CarGurus vs Cars.com for Dealers: Cost and Leads in 2026

What is the difference between CarGurus and Cars.com?

CarGurus labels used cars by comparing your price with its own estimate of local market value, while Cars.com relies on condition reports and large photo sets to build trust. Counted by paying dealers, CarGurus is the bigger network.

A CarGurus Deal Rating is the price label a shopper sees next to an eligible used car. CarGurus' FY2025 10-K lists 5 labels: Great Deal, Good Deal, Fair Deal, High Priced and Overpriced. They come from Instant Market Value (IMV), which the 10-K describes as a "proprietary algorithm that assesses the market value of a used vehicle in a local market." IMV draws on "tens of millions of data points, including make, model, trim, year, features, condition, history, geographic location, and mileage."

Dealers have pushed back on the system. A DealerRefresh community review that compiles 118 threads records complaints that the deal rating rewards the cheapest listing. Dealers in that review say well-merchandised cars from stores that invest in reconditioning get "Overpriced" ratings, while competitors with artificially low prices get favorable ones.

On its Q2 2026 earnings call, Cars.com described Dealer Verified Listings, which put AccuTrade condition reports on marketplace listings as an "additional trust signal unique to our marketplace." Both companies are adding AI for shoppers. CarGurus introduced "Guru, our consumer-facing AI layer," and Cars.com reported that shoppers using Carson submitted nearly 30% of all leads in June 2026.

The two companies also differ in size and growth:

Q2 2026 metric	CarGurus	Cars.com
Paying dealers	26,151 in the U.S.	19,343
Change in dealers vs. Q2 2025	Up 3%	Down from 19,412
Total revenue	$251.0 million	$179.9 million
Revenue growth	Up 13%	Up 1%, with Marketplace revenue up more than 7%

In the same release, CarGurus guided Q3 2026 revenue to $253.5 million to $258.5 million.

The 2026 risk around deal ratings and advertised prices

Price labels and advertised prices drew legal action in 2026. On October 15, 2026, New York City sued CarGurus. The city's Department of Consumer and Worker Protection says it "found that CarGurus violated the New York City Consumer Protection Law more than 2,000 times." According to the city, cars were labeled "Great Deal" or "Good Deal" while mandatory fees were hidden. The suit also targets "an AI chatbot available on CarGurus' website, which also generates lists of supposed 'deals.'"

CarGurus is the defendant, but the city's examples are dealer listings. The Autopian reports that a 2023 Mitsubishi Outlander Sport listed at $16,699 carried a "Good Deal" label but was above market value once the hidden fees were added. A 2019 Audi Q5 advertised at $14,999 carried $3,685 in prep, conveyance and admin fees. The city is seeking $3,500 per violation.

Federal regulators are working on the same issue. On March 13, 2026, the FTC warned 97 auto groups that the prices they advertise must be the total price consumers will be required to pay, including all mandatory fees. The FTC's September 15, 2026 price transparency FAQs then covered pricing "across different media." They define the advertised price as "the actual price that any consumer can walk in and pay to purchase the vehicle, excluding only charges that the government requires the consumer to pay." Our Facebook Marketplace dealer rules guide covers how that guidance applies to social posts and staff texts.

How much do CarGurus and Cars.com cost?

Neither site publishes list prices. In Q2 2026 the average U.S. paying dealer spent about $2,711 a month on CarGurus and $2,500 on Cars.com, and quotes rise with inventory size and often at renewal.

These averages come from the companies' own metrics. CarGurus reports QARSD (Quarterly Average Revenue per Subscribing Dealer), which was $8,134 for U.S. dealers in Q2 2026, up 8% year over year. Divided by 3, that is about $2,711 a month. Cars.com reports ARPD (Monthly Average Revenue Per Dealer), which was $2,500 in Q2 2026, up from $2,435 a year earlier. On the earnings call, Cars.com said marketplace ARPD "reached an all-time high."

