The Poplar costs $300 and the Poplar S costs $350, the same price as our current runner-up pick, the Britax Boulevard ClickTight. Britax is phasing out the Boulevard ClickTight and Marathon ClickTight, though they are available to buy while supplies last. We also wanted to find out how the seats performed in everyday use. For example, we discovered that we had clear preferences when it came to choosing which seat we’d pick to move between cars on short notice. Whenever possible, we sought feedback about the seats from the kid testers. He could still safely ride rear-facing in any convertible car seat in terms of height and weight, but he looked uncomfortable in many seats, and I had a hard time buckling him in since his legs were all scrunched up.
As mentioned, the Boulevard is part of Britax’s family of ClickTight seats, along with two other, similar models—the base model Marathon ClickTight and the now retired Advocate ClickTight graco turbobooster (still available at some retailers). Their install methods are identical, and many of their features are the same. The main difference is in the layers of padding throughout the seats.
The leg panel has multiple settings and can give up to 5″ of extra leg room for a rear-facing child. This is optional and does not have to be used if you have a smaller vehicle or very tall passengers. The SafeWash fabrics can be machine-washed and -dried up to 30 times, whereas the other fabrics must be hand-washed and line-dried. If graco car seat you’re installing the Boulevard with the LATCH system (and again, we can’t think of a scenario where you would or should), the process is the same, but you use the included LATCH straps in place of the seat belts. Aesthetically, the Extend2Fit Convertible is nothing special. It looks like a totally standard, run-of-the-mill car seat.
Whether it’s finding great products or discovering helpful advice, we’ll help you get it right (the first time). Like the Extend2Fit Convertible, the 3-in-1 has a one-year warranty and a lifespan of 10 years from the date of manufacture. Since it is a relatively new model, the NHTSA has graco turbobooster yet to release crash-testing data or an ease-of-use rating for this seat. We spoke to dozens of caregivers about their car seat experiences, scanned hundreds of online reviews, and read articles and recommendations from other media sites like BabyGearLab and Car Seats for the Littles.
The Graco 4Ever 4-in-1’s cushions are made with plush fabric that doesn’t scratch delicate skin. It also has a special harness system (no need for rethreading), plus six-position reclining and a 10-position headrest. The harness is easy to use and makes us feel confident that our kids are safely buckled. For the rear-facing install, we think the car’s seat belt is a better choice than the LATCH method because it will save you from making the switch in the not-so-distant future. (And both methods require about the same amount of effort.) The Foonf can only be used rear-facing with LATCH for babies who weigh up to 25 pounds; about half of all babies will reach that weight by 12 months. To begin the process, first you’ll remove the seat cushion and set it aside; it comes off entirely, allowing access to the inner workings of the seat.
One of the key differences between the Extend2Fit 3-in-1 and the Extend2Fit Convertible is that the 3-in-1’s maximum shoulder-harness height is over an inch shorter than the Convertible’s. If a child is tall, they could reach that harness limit, and you’d have to switch them over to booster mode—possibly before you would have ordinarily put them in a booster. Although the Foonf feels roomy to its passengers, this is one of the narrowest car seats on the market, at only 16.9 inches wide, making it a good candidate for families that need to fit three seats across. And it doesn’t have any parts that flare out to compete for space with neighboring car seats or riders. To help narrow down our initial list of over 90 seats, we evaluated the frontal crash-testing data from the NHTSA. However, since car seats are not required to be certified before sale, several of the seats included in our at-home testing did not yet have government crash-testing data available; this limited our ability to compare results systematically.