Carvana Warranty: What Every Car Gets, and What CarvanaCare Adds

Carvana’s warranty is a free limited warranty on every car it sells, good for 100 days or 4,189 miles, whichever comes first, with a $100 deductible at in-network shops. It covers most mechanical and electrical failures and leaves out wear parts, maintenance and cosmetic flaws. A 7-Day Money Back Guarantee runs alongside it. CarvanaCare is different: an optional service contract, sold only before delivery, that Carvana’s own filings say another company owes. This page draws on Carvana’s documents, read on 30 September 2026: 24 help-center articles and a topic page, the Limited Warranty sample contract, two CarvanaCare brochures, the CarvanaCare product page as archived on 24 July 2026, the website User Agreement, and Carvana’s 2025 annual report with the dealer agreement filed behind it. It also uses the CFPB complaint file for Carvana’s lender entity.

What every Carvana car comes with, and what costs extra

Carvana puts two protections on every car it sells and offers a third for money. The help center says every vehicle comes with a complimentary limited warranty valid for 100 days or 4,189 miles, whichever comes first, covering basic and powertrain components “similar to the manufacturer”. Every car also has the 7-Day Money Back Guarantee, and both apply to partner cars listed on the site.

The paid product is CarvanaCare, which Carvana’s product page says “covers your car similar to its manufacturer’s warranty”. Carvana’s annual report calls these products VSCs, vehicle service contracts, and says another company is obligated on them. As our guide to who owes you the repair explains, the seller, the company obligated to pay claims and the company that decides them can all be different, and only the obligor’s money stands behind the promise.

Who owes you the repair: Carvana, SilverRock and DriveTime

For the free warranty, the sample contract is direct: “Dealership”, “We”, “Us” and “Our” mean Carvana, LLC, and the warranty “is provided to You by Us.” The administrator, which authorizes claims and pays shops, is SilverRock Automotive Inc, described by Carvana’s help center as its “trusted warranty partner since 2012” with a network of over 10,000 repair facilities. Carvana’s annual report says DriveTime has administered the warranty since 2017 for a per-vehicle fee, which came to $24 million in 2025.

For CarvanaCare, Carvana’s consumer pages send claims to SilverRock but never name the company obligated to pay them, except in Florida, where both brochures say CarvanaCare is provided by SilverRock Automotive of Florida, Inc. The annual report names it: Carvana sells service contracts “that DriveTime administers and is the obligor”, DriveTime meaning DriveTime Automotive Group, Inc. and its consolidated affiliates. The report dates the agreement behind these sales to December 2016, most recently amended in April 2021. Those dates match the SilverRock Automotive Master Dealer Agreement that Carvana filed with the SEC, signed on 8 December 2016 by SilverRock Automotive, Inc. and SilverRock Automotive of Florida, Inc. with Carvana, LLC, and amended by a Third Addendum effective 19 April 2021. That agreement makes SilverRock “solely responsible for administering and paying all benefits”. Whether those obligations are insured, only the contract would say, and Carvana doesn’t publish one.

The report is plain that the companies are connected. It calls DriveTime a related party because of the Garcia Parties’ control and ownership of substantially all of its interests, lists DriveTime among the entities controlled by Carvana’s controlling stockholder that provide services including “the administration of VSCs”, and says these arrangements “cannot be assumed to have been negotiated at arm’s length.” That doesn’t make a contract worse. It does mean the seller and the payer of claims aren’t independent of each other.

The money follows the same path. Carvana collects each contract’s retail price, keeps a commission and passes the rest to DriveTime. It recognized $338 million of these commissions in 2025, $193 million in 2024 and $138 million in 2023, net of expected cancellations and including payments for excess reserves. Carvana sold 596,641 cars in 2025, so the 2025 figure is about $567 per car sold, by our division. Not every buyer takes a contract, so the average commission per contract sold is higher, by an amount the filing gives no way to work out. From 2023 to 2025 the commissions grew about 2.4 times while cars sold grew about 1.9 times, and the report credits part of its 2025 revenue growth to “higher VSC conversion rates”.

Two more terms matter. The report says Carvana can receive payments for excess reserves “based on the performance of the VSCs versus the reserves held by the VSC administrator”, so it gains when claims run below what was set aside for them, and that its own risk on cancellations “is limited to the commissions that we receive.” And the 2016 agreement lets Carvana set its own cut: “Dealer’s compensation will be determined by the Dealer upon submission of the Customer Contract to the Company.” That is the markup inside your quote. Our guides explain why service contracts have no sticker price and where the markup comes from.

