car from the comfort of your own sofa. They’re not ranked, but we think they’re all worth a look.

One thing to note is that many of these sites are owned by companies trying to sell you something, rather than traditional listings where dealers pay for advertising space for their stock. They’ll earn commission on many of these sales, which can influence the results you see.

Please note that several of the companies listed below have an asterisk next to their name – they are commercial partners of The Car Expert, which means that we may get a small commission if you click through to their website. This doesn’t affect the deals you are offered or the price you pay; it just helps us to keep running our site.

Motors*

Although not quite the largest site in overall numbers (that honour remains with Auto Trader), Motors has made great strides in recent years with high-profile TV advertising campaigns that have successfully attracted visitors and stock to its recently refreshed site.

Motors was first to market with the ability to view by monthly payments and is supremely user-friendly, with the clever use of eye-catching graphics enabling buyers to select their criteria according to practicality, budget, road tax and creature comforts. Stock is sourced from a wide range of franchised and independent dealers from across the UK.

Like several other sites, Motors also provides car reviews on various models. However, we have found several of these to be out of date and not necessarily representative of the latest models.

Auto Trader*

Auto Trader has dominated the used car market for decades. Although the print publication was discontinued in 2013, the online version has evolved into the most visited car website in the UK, thanks to its use of cutting-edge online technology and its ability to attract the country’s biggest listing of used cars. It also lists new cars for most makes and models, although these won’t necessarily be in stock and ready for immediate purchase.

Despite new challengers arriving to chake up the marketplace, Auto Trader it is still the largest used car classifieds site in the UK. As a generalisation, cars that appear on various other sites will also be on Auto Trader, but there are lots of cars on Auto Trader that don’t appear anywhere else. Unlike most other similar sites, Auto Trader also has plenty of private sellers as well as car dealers.

Buyers can fine tune their search by vehicle size, fuel type, economy, emission levels and much more. There is also the ability to search by monthly finance cost, an essential function as car buying has moved increasingly to the PCP monthly payment model. Bear in mind that the finance payments are only examples, and may often require large up-front deposits to achive the monthly payments shown. For more information about car finance quotes, we have a comprehensive guide to understanding a PCP quotation.

The vast majority of cars (about 90%) are sourced from car dealers, although it remains a popular site for private sellers to advertise their cars.

RAC Cars*

RAC Cars is a fairly new addition to the RAC motoring portfolio, although the service is actually provided by Heycar (you’ll find them further down this list). As such, it looks and works exactly like the Heycar site.

The advantage of RAC Cars over using Heycar directly is the close integration with RAC’s other services, such as breakdown cover, servicing, and vehicle inspections.

Like Heycar, all the used cars listed are from traders (in this case, RAC-approved dealers), rather than private sellers, and all will be less than ten years old. You start by entering your postcode and then you can filter by price, new or used, body style and so on.

Also like Heycar, the site is very heavily skewed towards Volkswagen Group vehicles. Starting a search using our home postcode, we didn’t find a car other than an Audi or Volkswagen until page three of the site’s listings. We tried again, this time using a central London postcode as our address, and it took until page nine to find a car that wasn’t made by the Volkswagen Group.

Carwow*

Launched in 2013, Carwow it is aimed primarily at buyers in the market for a new car, with all stock provided by franchised dealers. You select your make, model and specification, then Carwow invites its partner dealers to make you an offer.

The search facility is easy to navigate with budgets ranging from £8,000 to over £80,000 and there’s plenty of consumer friendly advice on what to choose, complete with a large and growing car review section.

What differentiates Carwow is that once the buyer has chosen the model they are interested in, it’s then up to dealers to come up with the best price. This process is done by email and removes the need for haggling. A lot of the best deals are dependent on you taking the dealer’s finance, which can cause confusion for some buyers.

Carwow is growing its used car section, although it’s still small compared to some of the better-known used car marketplaces. It has also branched out into leasing and commercial vehicles.

Cazoo

This is the second coming of Cazoo, under new ownership by Motors (see above). This time around, there’s less focus on countless high-profile sporting sponsorships and more on providing a high-quality used-car marketplace.

The site claims to strip out the jargon from other car marketplaces (much like we do here at The Car Expert!) to ensure everything is clear and easy to understand.

There are more than a quarter of a million cars on the site, ranging from £10 parts-only wrecks to multi-million-pound supercars.You can narrow down your search with one of the more detailed filters of the sites on these pages, such as compliance with London’s ULEZ scheme or fast changing times for EVs.

Cazoo has a growing library of car reviews – which are not simply copied and pasted from Motors, but separate reviews. Although, as with Motors, you do need to check to make sure that the review is about the specific model you’re looking for, rather than an older or newer version.

Motorpoint*

Motorpoint sells ‘nearly new’ cars which all come with a warranty. As well as the website, Motorpoint has 21 stores across the UK.

Click on ‘browse cars’ and you’re taken to a page offering lots of options, from car makes, to bodies, lifestyle (4x4s, automatics), finance (how much per month) and ‘Economical driving’ (low cost, high mpg or hybrids).