CarGurus dealer packages

CarGurus' 10-K describes a free tier and several paid tiers:

• Restricted Listings: free, with "capped anonymous leads and connections"
• Featured+ and Featured Priority+: the current paid tiers
• Featured and Featured Priority: legacy paid tiers that are still available

Pricing varies by "dealer's inventory size and region." Dealers may see rate increases at renewal "commensurate with growth and updated performance expectations." Most dealer contracts have one-month committed terms with no obligation to stay beyond that term, and dealers can end their subscriptions before the next renewal term starts.

Cars.com dealer packages

Cars.com's dealer marketplace page lists 3 packages: Base, Premium and Premium+. Premium adds 360° spin, and Premium+ adds Dynamic Inventory Retargeting. The page shows no prices.

What dealers report paying at renewal

Forum posts give the clearest view of real quotes, though no one has verified them. Read each one as a single store's experience.

Dealer report	Site	Before	After
DealerRefresh, July 9, 2026	Cars.com	$1,500 a month	$2,044 for 75+ cars, or $1,799 to keep the same package
DealerRefresh review, May 28, 2026	CarGurus	$795 a month	Nearly $5,000 a month
Same review	CarGurus	$750 starting rate	$5,640 a month after two years
Same review, range across 118 threads	CarGurus	Base rate	Increases of 16% to 602%

By our math, the Cars.com increase in that thread works out to 36% for the bigger package. The rep told the dealer their "cost per lead is $5, and other dealerships are $40." One forum member suggested capping the inventory feed at 74 units to stay below the 75-car price break.

Before you sign a renewal on either site, work through the advice from that thread:

1. Ask for VDP views and SRP views.
2. Ask for calls, emails and chats, counted separately.
3. Match those leads to appointments, shows and sold units in your CRM.
4. Divide the monthly fee by sold units to get your cost per sold car.
5. Ask whether a smaller feed or a lower tier changes the price.

Which one brings more buyers?

CarGurus has had the cheaper leads: dealer tracking from 2024 put it below $40 per lead and Cars.com below $50. No public data compares the two sites head to head, so your own cost per sold car decides it. Cost per lead is your monthly fee divided by the calls, emails and chats the site sends you.

Those figures come from a DealerRefresh thread citing George Nenni's tracking data across several hundred dealers, and they date from February 2024. Average spend has risen on both sites since then, so ask for your own numbers.

Cars.com shares more traffic and lead data than CarGurus does. Its Q2 2026 release shows 143.0 million visits, down 12% from 162.0 million a year earlier. On the earnings call, Cars.com said "Q2 lead conversion was up double digits year-over-year" and that Carson users are "4x more likely to submit a lead."

Cars.com's dealer page claims 26.6 million average monthly unique visitors. The company also says 83% of them plan to buy within 6 months and that its traffic converts 89% better than Google Ads traffic. Cars.com makes these claims about itself, and no outside source backs them.

CarGurus' Q2 2026 release does not break out lead or connection counts. You will only see CarGurus lead volume in your own dealer reports.

Turn math: what a lead is worth against days' supply

Days' supply is how many days your current inventory would last at the current sales pace. Cox Automotive put U.S. used-vehicle days' supply at 49 days in September 2026, up one day from a year earlier. Used inventory was 2.21 million units, up 3.3%, and the average used listing price was $27,235, "the highest monthly average since December 2022." Cars under $15,000 had only 34 days' supply.

Example: you stock 60 used cars and turn at the national pace of 49 days' supply, so you sell about 37 cars every 30 days (60 ÷ 49 × 30). If 10 of those buyers came from Cars.com leads and you pay the $2,500 average, Cars.com cost you $250 per sold car. If 10 came from CarGurus at the $2,711 average, CarGurus cost you about $271 per sold car. A site that sends only 4 buyers costs more than double that per sold car.

