Nokian Hakkapeliitta R3

The tyre is soft and moves quite a bit on tarmac.

Grip level is really good on proper winter conditions.

Really quiet and comfortable also.

Fantastic winter tire for harsh canadian winters. Highly recommended. Before the Hakkapeliitta R3 I ran R2. It too was a great tire, but the R3 is an improvement over the R2. This is the best none studded winter tire on the market. Good tire life also if you run them from November to April.

TL;DR I am extremely satisfied with the Nokian R3's in snow and ice conditions. Last winter I was driving over a mountain-ridge, in single-digit freezing(celsius) and heavy snow, the road was completely covered and some cars were driving, so the snow was very compact. I had to stop multiple times, due to opposing traffic and I was able to continue without any problems, passing other cars and busses, that had no chance of continuing from a stop on the mountainside (8-10degree cliam)

Have YOU got experience with the Nokian Hakkapeliitta R3? Help millions of other tyre buyers

Review your Nokian Hakkapeliitta R3 >

R3 SUV purchased Oct/21. We are mandated winter tires October 1 to April 30. I don’t care how they drive in rain, what they look like or how noisy they are all I care about is severe winter performance. These tires have poor lateral grip and braking and acceleration on hard compact snow is terrible. I don’t know if these tires were not cured properly or just a poor compound. They remind me of bias belt tires from the sixties. I cannot recommend these tires. I have been licensed for 60 years and have driven public transportation and motor coaches for 30 years, several smaller vehicles and motor cycles.

I've driven these tyres for two winters now and encountered various road conditions. The main focus is deep winter conditions - great performance on snow and ice, but comparatively worse performance in dry and rain. The road feel isn't very sharp on dry asphalt, feels a bit like a boat, but on snow you can read them really well. The behaviour of the tyres is very predictable, you can tell when they're about to slip and how much they're slipping very easily. Slides have been very easy to control or avoid.
They are quiet, and make a slight wind howling sound. Speed bumps and potholes are very squishy and only slightly annoying, smaller road bumps are completely absorbed. After 20000km, I still have 6-7mm of thread left. The rubber is very soft though, so with fast accelerations and speeds they might wear a lot quicker. The tyres feel confident at cold degrees, but warmer than 7 degrees Celsius they feel very spongy.
Performance on various winter road conditions:
1) dry: good grip, but "swimming around" like a boat, the feel isn't very sharp. Above 100 km/h the tyres feel twitchy.
2) fresh powder snow: controllable, decent grip and good braking distance, but sometimes can understeer.
3) deeply packed snow: great grip and sharp steering, good braking distance. The tyres seem to easily grab onto the snow.
4) rain: longer brake distance than many other tyres, still decent grip but not what you might be used to.
5) snow slush, salted roads: better than in rain, digs deep into the slush and grabs fairly well. Some controllable slipping, but decent braking distance.
6) regular ice: the tyres grip ice quite well. moderate braking distance and grip, although longer than on snow. Slides in hard icy corners.
7) black ice: strictly dangerous, since the ice is glass-smooth and the tyres have nothing to grab onto. ABS kicked in even braking from 5 km/h and braking distance was several meters. Steering is hard. Only nail-tyres would help here.

In conclusion, these tyres shine in deep winter conditions, but aren't meant for rainy winters. Grip on various snow surfaces is great and good even on ice. They are very predictable, which makes it easy to correct slides. The tyres are comfortable and quiet, and the wear is good.

I've found Hakka to be the best winter tire. Always the best grip in deep snow. I’ve mostly used Hakkas on 2 vehicles for the past 2 decades. I tried a few other popular winter tires but always found the Hakkas a bit better. HOWEVER my last two sets of Hakkas (R2 and R3 SUV) got severe dry rot cracking in the tread grooves and all over the sidewall(R2) and severe dry rot cracking in the tread groove only (R3 SUV). When noticed, the R2 cracking was so severe at 24,000 of winter only kilometers and the R3 SUV was cracked fairly severely at only 7,000 winter kilometers on a new SUV. Always stored cleaned and dry in a sealed plastic bag four of the elements and with proper inflation checked bi-monthly. I do not know if this is a coincidence but these sets of poorly manufactured tires were Made in Russia. All my previous Nokians were Made in Finland and were amazing. I’ve tried to contact Nokian (America) on more than one occasion since May 2022 and submitted photos and receipts to them and now is Sept 2022 and I have never received a response. Never had this issue with any tire in the past 41 years of driving. I guess I will now be switching brands since it does not appear they honor warranty