The 100-day warranty: when the clock starts and what it covers

The sample contract runs to six pages, form WTY (CV-MuSt) 2024 V1, stamped SAMPLE, with its dollar amounts in square brackets; the contract you sign is the one that counts. Coverage ends at whichever comes first: 100 days after the Vehicle Purchase Date, or 4,189 miles “measured from the Current Odometer reading” printed on the contract. The miles run from the reading at sale, and the days from the purchase date rather than delivery; Carvana’s product page and a 2023 mobile-app page both say “from the time of your purchase”. If your purchase date comes before delivery, the gap comes out of the 100 days.

The contract defines a covered Breakdown as the total failure of a covered part “due to defects in material or workmanship”, and writes the cover the generous way round: “Repairs on all assemblies and parts are covered” except four categories, “unless otherwise required by state law”:

• Cosmetic imperfections: physical defects that don’t affect drivability or safety.
• Replaceable or wearable parts: the drive belt, tires, brake pads, brake rotors, clutch material in manual transmissions, wiper blades and fluids.
• Recommended maintenance: lubrication, tune-ups, filters of any kind, coolant, spark plugs, and bulbs or fuses unless a covered repair caused the cost.
• Aftermarket accessories: the help center gives wheels and electronics as examples.

The help center’s 14 examples of covered items run from the engine, transmission and drive shaft to braking, seat belts, steering, suspension, wheels and exhaust, and its not-covered examples add batteries to the wear parts.

Then come the 21 exclusions in section 7(b). The ones most likely to catch a buyer:

• Any repair a manufacturer, repair shop or parts supplier provides under its own warranty, anything covered by a recall or factory service bulletin, and “any part not covered by, or excluded by” the manufacturer’s warranty.
• Breakdowns caused by missed maintenance, contaminated or wrong fluids, towing a trailer the car isn’t equipped for, modifications, lift or lowering kits, oversize or undersize tires, off-roading or racing.
• Overheating, physical damage, and damage from driving on after a covered part fails.
• A car used for business, deliveries, construction or commercial hauling, rented out, or used to plow snow.
• Breakdowns outside the United States or Canada, or on a car whose odometer can’t show its true mileage.
• Rust or corrosion repair.

Three terms set the outer limits. Total payouts can’t exceed the Vehicle Purchase Price, not counting tax, title and license fees. The warranty ends when you sell the car and “is not transferable to any other vehicle owner.” And it limits implied warranties to its own term, where state law allows. Because Carvana gives a written warranty, federal law lets it shorten implied warranties but not remove them, which is what separates this car from one sold as is; our guide to what a dealer warranty is worth shows how to read one on the Buyers Guide.

Deductibles: $0, $100 or $350, depending on the day and the state

The sample contract charges a deductible per Repair Visit, meaning any visit “to perform a diagnosis, teardown, or a covered repair”: $100 in network and $350 anywhere else. The help center is softer. It says claims at an in-network shop in the first 14 days, counted from the day you receive the car, have a $0 deductible, and $100 after that. Its claims article is more careful still: Carvana will “typically” waive the deductible in those 14 days, and “this policy could change at any time.”

Out of network, $350 is only the start. The help center warns of diagnostic fees and “repair costs that exceed the fair market value”, and says SilverRock won’t guarantee the work. In network, it says diagnostics on approved repairs are free, SilverRock pays the shop directly, and the repair carries a 12-month or 12,000-mile warranty, whichever comes first, from the shop.

Where you live can change all of this. The sample contract’s state amendments rewrite the deductible, and sometimes the warranty itself, in 12 states:

So the 14-day waiver is a policy Carvana says it can change, while in ten states the contract itself waives the in-network deductible, and in six of them for the whole 100 days. If you live in one of those six and are asked for an in-network deductible, point to your state’s amendment.

Making a claim: SilverRock first, before any work starts

The help center’s route for a mechanical or electrical fault: find an in-network shop through the Service and Repair section of your Carvana account, tell the shop you have a warranty with SilverRock, and let it diagnose the car. The shop must then contact SilverRock “to get approval before repairs begin”, and SilverRock pays it directly. For an electric vehicle, contact SilverRock first; it recommends shops able to do the work.

