The Dodge Charger HEMI has the highest rate of whole-vehicle theft claims among 2016-18 models.

The BMW 3-series sedan has the lowest rate of whole-vehicle theft claims among 2016-18 models.

Absent from the most-stolen list is any version of the Cadillac Escalade, which previously dominated the HLDI’s rankings of vehicles popular with thieves. Part of the reason is that the large luxury SUV now has more competition in that category, including from the Infiniti QX80 and the Land Rover Range Rover, vehicles that are now among the most stolen.

The HLDI said that Escalade owners also are likely benefiting from enhanced security features that go beyond the ignition immobilizers that most of today’s vehicles have in order to prevent them from being started without a proper key. Standard immobilizers were not enough to prevent the Escalade from being frequently stolen, so Cadillac added more antitheft features beginning with the 2015 model year. They include glass breakage sensors, motion detectors, and an inclination sensor that triggers an alarm if someone tries to take the wheels off, tow the vehicle, or lift it onto a flatbed truck.

“The models most likely to be stolen tend to be powerful, pricey, or pickups, but vehicle theft is also a crime of opportunity,” said the HLDI’s senior vice president, Matt Moore. “Better security features on all vehicles would be the best way to address the problem.”

By looking at claims per insured vehicle year, the HLDI’s theft reports allow people to compare the relative risk of each vehicle. In contrast, other most-stolen-vehicle lists report raw numbers of thefts and are dominated by the most common vehicles on the road, the HLDI said.

The HLDI’s whole-vehicle theft report differs from its standard theft report, which looks at all theft claims, including those for stolen vehicle parts or for items taken from a vehicle.

To isolate whole-vehicle claims, the HLDI looked at the amounts paid for total losses under collision coverage, which is generally the residual value of the vehicle. If the payment associated with a theft claim is around the same as would be expected for a total loss under collision coverage for the same vehicle of the same age, it is considered to be a whole-vehicle theft claim.

As with all HLDI analyses, the results in the whole-vehicle theft report are adjusted to account for the effect of demographic and geographic factors.

Vehicles with the highest claim frequencies for whole-vehicle theft

2016-18 model years

2016-18 model years