If durability in whatever metric you mention were laboratory tested the time to test could be many years, well beyond the market presence of the particular product.
Some products can have synthetic tests, such as mattresses (rolling weights mimicking a human) or luggage (tumbling) to suggest their real world durability. How would that be done for a toaster or other appliance?
Hence brand reliability from member surveys gets cited, but every brand no matter how good produces some bad products, and poor brands some good ones from time to time, so it is a difficult issue looking for viable solutions. Suggestions on ‘how to do’ are welcome.
Many toasters are not designed to be repaired while some have replaceable elements that are, as you suggest, expensive in the context of a new similar toaster. If one cannot DIY replacing elements there is added cost to have it done.
nb. Reliability and testing was just addressed by Choice staff in another topic.
