BMW M3 e46 Tires

On this page you will find the best real world tire reviews from owners of the BMW M3 e46.

Do you Drive a BMW M3 e46? Why not add your own tire review and help other owners pick the right tire! After all, who knows what the best tire for a M3 e46 better than the owners?

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Tire Reviewed Dry Grip Wet Grip Feedback Handling Wear Comfort
Michelin Pilot Sport PS2 (156) 94% 87% 88% 87% 80% 85%
Matador MP 46 Hectorra 2 (57) 88% 82% 79% 75% 85% 84%
Hankook Ventus RS4 (18) 87% 73% 85% 89% 86% 63%
Kumho Ecsta KU31 (165) 83% 75% 77% 76% 72% 74%
Radar Dimax R8 plus (16) 81% 76% 68% 68% 70% 66%
Nankang NS2 (211) 76% 58% 65% 62% 73% 62%
Primewell PZ900 (59) 72% 58% 54% 57% 57% 50%

BMW M3 e46 Tire Review Highlights

Writing about the Matador MP 46 Hectorra 2 given 36% (225-45-19-)
Driving on mostly country roads for 2000 spirited miles
The worst tire ever. Bouncy when I drive a corner with 80 km/h. The sidewall moves in the middle of the corner an I then need to steer again. There is no predictable driving characteristic, the tire gives steering feedback like driving on marbles. And on the motorway with 100Km/h in the wet the car went siedeways. I‘m driving a e46 m3 and a friend of mine put these on. I am now gonna change them for Michelin PS4s
tire reviewed on 2022-03-20 06:38:12
Writing about the Hankook Ventus RS4 given 94% (265-35-18-)
Driving on a combination of roads for 8500 spirited miles
I initially purchased a set of these tires years ago when I just started HPDE. Soon afterwards I decided to try other tires to see how they compared, including the Yokohoma Advan AD08R, Federal RS-RR, Hankook RS3, and Sailun R01.

From experience the Hankook RS4s outperform all of them. Turn in response is very fast, but also very sensitive so it can be slightly difficult for new inexperienced drivers to place the car. Once gotten used to however it becomes very predictable and this no longer becomes and issue. The tires have high lateral grip and the car remains very composed when on the limit, especially during high speed corners. The edge of grip is also quite easy to find and allows you to easily push it without any issues.

Wet grip is surprisingly amazing for an Extreme performance 200TW tire. Dont expect it to grip like PS4s but they exceed the wet grip levels of the other tires in this catagory.

Theres one thing that cannot be argued and its that these tires wear like iron. They are far better than the old Hankook RS3s, which were already great. They havent show any signs of overheating during spirited drives or track driving and grip does not fall off as they wear, so they make for an amazing HPDE/Endurance racing tire where you would be doing several sessions. Reviews by other users support this claim and rave about their wear characteristics.

Unless theres another tire out there that has the same handling characteristics, along with extremely low wear, I will be staying with these tires. This tire dominated the Time Attack event here in NSW Australia, with the majority using them over the Federal RSRR and AD08R. The winner, also using RS4s was only half a second off his best time, which was done on Advan A050 Semislicks (60TW)

tire reviewed on 2019-08-27 12:03:16
Writing about the Radar Dimax R8 plus given 52% (225-40-19-W)
Driving on a combination of roads for 1000 average miles
These tires constantly change shape as they warm up and cool down with speed changes. The vibration in the steering and noise when this happens is quite bad, though it goes away with more time driving. These tires are probably fine for low speed town driving, as this problem occurs when transitioning between motorway/freeway speeds and town speeds.
tire reviewed on 2018-01-17 17:19:36
Writing about the Michelin Pilot Sport PS2 given 87% (255-40-18-W)
Driving on a combination of roads for 10000 easy going miles
Great for high speed motoring.

Wear rate poor
tire reviewed on 2012-11-09 15:37:55
Writing about the Primewell PZ900 given 100% (225-45-17-)
Driving on a combination of roads for 300000 spirited miles
i fit over 100 primewell tires a week, they are a stunning tire, clearly you ppl dont know what your talking about, your comparing a primewell to a pirelli p zero which costs almost twice as much n moaning about gettin 15k plus outa them ? for the money they are great, if ur not happy with them put a set of "suntracks " on then you'll relaise what a poor tire really is !
tire reviewed on 2012-09-24 09:51:46
Writing about the Nankang NS2 given 41% (225-45-17-)
Driving on a combination of roads for 0 spirited miles
225 40 19 fitted to my M3 when i bought it, i wasn't very happy but i got on with it. Anyway i have just purchased some Goodyear Eagle Asymetric 2 and the first thing that struck me is how much wider they looked. I measured the Goodyears thread at 225mm i then measured the Nankangs 195mm no wonder they are so poor. The grip in the wet borders on dangerous the only good thing about them is that they wear out quickly so I could get rid of them earlier than expected.
tire reviewed on 2012-04-26 15:18:00
Writing about the Kumho Ecsta KU31 given 80% (225-45-17-)
Driving on a combination of roads for 5000 spirited miles
Had these by coincidence as my friend who owns a tire shop was left with them after someone had ordered them and not turned up. Got them at a really cheap price as the original customer had lost his deposit. Having owned this car for about 4 years I've always had contis m3 and to me there's not much in it. I have noticed that their not as good in the wet but I tend to drive carefully when it's raining as these cars are very tail happy. I have also changed the sizes so I'm running 275/35/19 rear and 245/35/19 front. The dry grip on these is phenomenal and I don't worry as much with regards to tire wear as these are less than half the price of the contis.
Stopping distance is on par and the wear rate is good too. I've done 5k miles and they still have 6mm on the rear whereas the contis would be roughly at 4mm at this stage.
I would recommend these to m3 owners as they are readily available and I like em so much Im going to install them on my evo fq320 when the current falken fk452's wear out.
Well done kumho! I can actually use the car for its purpose without worrying too much on tire prices.
tire reviewed on 2012-03-04 09:19:26
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