Don't believe the review on this website. I've used my Hakkapeliitta R3 tires on my 2019 BWM X3 M40i now for 3 winter seasons and they are by far one of the best winter tires out there. The second best I would have to compare them to are the Michelin X-Ice 2 and 3 tires. Unfortunately, you can't get the X-Ice 3 tires for SUVs...yet. I have the X-Ice 2 tires on my wife's minivan, hence why I know how good they are in winter driving conditions. Another option for SUV owners might be the Goodyear Blizzaks. Regardless, the R3 tires are an excellent overall tire with very good braking and handling on snow and ice. There is almost no road noise form the tires, which is an amazing feat. The only drawbacks are faster tread wear compared to some of the competitors and it's low speed rating of only 106mph. So, when you are on drive pavement and have the opportunity to put the pedal to the metal, just be careful as that 100mph mark comes up fast! My SUV provides a warning tone when that speed is reached and let's me know to let off the gas. Overall, I would recommend the R3 to any SUV owner looking for a great snow tire with both performance and reliability. UPDATE: Nokian has just recently released the new Hakkapeliitta R5 tire which is supposed to improve upon the weaknesses of the R3. The R3 has been out now for several years, so the improvements were expected - and welcome - especially for drive pavement performance! I haven't been able to find any official reviews on the R5 since it was just released, but it's something to keep on eye out for if you are looking to upgrade your R3s.

I purchased my Nokian Hakkapeliitta R3 tires for my AWD Altima SR. I wanted a tire that was good on snow and ice but also good on dry and wet too. I purchased them before a trip over an usually snow covered mountain pass. There was snow and ice of several inches and required chains for non-AWD vehicles. These tires were fantastic on the snow and ice. They performed beyond what I expected and when I came back from my trip there was a snowstorm in Seattle. I was extremely impressed by the performance on steep snowy hills. I would buy again.

I've been using these tires for 2 years now, in the dry and in the wet they are worse than a normal winter tyre, but they really shine when driving on slush and snow, giving you a huge advantage when going up a snowy road in the alps.

Good tyres with a good grip on an ice road. Not enough road feedback on a dry road and higher speed.

Excellent tire very good in snow and ice I also have Nokia’s Hakka 9 SUV studded on my Tesla X can’t beat it in our cold Canadian winter where I live 5 months of snow unbelievable traction on ice

I'm starting my 3rd winter with the R3. Living in the Toronto Canada area, winter can mean driving in rain, snow or dry freeways with temperatures being above freezing to -25C or lower. The tires give excellent performance regardless of the road conditions. With heavy rains I have never experienced hydroplaning on wet roads nor had any difficulty with traction while driving on snow covered roads. I am very happy with R3 and would not hesitate to recommend them to others.

The Hakka R3 has been phenomenal for my style of commute mostly straight lines and steady speed drives. I rated these tires as compared to Summer/all seasons as I haven't had a different set of winter tires for this tire size to have a better comparison. As far as dry and wet grip the tires will occasionally slip when starting from a stop, but I attribute that more to driver error with limited experience driving M/T. On roundabouts I can confidently go 40mph on a 25 advisory curve but can tell it's close to slipping. In my few experiences making an emergency stop from 20 or 40 mph stopping distance is about average for a winter tire maybe 1 car length more than on a standard all season in 45°f @40mph and about ½ that in 30°f(~0°c). In snow and ice the grip is excellent even for a winter tire and I had no issues at any point except for in some deep and wet slush whilst making a turn at intersections. Comfort/NVH (Noise vibration harshness) were very satisfactory even when compared to a touring A/S tire (subjectively) though slightly louder than my summer tires which I'd expect due to all the extra siping it wasnt by much and certainly not bothersome to me. Also of great importance to me is Rolling Resistance. My vehicle is meant for superb fuel economy and most people who drive them swear by using only the stock tire to maintain the 60mpg US the car is made for, however I have not noticed much of any difference (maybe 2-3mpg accounting for higher overall diameter of the Nokian).Lastly as far as wear is concerned I'm unsure so far. The tires are all about ⁷/³² from the original ¹⁰/³² with one rotation on them so far. I work in a tire shop and I've seen some sets last 40k miles before getting to ⁴/³² and I've seen some last around 25k as always YMMV based on alignment, air pressure and driving style. Absolutely plan to get more Nokian tires in the future and hope more people will give their products a try.

I am running Nokian Hakka R3s on a BMW i3. I have had the tyres for about 3 weeks now. The weather has been cold initially but has gone back to being very mild. This sort of weather is where dedicated winter tyres can for want of a better expression slip up. Pleasingly the Hakka 3s are giving a level of grip well above my expectation in this mild and wet weather. In the dry too, this tyre is performing more like an all season tyre than a winter tyre.

I deliberately put the pedal down on one occasion much harder than I would normally do and the tyres started to lose grip. This however was the only time and it was a deliberate test. Otherwise on tight cornering and unexpected hard braking, the tyres have performed admirably in both wet and dry conditions. In the cold weather they are even grippier and have given a preview of their winter capability. I can now confidently look forward to some harsh winter weather to see how they perform.

The other thing of note is that they are incredibly quiet and are head and shoulders above the summer Bridgestone
tyres which are now off for the winter. I will revisit this review with my experiences in harsh winter weather but at present the Hakka 3 looks like a winner so far. Just be careful about pushing them too hard in mild and wet temperatures though.