The contract adds the conditions that decide claims. You or the shop need the administrator’s authorization number before any covered repair. If asked, you must authorize a teardown, which the warranty pays for only if it finds a covered breakdown. An emergency repair outside business hours won’t be denied solely for lack of prior authorization, but you must keep the replaced parts for inspection and call the next business day. Claim paperwork is due within 90 days of authorization, and you must be able to show the car was maintained as its manufacturer recommends. If factory warranty remains, go to the carmaker first: the help center says to get a diagnosis at the manufacturer’s facility and have the technician call SilverRock about anything not covered there.

The warranty also pays for a rental car, up to $60 a day and $600 per breakdown, at one day for every 8 hours of labor in the shop’s national repair manual, with the receipt due within 90 days. Roadside help covers towing, emergency fuel or fluids (you pay for the fuel itself), fitting your spare, a locksmith and a jump start, each with a limit the sample prints as $100. The help center says towing is covered up to $200.

In the first week there is one more route. Cosmetic flaws that weren’t shown on the car’s 360-degree tour can be submitted for review, up to three of them, during the 7-Day Money Back Guarantee; if a flaw falls outside Carvana’s standards, SilverRock contacts you within 48 hours. SilverRock does this under a 2021 addendum to the dealer agreement, which made it responsible for buyers’ “vehicle-specific post-sale communications and resolutions”.

The 7-Day Money Back Guarantee, and how to use the week

The guarantee begins on the day you receive the car, and that day counts as day 1 “regardless of delivery time”. You must tell Carvana you want to return or exchange before 8 p.m. EST on the 7th day, six calendar days after delivery day by our count, so a car delivered on a Monday evening has to be flagged by Sunday evening. The collection itself can be later. A 2023 Carvana mobile-app page still on its servers says 5 p.m. EST; go by the earlier hour unless your purchase agreement says otherwise.

You may drive 400 miles during the week, after which you pay $1.00 a mile, so a 500-mile week costs $100 by our sum. Carvana won’t take the car back if it has been damaged or in an accident, altered from its delivered condition, or given a lien other than Carvana’s own financing. You can exchange up to two times, for three cars in all, but the third comes without the guarantee, and an exchange must be set up with a Carvana advocate first or the new order counts as a second purchase.

The refund is what you paid, minus shipping. Delivery charges come back; shipping charges, which pay for moving the car to your nearest Carvana location, do not, though the terms of use refund them if you cancel within 24 hours of ordering or after Carvana says delivery will be delayed. Refunds take 10 to 15 business days. Registration and financing are cancelled once a return starts, and a trade-in stays with Carvana as a sale at the price in your purchase agreement.

The week is also your inspection. Buying online, you pay before your own mechanic has seen the car, and the 2023 page says to “feel free to take it in for an inspection.” Book it for the first days, not the last. Our pre-purchase inspection guide covers what to ask for, and our comparison of Carvana and CarMax explains why that order of events is the real difference in buying online. Our CarMax warranty guide reads CarMax’s terms for comparison.

What Carvana inspects depends on which of its pages you read. The help center says not every vehicle is Carvana Certified, that the 150-point inspection is for certified cars, and that all its cars are reconditioned and have “no reported fire, flood or frame damage” according to CARFAX and AutoCheck, adding that other information “may not have been reported.” The product page, as archived in July 2026, lists the 150-point inspection as standard on every car. Carvana Certified is Carvana’s own label, not a carmaker’s program (our certified pre-owned guide explains the difference), so check the title history yourself: a salvage or rebuilt brand is the kind of record a report can miss.

CarvanaCare: four plans, and what the brochure lists in each

The current CarvanaCare brochure, the one Carvana’s help center links to, was created on 4 June 2026 and describes four plans. Cosmetic “covers paintless dent repairs, tire and wheel repairs, plus oil changes and tire rotations for the first year.” Essential covers “the components that move the vehicle such as the engine, transmission, and drivetrain.” Plus adds “steering, heating, A/C, exhaust, and much more.” Premier adds to Essential and Plus “3 oil changes and tire rotations for 1 year, minor cosmetic repairs, and tire/wheel damage.” Every plan includes roadside assistance and rental coverage, and the brochure claims more than 10,000 in-network locations.

The lists answer questions the plan names don’t. Brakes appear only in Plus, and only as hydraulic and electronic parts such as calipers, the master cylinder, the brake booster and the ABS pump; pads and rotors appear in no plan. Plus’s description names exhaust, but the only exhaust parts listed anywhere are the exhaust manifolds and valves in Essential’s engine list. Seals and gaskets appear only in Plus. For electric cars and hybrids, Essential lists the drive motor or generator, the high-voltage battery, the inverter and the on-board charger, and Plus adds 7 more, including the battery pack and the DC-DC converter.