Cheaper cars turn faster, so a lot heavy in sub-$15,000 inventory needs fewer marketplace leads per unit. Our weekly plan for selling more used cars covers pricing against days' supply and 30/45/60-day aging steps.

How do CarGurus and Cars.com handle photos and video?

Cars.com takes up to 99 photos for used cars and 32 for new, adds 360° spin on Premium and sells AI video ads separately. The CarGurus filings we read cover listings, deal ratings and AI tools but describe no dealer video product, and on both sites, posting to your own social pages is a separate job.

The Cars.com dealer page does not describe a video upload feature. Cars.com does sell VIN-specific AI video ads that it builds from your feed and runs on TikTok, Instagram and Facebook. Our Cars.com AI video guide explains that product and notes its pricing is not public.

On CarGurus, real photos affect trust as well as clicks. CarGurus' help center lists stock-only photos or no photos as a red flag for scam listings, as our car photo shot list for dealerships notes. That post gives the full shot order for both sites.

Your listing photos can also bring in buyers outside the marketplaces. According to the Cox Automotive Car Buyer Journey Study cited in our dealership social media strategy guide, 26% of car buyers used social media while shopping. You can reach them on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok and YouTube with no per-lead fee from either site. Prices shown in videos still fall under the FTC price guidance covered above.

Turning your listing photos into social videos with A21 Social

The job is a short vertical video of every car you list, posted on 4 platforms as each car goes live. Done by hand, that means a salesperson filming and editing every day. Our recommendation for this job is A21 Social: it takes the photos and details already on your Cars.com or CarGurus listings, builds short vertical videos with AI and posts them automatically to Instagram, Facebook, TikTok and YouTube, so nobody on your team has to film or edit.

Know the limits before you start. A21 Social imports listings only from Cars.com and CarGurus, so it won't pick up cars listed only on Autotrader or other sites, and it does not post to Facebook Marketplace.

To set it up:

1. Make sure every car has a full real-photo set on Cars.com or CarGurus, with an all-in price.
2. Pick a plan: Starter at $49, Pro at $129 or Enterprise at $199 a month, plus applicable sales tax.
3. Connect your dealership's Instagram, Facebook, TikTok and YouTube accounts.
4. Let new listings post as they go live, and have one person answer comments and DMs every day.
5. Once a month, compare sold units from social with your cost per sold car on each marketplace.

Which should you choose?

Pick the marketplace that matches how you price, then test the other one for 90 days against cost per sold car. These rules cover most stores:

• Choose CarGurus if most of your stock is used and priced at or under market, so Deal Ratings work in your favor. Its 2024 tracked cost per lead (below $40) was the lower of the two. Budget for rate increases at renewal; CarGurus prices by inventory size and region.
• Choose Cars.com if you sell on condition and presentation, with up to 99 used-car photos, AccuTrade condition reports and 360° spin on Premium. It also suits stores that price for gross and don't want an Overpriced label next to their cars.
• Use both if each site's cost per sold car stays within your target and your CRM can attribute every sale to its source. Recheck both before each renewal, because dealers on DealerRefresh report increases large enough to change the math.

A21 Social reads listings from both sites, so your social video setup stays the same if you switch.

How we checked this guide

In October 2026 we read CarGurus' Q2 2026 results release and FY2025 10-K, Cars.com's Q2 2026 results release, earnings call transcript and dealer marketplace page, DealerRefresh dealer threads, the NYC and FTC releases, and Cox Automotive's September 2026 used inventory report. Neither company publishes package list prices. We found no primary source for the Cars.com dealer dashboard, the CarGurus Top Rated Dealer requirements, an official Deal Rating cutoff or CarGurus site traffic, so this guide leaves them out. Dealer costs and cost per lead come from forum posts and a 2024 tracking summary that we could not verify independently, and every figure links to its source.

If you want your Cars.com or CarGurus listings on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok and YouTube without filming anything, try A21 Social from $49 a month.