Silver Cross Discover Car Seat Review

Quick Summary: The Silver Cross Discovery is a stylish car seat to use once your child has outgrown their harnessed seat and is then safe to travel in a high back booster. It's pretty light, so easy to move into different cars if you need it.

Things we love…

Now available in their brand new Donington colourway, the Discover is a high back booster car seat suitable for when your child outgrows their harnessed car seat and needs the next stage. Though it states it can be used from a minimum of 15kg, we would always recommend that you try and wait until your child is at least 4 years old before moving them into a high back booster to ensure that they are ready. It will then last until around 12 years old, a maximum of 36kg.

When they launched the first Brooklands collection of car seats, we loved how Silver Cross aimed to simplify car seat safety. They have their own app that you can use to find installation videos, instruction manuals and vehicle compatibility. QR codes on the side of the car seat help to get you straight to the help you need. Rather than having to pause installation videos, the fitting guide allows you to move to the next step at your own pace.

Installing the Discover can be done with or without ISOFIX and the child is secured with the vehicle seat belt. To install with ISOFIX, you first need to sit the car seat on the vehicle seat and make sure that it sits flush against the seat back, removing the vehicle headrest if it stops it from doing so. Next rotate the grey buttons on the side up from the back to extend the ISOFIX arms. Once you've connected the ISOFIX to the points in your car, the indicators on the side will turn from red to green. Make sure it is pushed up close to the vehicle seat back and you can then start placing your child in the seat.

With the child sitting in the seat, you can adjust the headrest to the correct position using the button at the back of the headrest. There are five different positions to choose from and it moves smoothly up and down.

The Side Impact Protection of the Discover opens up wider as you move the headrest higher, to allow for larger children sitting in the seat. This is a great idea to help cater for a smaller 4 year old, onto a 12 year old.

The vehicle seat belt that you are using to secure your child needs threading through the red belt guide on the headrest and then underneath the lap guides, which are like little armrests, before fastening in the buckle. The armrests ensure that the belt is kept lower over their pelvis, rather than sliding up onto their abdomen. If your child is independently fastening their own belt, car seats with arms can slightly obstruct their view of the buckle.

The whole car seat is covered in a diamond patterned material that is made from a bamboo fabric. This ensures that any moisture is wicked away from the child, helping to keep them cool while travelling in the car in warm weather.

We love the decision to use this fabric on a car seat, as it's also hypoallergenic and anti-bacterial - we all know how dirty car seats can get! Our 6 year old tester said that she was comfortable sitting in the seat.

Things to look out for…

We did find that the gap on the headrest belt guide to slide the seat belt through is quite tight, but luckily it isn't something that you'll be doing very often, unless you need to take in and out of the car.

We are sure that it's on its way, but we would love to see an i-Size version of the Silver Cross Discover too, to increase the testing that it has gone through.

Our verdict...

The Silver Cross Discovery is a stylish car seat to use once your child has outgrown their harnessed seat and is then safe to travel in a high back booster. It's pretty light, so easy to move into different cars if you need it.

The seat is nicely padded, making it comfortable for the child, and it's also easy to install and use in the car. Our tester thought the pattern on the seat was lovely!

We love what Silver Cross are doing to promote car seat safety and by trying to make the installation of their seats much simpler. The app is a great addition to the range.