How the cover is written matters as much as what it lists. The product page, as archived on 24 July 2026, calls Plus “front-to-back coverage for mechanical and electrical components.” The brochure is a list of named parts, and its own web address files it under “inclusionary”, the trade’s word for cover limited to the parts a contract names: a part not on the list isn’t promised. The free 100-day warranty works the other way round, covering everything it doesn’t exclude.

No Carvana page prints a plan’s term or price. The brochure promises “budget-friendly deductibles” in network, none on cosmetic claims, and deductible options at checkout. The help center says in-network deductibles “vary, with options as low as $100” and that out of network you add $250, which makes $350 at the lowest option, the same as the free warranty; that addition is ours. It says plans come “at various coverage levels and term lengths” without naming any. An older brochure, created in March 2021 and still on Carvana’s asset server, advertises a “$0 DOLLAR DEDUCTIBLE at Preferred Repair Facilities” and three plans, as many as the help center and the July 2026 product page still list.

When CarvanaCare starts, and your one chance to buy it

CarvanaCare has one buying window, and it closes at delivery. The help center says you can add it “up until your scheduled delivery or pickup” and not after you accept the car. The dealer agreement Carvana filed with the SEC in 2017 has the same rule from the other side: Carvana “may only issue or sell Contract Programs on the date vehicle is sold to Purchaser.” You decide before you have driven the car or had it inspected.

Coverage starts the same day: “Coverage begins the day you receive your vehicle and you can cancel at any time for a prorated refund.” Yet Carvana’s other documents describe later protection. The annual report calls service contracts “protection against the costs of certain mechanical repairs after the expiration of their vehicle’s original manufacturer warranty”, and the product page says you’ll need more protection “once your 100-day warranty and manufacturer’s warranty is over.” Both hold. The term starts at delivery, but for the first 100 days most mechanical failures fall under Carvana’s own warranty, and a remaining factory warranty pays before either. On a car with factory cover left, the early part of the term may buy little. Ask for the plan’s end date and end mileage in writing, to see how much of it lies beyond the cover you already hold.

The price appears only at checkout, where the help center says you can “add coverage to your financing”; the annual report says only that prices “are set forth in each contract.” Financed, the contract is paid off with interest along with the car. And if you return the car, the help center says registration and financing are cancelled but doesn’t mention CarvanaCare, so make sure the contract is cancelled with the car.

Cancelling, transfers and disputes

Carvana says you can cancel CarvanaCare at any time for a prorated refund. No Carvana page prints the refund formula or a fee, but the dealer agreement refers to “any cancellation fee set forth in the Customer Contract”, and it has cancellation requests coming from, and refunds going to, the purchaser or the lienholder. If the contract is in your loan, ask where the refund goes. Our guides cover cancelling a service contract and how cancellations go wrong.

The free warranty ends when you sell the car and applies only to the customer named on it. Carvana prints no transfer rule for CarvanaCare; its help for people selling a car to Carvana says “Any extended warranties are not transferable and will not add to your vehicle’s value,” so check the contract’s own clause.

For disputes, the sample warranty has no arbitration clause, apart from Massachusetts’s notice of a right to state-certified arbitration, requested within 6 months of delivery. Carvana’s website User Agreement, effective 17 October 2025, does have one. It sends claims about the site and about “statements regarding any vehicles or other products listed or described on the Service” to individual arbitration with the American Arbitration Association, leaves small-claims court open, and puts any in-person hearing in your federal judicial district. You can opt out in a signed writing within 30 calendar days of first visiting the site, but that isn’t a rejection of “any other arbitration agreement between you and us”, so your purchase agreement and a CarvanaCare contract may carry their own. Neither is published; ask for both.

What Carvana’s CFPB complaint file shows

No public database records how warranty or CarvanaCare claims are decided, but the finance side is public: CarvanaCare can go into a Carvana loan, and complaints about add-ons sold with a loan go to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. On 30 September 2026 we pulled all 775 vehicle loan or lease complaints against Carvana Group, LLC, received between 10 July 2017 and 11 September 2026: 732 about loans and 43 about leases. That is the 30th-largest count among the 1,147 companies listed, and 62.3% of the 1,243 complaints against the company across all products. A complaint is an allegation, not a finding, and the response is the company’s own label.

