After reviewing hundreds of car seats, strollers, and child safety gear, I’ve spent enough money to realize when I’m getting a good deal and when I’m not. For me, Amazon is the place to be when it comes to making the most of my money, as every dollar I save shopping there helps me with the car seat review budget. My readers are always on the lookout for car seat deals, which is why I made the 2015 Black Friday car seat guide, and which is why I’m now making the guide to finding high quality car seats on Amazon for cyber Monday. Naturally, I’ve also included my reviews of these seats to help you with choosing between them.

If you’re like most people, you’ve got a lot of things on your plate as the holidays approach, and you might not have much time to find the best deals for everything. That’s where The Car Crash Detective comes in!

I searched through Amazon to find the best values for infant seats, convertible seats, combination seats, and booster seats, and included my personal thoughts on which of the seats are must-haves if you’re in the market in their respective categories. Have fun shopping and remember to rear-face until 4 if possible, forward-face until 8 if possible, and booster until your child passes the 5 step test.

Looking for more car seat reviews, recommendations, and tips on best practices? You can read all of my reviews of recommended car seats here. Friends in Canada, your recommended list is here.

The 4 Best Convertible Car Seats on the Market for Rear-Facing (Convertibles that Rear-Face to 50 pounds)

   

The Clek Fllo – Review Here, Buy Here.
The Diono Rainier – Review Here, Buy Here.
The Clek Foonf – Review Here, Buy Here.
The Diono Pacifica – Review Here, Buy Here.

When it comes to car seat safety, the science is clear: the safest position for all children is rear-facing. This goes for adults too, but until we have autonomous cars, rear-facing adult seats aren’t likely to occur. But we know that for children, the longer we can keep them rear-facing, the safer they are when traveling in cars, trucks, SUVs, and minivans, and the less likely they are to suffer serious or fatal injuries should crashes occur.

Unfortunately, many parents forward-face at 1 because that’s when the law allows us to turn our children around in most states (except for California, New Jersey, and Oklahoma), and most parents are forward-facing by 2 in the remaining states. However, rear-facing longer keeps children safer longer, and the aforementioned seats that allow children to remain rear-facing until they weigh 50 pounds are the best on the market.

The Dionos are the best value for the money if you’re looking to maximize the time you spend between buying car seats, as both offer longer forward-facing usable times than the Clek seats, and also include booster modes, even though those modes aren’t going to be useful for some kids. The advantage of the Clek seats is that they’re as narrow as convertible car seats get, which means it’s possible to fit them 3 across in just about any vehicle.

My favorite seat of the four is the Fllo, followed by the Rainier, but you can’t go wrong with any of them. No seats on the market will allow you to rear-face longer than these 4, and since rear-facing is the safest position we can place our children in whenever traveling with them in a vehicle, this is where you want to be if you can afford it in terms of child safety.

Each of these seats will allow you to rear-face the average child through the preschool years and likely into kindergarten, or age 5. They can then be turned forward-facing and used for varying amounts of time in that orientation; you’ll get much more time with the Dionos than with the Cleks, if you’re interested in getting a longer overall seat lifespan per child.

Remember to pick up the infant insert as well if you’re buying one of the Cleks and want to use them from the day you leave the hospital, otherwise you’ll need to wait until your child has head control and can sit up independently. Similarly, if you’re buying one of the Dionos, make sure to pick up an angle adjuster so you’ll have a reasonable amount of room when driving or sitting as a passenger in the front row of your vehicle.

The 4 Best Convertible Car Seats on a Modest Budget ( under $200)

 

 

The Graco Head Wise 65 – Review Here, Buy Here.
The Graco Size4Me 65 – Review Here, Buy Here.
The Graco Contender – Review Here, Buy Here.
The Graco Fit4Me 65 – Review Here, Buy Here.

While there are lots of parents who aren’t aware of the benefits of rear-facing, there are also parents who are, but who simply don’t have the budgets necessary to purchase the high-end rear-facing seats above like the Cleks and Dionos. For these parents, I always recommend the Graco clones, which includes seats like the Head Wise 65, the Size4Me 65, the Contender, and the Fit4Me 65.

These are my favorite convertibles on the market under the $200 price point, and as I wrote in an earlier post, I have had three of these seats installed in family vehicles for a while (the Head Wise, Size4Me, and Contender), and am about to purchase the 4th after borrowing it last week from a friend. All four seats are quite similar to each other, with a few slight differences.

For example, I find the Head Wise 65 to be the most comfortable of the four seats due to the additional padding it provides; it also has more side impact protection as a result. The Size4Me features a removable head support padding, while that in the Head Wise is fixed. The Contender takes up more room when you use it to rear-face, as I found out in my ultimate rear-facing convertible car seat comparison. The Fit4Me is most like the Head Wise in that it includes a ball lever on the side to indicate the recline angle.  All of the seats are great, but if I had to choose an order or preference, it would be the Head Wise, Fit4Me, Size4Me, and then the Contender. You can’t go wrong with any of them, however.

If you find the information on car safety, recommended car seats, and car seat reviews on this car seat blog helpful, you can shop through this Amazon link for any purchases, car seat-related or not. Canadians can shop through this link for Canadian purchases.