Living on the side of a mountain in rural North Wales (so probably not too far from the OP's position), and driving a reaer-wheel-drive BMW 3 series estate, I can say that winter tyres make a huge difference in icy and/or snowy conditions.

Probably no real difference to summers in day-to-day driving.

My winters are Pirelli Sottozeros on 18" wheels, summers are PZero on 19" wheels.

This can be terribly specific to your personal needs. And especially how critical it is that you travel when the weather is bad.

I think that's the cusp of it. How important is dry cornering grip and braking to you? If you are a 'normal' driver rather than press on then maybe something like the Michelin cross climates would be a good compromise and treat them as your standard replacement tyre.

Can you afford to leave the vehicle if stuck and wait for better conditions? Keep the standard tyres if so.

If you rely on the vehicle 24/7, the roads are a bit hairy in your area and you tend to leave early then bite the bullet and get a good set of full winters. They will last well if only used for the season so the initial investment will soften over time.

All this is assuming that we get a bad winter. These days we're lucky if we see a smattering of snow, mores the pity. But saying that, there will always be days when the roads are frosty.

That's the trouble with this country - the weather is too unpredictable to make a definite decision.

That leads me to a question for anyone. Do winter tyres allow more control on black ice than summer tyres given tthat they are more malleable in colder temperatures?

Snow tyres are a subset of Winter tyres, specialised for snowy conditions we don't get in most of the UK - Winter tyres themselves are designed for cold (<7 C), wet conditions that we do get a lot of in all parts of the UK.

Older designs of All-Seasons are a compromise, not as good as a Summer tyre in summer but better than one in winter - and vice-versa with Winter tyres.

Modern All-Weather tyres like Michelin Cross-Climate and Nokian Weatherproof have a much wider range of capability than the old All-Seasons so may be worth seeing if your size is available.

Ignore the M+S marking on some tyres, it's meaningless as it has no standard performance test - M+S doesn't qualify as a winter tyre on it's own - the Alpine symbol, known as "three peak mountain snowflake" or "3PMS" is the only valid indicator of a Winter tyre, most of those do also have M+S but that's for the American market.

Snow tyres are a subset of Winter tyres,

I never mentioned Snow Tyres. I know they are not the same as winter tyres.

Older designs of All-Seasons are a compromise, not as good as a Summer tyre in summer but better than one in winter - and vice-versa with Winter tyres.

Modern All-Weather tyres like Michelin Cross-Climate and Nokian Weatherproof have a much wider range of capability than the old All-Seasons so may be worth seeing if your size is available.

Ignore the M+S marking on some tyres, it's meaningless as it has no standard performance test - M+S doesn't qualify as a winter tyre on it's own - the Alpine symbol, known as "three peak mountain snowflake" or "3PMS" is the only valid indicator of a Winter tyre, most of those do also have M+S but that's for the American market.

Always thought All Seasons and All Weather tyres were the same thing, so thanks for the definition.

Good advice to look for the "three peak mountain snowflake" or "3PMS".

My comment on Snow tyres was for the OP - too often Brits dismiss Winter tyres because we don't get much snow, ignoring the fact they're better in winter even without snow.

All-Season and All-Weather aren't defined standards, in effect they're just marketing jargon.

I would also thoroughly recommend the Tyre Reviews website, especially as we can read reviews from actual car owners matching the exact tyre (make, type and size), driving style and mileage with our own and car. Its very noticable that some tyres work well on one acr and not on another, even if both seem to be quite similar in spec on the surface. It has a good search function where you can search by tyre size, make or tyre or car, which can quickly narrow down the number of reviews, which are also tabulated in ranked order, though the winter tyres always get better 'results' (because they are only used in winter and mainly from continental European drivers who drive in snow more than we do) than 'summer' or 'all season' ones.

Worth looking at these reviews and the magazine ones they list. They, like HJ, also have a YouTube precence with useful videos and reviews themselves, including winter and all-season (cross climates in particular) tyres.

HI,

I had a spare set of winter wheels and tyres (Nokian WR3's) for my Jag XF for use in the winter. As it's a RWD car, I felt I needed these as I'm not a very good driver and with RWD cars I have a poor track record (prior to the Jag owned 1 RWD car and crashed it after 4 months due to not understanding the differences in handling between FWD and RWD!).

I found they made a huge difference, I could happily go up reasonably steep inclines covered in fresh show in them, they would still bring the car up well when stopping on fresh hail etc. etc.

The won't overcome the laws of physics, so if you stamp on the brakes hard @ 40mph in snow you will still slide a bit, but they were a lot better than summer tyres.

I no longer have the car so I will be putting the wheels and tyres on the market soon, but I won't be buying a replacement set because :

i) I now own a Rover 600 and it is FWD and also doesn't have much power

ii) moved house in the meantime so walk the kids to school,

iii) my office is moving to a city centre location so I won't be driving to work. And if it snows the trains won't be running so I'll stay at home.

So it depends on the circumstances and the car.

I don't see the point of winter tyres in the UK, the the last ten years I've been fitting mud and snow all-season tyres to my household's cars, they're fine in the summer and cope in the winer - job done.

The UK winter climate varies significantly from the low altitude south-east to the higher altitude places further north.

Buying M+S All-Season can be hit-and-miss - only the good ones are better.