You get a picture of each car, the outright price and monthly finance cost, and brief details including year, mileage, warranty length, and fuel type. Click through on ‘full details’ for your chosen model and you’re given more pictures, inside and out including one wheel, and a list of features.

Some details are assumed or taken from official manufacturer figures so it’s worth checking with the supplying dealer if you are taking your choice further. Some of the offered cars could have been rental or lease vehicles so again that’s worth confirming. You can reserve any car online for £149.

Motorpoint has made significant efforts to add and update its car reviews in recent years, which is a major area of improvement.

CarGurus

Launched in the UK in 2016 by the co-founder of TripAdvisor. After becoming the biggest online marketplace for used cars in the US, CarGurus is in a position to use online technology and tools that have been road-tested in the US and Canada to give UK car buyers a new online shopping experience.

All cars are sourced from franchised and independent dealers with the site offering price transparency as buyers are advised whether the price is in line with market values. It also shows any price drops and will tell you if the price reflects a “Great” or “Fair” deal.

What’s clever about the search facility is that cars are listed according to the accuracy of their market pricing as well as the reputation of the dealer, as car retailers cannot pay extra to be listed first.

PistonHeads

PistonHeads is one of the oldest and most popular motoring websites with a unique offering of an enthusiast marketplace, extensive news and the famous motoring forum, which has a staggering 20 million-plus posts from car enthusiasts. 

If you are looking for a special edition or rare vehicle, this is definitely a good place to look. From supercars to prestige editions to classics, there is a great choice and thew vehicle often have more extensive descriptions than found elsewhere. Be warned – you can spend hours in the forum reading up on your dream car from the enthusiast owners posting everything from common faults, favourite drives and rebuild photos.

Whilst there are fewer private cars on the site today, there is still a good mix of major dealer groups, independents and specialists that cater for this market. PistonHeads is a car buying website with a clear identify and differentiation. 

Heycar

Launched in 2019, Heycar is owned by Volkswagen Financial Services. Why is VW in the used car classifieds scene? Presumably to help its dealers more cars, and to direct more of your spending into their dealerships. There are no ads for third-party providers of finance, GAP insurance or other services, as you’ll see on Auto Trader, so it looks much cleaner.

Heycar only works with ‘selected dealerships’, which means it’s mainly big franchise operations rather than smaller local garages. All cars must also be less than eight years old and have covered less than 100,000 miles, which is exactly the sort of stock that franchised dealers carry anyway.

When you go to the Heycar site, you may notice that the list of ‘most popular makes’ starts off with Volkswagen, Audi, Skoda, Cupra and SEAT – all of which are Volkswagen Group brands. After that, it goes onto Ford, Vauxhall et al, but that probably gives you some indication of the site’s priorities…

Cinch

Cinch has a good selection of cars and multiple ways to narrow down your search. But if you’re not sure what you want, there’s a good ‘Help Me Choose’ tool on the site to help you make up your mind based on your driving preferences.

Cinch promises a 225-point quality check along with a 14-day ‘faff-free’ money-back guarantee. You can have your new car delivered anywhere in mainland UK within a two-hour timeslot. All its cars are under seven years old and have travelled fewer than 70,000 miles.

Finance packages are offered including monthly payments and HP and PCP deals and you can arrange to part-exchange a car as long as you have bought one of Cinch’s models online. There is a separate list of cars available for sale through approved dealers. This section looks a little disjointed mainly as the pictures of the cars are taken from different angles and don’t have that smart, uniform look of the rest of the site.

Vertu Motors

As one of the largest car (and van) retailers in the UK, Vertu is well placed to offer a wide range of both new and used vehicles. The company also handles MOT, servicing and repairs too, across its network of dealerships, providing everything you need to keep mobile.

There are plenty of makes and models to choose from, with each car carrying a photo and brief details such as engine and fuel type, body style, age, colour, miles covered, cash price and monthly PCP cost. It also states where in the country the car is being held. There’s also a ‘special offers’ section for both new and used cars.

Nationwide delivery is offered – it’s free up to 30 miles from the dealership – along with mechanical inspections, after-sales help and a customer service department for assistance with buying a car.

Sytner Select

Sytner Select is the new name for CarShop, operating from eight locations around the UK. Sytner is one of the UK’s largest dealer groups, and Sytner Select is the name for its multi-brand used car supermarkets.

Again the search engine is easy to use and the descriptions of each car extensive including around 30 photos. All vehicles come with a minimum six-month warranty, although many will still be under their new car warranty anyway.

If you see a car you like you can reserve it for a refundable £99. Sytner offers PCP and HP finance options, and there’s a home-delivery option – though the site warns that this might be subject to an extra charge.

*The Car Expert has commercial partnerships with Auto Trader, Carwow, Cazoo, Motors, Motorpoint and RAC Cars. If you click through to their websites and view any of their vehicles, or proceed to purchase a vehicle, we may receive a commission. This does not affect the price you pay.

Additional reporting by Andrew Charman, Curtis Hutchinson, Tom Johnston, Sean Rees and Lee Williams. Originally published in January 2018, most recently updated January 2026.