White letters out on tires or no?

I'm getting new tires on my 4runner this week. Now, I can stand one up against the wheel with white letters out and one with white letters inside, but I thought I would get y'alls opinions based on your personal experience. Does one look dramatically better than the other, or are they both good and it just comes down to personal preference?
I have a red SR5.

 

Directional tires have an inside and an outside, so if you have to mount those accordingly. If the tread isn't directional, it's up to personal preference.

 

There will be lots of factors that could lead to a decision, but ultimately it's up to your personal preference. I think that it would look out of place against the Barcelona Red color unless you had other white decals or accents on the car.

 

Personal preference, but I'm a fan of white letters out.

 

Does owner’s age play a role in deciding? Apparently, with me, it did. In year’s past, I went with the white lettering showing out on many of my vehicles tires. Most recently, with my 2006 Tundra SR5 Double Cab TRD 4WD that I bought new, and recently sold last November to get into my current 2022 T4R.

I bought AT tires for my T4R shortly after I bought it, and had them installed white lettering facing IN. So I guess I have personally out-grown white lettered tires. (I am presently aged 68.)

But, regardless of age, I think maybe it’s still a matter of preference. You do you. I have nothing against white lettering. They look cool when I see a vehicle with them. I guess I was just ready for a change. Oh, incidentally, my T4R happens to be white.

Keeping the white on white lettered tires clean and bright looking may be a factor to consider for you. It’s a bummer to have white lettered tires all grimy and dirty from brake dust and road grime. Cosmetically, white letter tires are more upkeep I think.

 

white letters out = no
white letters in = yes

 

Some folks like white letters, others don't. The only opinion that matters is your own.

Here's a picture grabbed from a Google image search for reference:

 

White letters out, absolutely. RWL for the win.

 

You're better at Googling than me I tried to find something like this but couldn't. I think when I try to search things on the internet, they send me down the stupid internet.
I think it looks really good like that, but to another responder's point, do I want the high maintenance of having to clean those frequently to keep them looking good?

 

I'm going to do this to my ride on my next set of tires. I think it'll help set off the "Vintange" look of my 4Runner.

OP, I vote for outlined white lettering.

 

I'm not sure what kind of "high maintenance" is required. Here's what my KO2's looked like after about 14 months and ~29K miles of use, and no effort whatsoever towards keeping them clean.

 

It's strictly a matter of personal preference. Nobody else notices or cares.

 

Correction: Nobody else MATTERS. Lots of others notice & care, but who gives a shit what they think, right? It's the OP's ride & money. He can (and should) do whatever he wants to it to make himself happy.

 

That hurts, man. You mean everyone isn't going to be looking at my 4runner and thinking, "That guy must be really cool?"

 

FTR, I don't care what others think about how my car looks, I just wanted to gauge if others chose one way or another and if they were happy with it.

 

So this is a vote for white letters out. I really like the way it looks, but was concerned about keeping them clean. Your post leads me to believe that won't be a concern.

 

Slightly off-topic, but when you buy new tires do they require you to give up your old tires or charge a little more? You know, it seems like they do that with batteries, because the liberals are afraid everyone is gonna bury the batteries in their backyard and kill the earth, so there is some kind of core deposit charge that incentivizes you to turn in your old battery for "proper disposal."
I want to either get a couple of bucks for my old tires (that have about a quarter of their tread life left), or if no one wants to buy them I thought about using them as planters in my garden.
I tried googling for the answer, but once again they sent me down the stupid Internet. I guess I don't know how to phrase the search terms, lol

 

Usually they will charge you a disposal fee for the old tires...IF you don't want the tires, they shouldn't charge you anything if you keep them...BUT that depends on where you buy them from....on the batteries they recycle the lead in the batteries, so there's a charge either way if you keep the old one or not.

 

Thank you. I buy my tires at Sam's Club and have never been charged a fee that I know of to dispose of the tires. I believe that's built into their cost of doing business.

 

Haha. Rick, I think age does have something to do with the choice. But in my case it works the other way. When I was younger I would get the tires mounted with white letters in, for fear of looking too flashy. Now I like the white letters out. Makes me think of my 4Runner as a Hot Wheel or Matchbox car.

 

I think white letters would look good with red. I'm all silver and black, so no white letters for me.

 

U do U!

I have the white side in on my ride as that’s the way I like it.

Do whatever makes you happy!!

Cheers,
Bob

 

When I bought my new AT style tires at my local Discount Tire less than a year ago, my existing all season style tires had tons of life left on them. I told my tire guy right up front that I was going to take my old tires with me to eventually re-sell them. So I asked him not to charge me any disposal fee on the old tires. He said he couldn’t do that, they had to list the fee on the bill. But he said what he could do was just deduct the disposal fee amount off of the price of the new tires. That was fine with me, I said whatever works. And so he did. It wasn’t much to fret over, but to me it was the principal of the thing. I thought I’ll be damned if I’m going to pay their stupid disposal fee if I was taking my old tires back with me.

And even over and above that, a lot of these shops and stores still tack other charges and fees on to your bill these days- Shop supplies, core charges, other environmental fees, etc.

 

I like them out BUT always put them in because they get dirty to fast and look crappy if they are not bright and clean. I am not going to clean them every three days.

 

Same. I used to think white letters out was a little gaudy, now I think it looks cool. I'm 60.

 

ThatBassGuy would differ with you (comment above). He claims no extra effort was required to keep them clean.

 

When I'm elected president, I'm going to mandate white lettering/white outlined tires and chrome bumpers/mirror caps & rocker panels.

I will make it illegal to have raptor lights.

• Vote @Borracho Loco in 2024!

 

All my WHITE letter tires always looked like GRAY letter tires after a short time UNLESS I was CONSTANTLY cleaning them.

 

Borracho Loco 2024!
I just have one question, what are raptor lights?

 

They are these (AKA: One of the dumbest mod's one can do to their truck).