Carvana answered 763 on time and 12 late. It closed 773 with an explanation and 1 with non-monetary relief; 1 was still in progress. That is 0.1% with relief, against 9.4% across all 103,865 vehicle loan or lease complaints. The two add-on sub-issues hold 104 of Carvana’s complaints, 13.4% of its file against 5.5% across the product, and the larger label, with 94, is the file’s second-biggest sub-issue after confusing or misleading advertising or marketing, with 120. None of the 104 closed with relief, against 7.9% for the product’s 5,713 add-on complaints.

Add-on complaints climbed from 19 in 2024 to 32 in 2025, and 24 in 2026 before mid-September, already 22.9% of that year’s file. The rise runs alongside the growth in commissions, though the label can’t separate CarvanaCare from GAP or other add-ons, and the narratives that might have are no longer served by the CFPB. Complaints about loan servicing may also sit under another name: the annual report says DriveTime services the loans Carvana originates.

Where Carvana’s own documents disagree

Read side by side, Carvana’s documents contradict each other in eight places. In each, the contract you sign governs; where it is silent, get the answer in writing.

Two further tensions sit inside single documents: the brochure’s Plus description names exhaust while its component table lists none under Plus, and the product page’s “front-to-back” wording sits beside a brochure of named parts. And the documents run on two clocks: the warranty’s days from the purchase date, and the 7-day guarantee, the 14-day waiver and CarvanaCare from the day you receive the car.

CarvanaCare, a third-party contract, or neither

Whether a service contract is worth buying at all is the subject of our guide to whether an extended warranty is worth it. At Carvana the question comes down to four things.

What the car already has. The 100-day warranty, a better deductible in ten states, and often part of a factory warranty: Carvana’s product page says many of its cars are still covered by the original manufacturer’s warranty. Check the car’s in-service date and mileage against the carmaker’s terms before you price a plan that starts on delivery day.

Who stands behind it. DriveTime, a related party, is CarvanaCare’s obligor, and SilverRock handles claims. A third-party contract names its own. Either way, check that the obligor is registered where you live, as our guide to what a state register will tell you shows.

The price. None is published, and Carvana’s commissions averaged about $567 per car sold in 2025, counting buyers who bought nothing. Get a written quote for the same term and deductible elsewhere before you order.

Timing. CarvanaCare must be bought before delivery. A third-party contract, or mechanical breakdown insurance from some insurers, can be bought after delivery, on terms that vary by seller, once you know the car better.

Calls saying your Carvana warranty is about to expire are a separate matter. In 2022 the FTC sued American Vehicle Protection Corp., a Florida seller it alleged had falsely claimed to be, or to be associated with, consumers’ carmakers or dealers, and had promised bumper-to-bumper or full coverage that was much more limited than represented. A stipulated order in March 2023 and a further order that July banned defendants from selling extended auto warranties and from outbound telemarketing. In 2024 the FTC sent more than $449,000 in refunds to consumers. See what regulators have done.

Common questions

How long is the Carvana warranty?

100 days or 4,189 miles, whichever comes first. The sample contract counts the days from the Vehicle Purchase Date and the miles from the odometer reading at sale, and the warranty ends early if you sell the car. It comes free with every car Carvana sells, partner cars included.

What does Carvana’s 100-day warranty cover?

Repairs on all parts except cosmetic imperfections, wear parts, maintenance and aftermarket accessories, subject to 21 exclusions. Carvana says it covers basic and powertrain components. Tires, brake pads, rotors and batteries aren’t covered, and neither are failures caused by missed maintenance, modifications, overheating or physical damage.

Is CarvanaCare worth it?

That depends on what the car already has and on a price Carvana doesn’t publish. CarvanaCare starts the day you receive the car, so its first months overlap the 100-day warranty and any factory warranty left. Its obligor is DriveTime, a company related to Carvana, and Carvana earned about $567 in service-contract commissions for every car it sold in 2025. Compare a written quote from a third-party provider before checkout.

Can I buy CarvanaCare after I get the car?

No. Carvana’s help center says you can add it up until your scheduled delivery or pickup, and not after you accept the vehicle. A third-party service contract or mechanical breakdown insurance can be bought later.

Can I cancel CarvanaCare?

Carvana says you can cancel at any time for a prorated refund. It doesn’t publish the refund formula or any fee, and its dealer agreement refers to a cancellation fee set in the contract. If the plan was added to your loan, ask whether the refund goes to you or the lender.

Is the Carvana warranty transferable?

The 100-day Limited Warranty isn’t: it applies only to the customer named and ends when you sell the car. Carvana prints no transfer rule for CarvanaCare, and its help for sellers says extended warranties are not transferable, so check the transfer clause in your contract.