Car seat besafe izi or joie ispin

[Boshi]

Hi - if anyone uses either of these car seats (The besafe izi twist or joie ispin 360 stage 0/1) can you let me know what you think? Would you recommend that seat?

Joie ispin 360 - big recommendation from me! My son looks so comfy sitting in it. I started using it from 8 mo and the first carseat was cheap crap. The Joie is MUCH better quality

Both great. The Besafe is much more premium so I would recommend that one if you have the money to spend on it, especially if you have sloping seats in your car as it is designed to counteract that.

OTOH Joie Spin is great for the price and it is a little more compact in the fit, so helpful if you are lacking in space.

@BertieBotts are they similar in terms of safety? I know the ispin safe (not 360? So confusing!) got a high adac and plus rating

I have the xc90 so I think space wise we are ok. I tried the ispin 360 today and it seemed quite good, the besafe doesn’t seem to be stocked anywhere but I am willing to buy online if it’s worth the extra!

The In Car Safety Centre had a deal on the Besafe one recently and they are worth going to and offer remote after sales support. Also, have a look on Besafe's website and see if they have any stockist near you - some of the independent ERF specialists are appointment-only and don't have premises as such, but if they stock besafe it's fairly likely they would stock Joie too so you can compare.

You might want to look at tethered seats too like Besafe Stretch? If you're concerned with safety then rear facing for as long as possible is basically the best thing you can do, and this one lasts until 125cm rather than the spin ones lasting until 105cm.

In terms of the safety rating you'll see a difference between seats which are 360 degree ie can be rear facing and forward facing (Joie 360 Spin, Joie i-Spin, Besafe izi Turn) and the ones which are 180 spin ie can only rear face and spin to the side (Joie Spin Safe, Besafe izi Twist). That's because when you have a seat with several modes they take an average of the score from each mode, and forward facing seats don't do as well in crash testing as rear facing. In terms of the Swedish Plus Test, companies only usually enter the rear-facing only version of the seat because the forward facing mode would not pass. So you'll see that Joie i-Spin Safe and Besafe izi Twist are Plus tested, but Joie Spin 360 or i-Spin 360 and Besafe izi Turn are not Plus tested.

I understand that the Besafe izi Turn & Twist are identical except for the ability to lock into forward facing or not, whereas the Joie 360 Spin / Spin Safe and the i-Spin 360 / i-Spin Safe are not quite identical, they had to add an extra bump to the top of the headrest to get the Plus Test pass on the rear facing versions.

Safety wise I'd be happy with any of them, though the original Joie 360 does have notably less side impact protection if that is a concern for you.

Lastly to note that the "B" version of the Besafe seats mean that they come with the newborn insert which you need for a baby under about 6 months. If you're moving to it after the baby seat then you don't need this, if you're looking to use it from birth, then you do.

Thank you so much @BertieBotts the rotating function was quite important to me so I went ahead and bought the besafe izi twist, the price difference between joie safe and besafe twist was £28 so fingers crossed it’s the right choice!

Ah great, I hope you like it : )

Hello. We’re torn between the Joie I-spin safe and Joie ispin 360. We ideally want rear facing as long as possible but think perhaps it would be good to have the option to FF later down the line if necessary. However as it can FF the 360 hasn’t passed the plus test whereas the safe has. Do you think the 360 would pass were it only used RF? We’re just worried about committing to a RF only as we don’t have the budget to buy again.

@Summer200 This is very good question. I am also wondering on this? Any thoughts?

Thanks in advance.

Usually with these 360/180 degree seat pairs where one is plus tested and one has the forward facing option, they are literally identical seats just with the forward facing lock mechanism taken out so you can't fix it in place that way or a block added so you can't swivel it forward. They are identical otherwise so using the 360 version in RF mode is exactly as safe as the plus tested version.

But Joie is an exception to this rule, they had to make some changes to their seat to get it to pass the plus test so the RF mode of the 360 isn't quite as high performing as a plus tested seat. We're talking marginal gains. Rear facing in any seat is already very safe.

Personally if you want the option to FF later I wouldn't go for Joie anyway. Britax have a much much better track record for FF seats, or Besafe. Both of these companies have a twin set of plus tested RF spin and 360 spin seats.

How old and what's the weight/height of your child now, or is this for a newborn and do you think you're likely to have another child? All useful info in the "not buying twice" aim.