My wife's CRV is listed to use 0w20, I've heard nothing but bad things about all the engine failures with engines using this viscosity. It's been said that these vehicles in Europe use 5w30 with great success. I've also read that the 0w20 oil is to achieve C.A.F.E. standards. What is the consensus here about switching over to 5w30 as opposed to the factory fill of 0w20?? Has anybody done this with positive oil analysis? BTW, we live in Florida where it doesn't get that cold in the morning, well except for this week, going down to a shivering 29 degrees.
2025 Honda CRV 2.0 oil recommendation
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Patman
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Where exactly have you heard about engine failures due to 0w-20? It’s just not happening.
I have a 2016 Civic with that 2.0 engine and it’s approaching 300,000 km using only 0w-20. I’ve actually never heard of a single 2.0 engine failure let alone one failing because of the viscosity of the oil. Wherever you’ve been hearing about all these failures, it’s completely wrong
I have a 2016 Civic with that 2.0 engine and it’s approaching 300,000 km using only 0w-20. I’ve actually never heard of a single 2.0 engine failure let alone one failing because of the viscosity of the oil. Wherever you’ve been hearing about all these failures, it’s completely wrong
If you have the 2.0, then 0w20 is fine 
If you had a 1.5T turbo, then you would need 5w30, along with premium gas.
If you had a 1.5T turbo, then you would need 5w30, along with premium gas.
Winter go with 0w30 Amsoil or @High Performance Lubricants or Mobil 1 0w30. Summer.. Pennzoil Ultra Platinum 5w30
My Passat uses 0W-20; no problems!
The 1.5 engine has some built in flaws. The 2.0 does not and is among the best engines in the world. You can certainly use the two oil grades you mentioned, but the Honda naturally aspirated four cylinder engines will provide hundreds of thousands of smooth miles on 0W20. Even if you had a 1.5, I think that the jury is out on whether a different grade of oil helps with fuel dilution and head gasket blow-through. What definitely would be of benefit is an immediate oil change, and moving to a 5,000 mile OCI while using the best oil that you are comfortable paying for and a decent filter (at every change). Lately, for me that means Pennzoil Ultimate Platinum and OEM Honda filters. Best wishes with this great vehicle choice.
Ah yes, the ever present 0w-20 Honda 2.0 engine failures.
Just last week, I was talking to my accountant about our 2025 taxes and he brought it up too. He was like “yah, yah, yah, W-2’s, but what about these Honda engine failures, right?”
Seems to be all anyone talks about these days.
Just last week, I was talking to my accountant about our 2025 taxes and he brought it up too. He was like “yah, yah, yah, W-2’s, but what about these Honda engine failures, right?”
Seems to be all anyone talks about these days.
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The early 1.5T's had some issues with camshaft wear but this has been corrected.
You can't fix headgasket designs with oil specs. So if headgaskets are your concern, oil is the wrong place to look.
For a hybrid, you want to minimize restart wear. Which means a very good, high moly boundary wear formulation and at least the 800ppm limit on phosphorus via ZDDP. Many hybrids won't have oil temps hot enough to really let ZDDP do its thing effectively, so moly becomes even more important.
A 40 grade will have less restart wear when hot. This is because it not only has a thicker residual film, but because 40 grades are not ILSAC or Energy Conserving, so they aren't formulated for extra low HTHS and can have less VII overall (higher VII tends to push HTHS down, a good thing for mpg oils).
But more important than viscosity is choosing an oil with esters for good metal affinity at startup and moly for good lower temperature boundary lubrication.
Even the basic PCMO grade oils from HPL are far superior to most oils for hybrids because they have the ester+moly formulation that provides superb protection during both cold and hot restarts, and this additive content is far more important than running a particular viscosity.
I advocate 40 grades for many commercial consumer oils because you can get a less constrained formulation. But it's a lot less effective than having a known superb additive strategy like HPL uses. IN other words, a 20 grade HPL will outperform a 40 grade shelf oil because it has the right additives and blend.
So, in order of protection for a hybrid:
1) HPL PCMO in any viscosity you want
2) Euro 0w oils (higher SAPS preferred)
3) about everything else.
Especially for a hybrid that tends to run cool oil temps, thicker viscosity isn't that helpful (though it never hurts in warm climates). Rather, it's about the overall blend and how the additives work in that application.
For a hybrid, you want to minimize restart wear. Which means a very good, high moly boundary wear formulation and at least the 800ppm limit on phosphorus via ZDDP. Many hybrids won't have oil temps hot enough to really let ZDDP do its thing effectively, so moly becomes even more important.
A 40 grade will have less restart wear when hot. This is because it not only has a thicker residual film, but because 40 grades are not ILSAC or Energy Conserving, so they aren't formulated for extra low HTHS and can have less VII overall (higher VII tends to push HTHS down, a good thing for mpg oils).
But more important than viscosity is choosing an oil with esters for good metal affinity at startup and moly for good lower temperature boundary lubrication.
Even the basic PCMO grade oils from HPL are far superior to most oils for hybrids because they have the ester+moly formulation that provides superb protection during both cold and hot restarts, and this additive content is far more important than running a particular viscosity.
I advocate 40 grades for many commercial consumer oils because you can get a less constrained formulation. But it's a lot less effective than having a known superb additive strategy like HPL uses. IN other words, a 20 grade HPL will outperform a 40 grade shelf oil because it has the right additives and blend.
So, in order of protection for a hybrid:
1) HPL PCMO in any viscosity you want
2) Euro 0w oils (higher SAPS preferred)
3) about everything else.
Especially for a hybrid that tends to run cool oil temps, thicker viscosity isn't that helpful (though it never hurts in warm climates). Rather, it's about the overall blend and how the additives work in that application.
According to the Honda CR-V forums, they are seeing more head gasket issues with the later models featuring the 1.5L turbo, 2022 and 2023. These vehicles have higher miles than the average 3 year old vehicles.
the 2.0L engine is a solid engine. I would stay with the recommended oil viscocity, 0w-20. There are no issues with the CR-V with regard to the oil viscocity.
No one knows that 2.0T Honda engine is less prone to head gasket failures than 1.5T.
There are a lot more 1.5T sold vs 2.0T, so statistically speaking you will hear more complaints in the forums for 1.5T than 2.0T.
Running higher octane might reduce headgasket failure by reducing chance of pre-ignition.
I have to edit this post..........I was mistaken, her engine is the 1.5 turbo. But the same question will apply, will it help longevity switching to 5w30? Did I read above that these engines have head gasket issues??
You will always have lower wear with increased HT/HS, and it will help to mitigate the issues with fuel dilution.
A $35 spectrographic analysis (especially the way it's used here) will not be able to show that. Comparative wear and quality analysis between oils requires laboratory tests to isolate the one minor variable of the oil. Cheap UOA will never do this unless you're comparing to orange juice or beer.
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The 1.5 is one of those rare Hondas that's been unimpressive in reliability. The Headgasket is the primary failure you hear about.
Honda put some thin grooves between the siamesed bores in these engines, and that seems to be the main contributor.
The 1.5T is almost 10 years old now. It seems odd that Honda (seemingly) hasn't made improvements by now to solve the head gasket issues. Or, they are not nearly as frequent as people on auto forums make them out to be.