Best Jeep Lift Kits For Highway Driving – 2022 Guide

Lift kits let you personalize your rig just a little more. 

Lifted Jeeps are great. They can tackle tougher backroads, tow heavier loads, and even run a plow.

If your Jeep isn’t purely an off-roader, then factor that into your buying decision. This guide is for those who commute on the highway as much as they tear up the hills.

Comparison of the Best Jeep Lift Kits for Highway Driving

Characteristics of Our Favorite Jeep Lift Kits for Highway Driving

The best Jeep Lift Kits for highway driving must account for the needs of the highway driver. Specifically, highway drivers are concerned with road feel, visibility, handling, and the ability to haul or plow. 

The best quality lift kits provide functionality as well as aesthetics. Most cheaper lift kits raise the body of your Jeep, giving it that cool and aggressive appearance, but will not account for the necessary functional alterations needed to compensate for the extra height. If you get extra height without any adaptation, your vehicle will not perform as well as it did before the lift job.

On a highway lift kit, we look, specifically, for an extension, ease of installation, ground clearance, the weight of components, angle adjustments, weight balancing, and steering stabilization. These last two factors are worth breaking down a little.

Steering Stabilization 

This is necessary to account for the altered handling of a lifted vehicle. It ensures that you have adequate control over the Jeep’s new center of gravity. 

Weight Balancing 

This is important to account for the additional weight of the lift kit components. It also is necessary to account for the adjusted weight distribution of a raised vehicle. If your vehicle does not account for this, you have a higher risk of rolling.

Review of the Best Jeep Lift Kits for Highway Driving

There are a lot of benefits to a lifted vehicle. However, the right lift kit for off-roading is not necessarily the right kit for highway driving. Different jobs require different tools. When highway driving, you generally want a lower lift, better handling, and a reliable road feel. Here are our favorite kits for the job:

Check out this article on how much does it cost to lift a wrangler by Your Jeep Guide.

Why Get a Jeep Lift Kit for Highway Driving?

It’s important to factor highway driving into the equation when buying a lift kit. Most Jeeps see a lot of highway miles. Let’s be honest, if you use your Jeep for off-roading, you need to get there somehow. Most of the time, that involves taking the highway.

On the highway, you generally want a medium-size lift. If you raise your Jeep too much, it is going to increase chance of rollover, hurt your mileage too much, bring on other stability issues such as death wobble, and cost you a ton in other components like adjustable control arms, toe-kits, etc.

A lift kit  can bring some bonuses to highway driving though. Obviously, it makes your Jeep look great. But it can drastically improve visibility and therefore, safety. The last thing you want to do when switching lanes is to strain to see around the car in front of you. 

One of the advantages of a lift kit is that it enables you to install larger tires. Larger tires are great for highway driving, especially if you are in a northern climate and have to worry about ice or snow. 

When driving on the highway, you want to increase visibility and tire size without losing handling or road feel.

What Size of Lift Kit Do I Need For Highway Driving? 

The rule of thumb for lifting a truck driven on the highway tends to be that you should stick with a small to medium lift of 1-2.5″. While increased tire size and visibility are huge perks, it’s important not to lose too much road feel or handling when traveling at higher speeds. 

With a small to medium kit, you retain the basic factory design of the Jeep, which is important when accounting for safety features and testing, as the engineers accounted for highway driving with their stock components.

Another thing to consider is your drivetrain. If you lift your Jeep over 2.5 inches, you will likely need to replace some drivetrain components.

What Are The Components of a Jeep Lift Kit? 

For the most part, there are two kinds of lift kits: body lifts and suspension lifts. These two types use different components and serve different purposes. Here’s a quick breakdown of the common components featured in a Jeep lift kit. 

Lift Kit Components 

1. Rubber spacer pucks: These pucks simply sit between the body and frame to give extra height. They do not require meddling with the suspension or any major disassembly.
2. Coil spring spacers: Coil spring spacers are spacers that raise the body of the Jeep. Typically, they do not require a full replacement of the springs. They add a few extra inches without much hassle.
3. Front and rear brake line brackets: Typically, you will need to install extended brake line brackets on a lifted vehicle to account for the altered height.
4. Front and rear shock relocation brackets: These add clearance from the shock on the axle shaft. 
5. Rear track bar bracket: These are important to account for handling on a lifted vehicle. They lower the risk of rolling.
6. Sway bar links: Sway bar links not only account for the extended height but the new angle on a lifted vehicle, too.

Benefits of Investing in a Quality Jeep Lift Kit for Highway Driving 

When it comes to lift kits, there is a wide range of cheap options available. We don’t usually recommend buying one of these cheaper options. If you plan to use your kit functionally, then it’s worth forking out a bit more and picking up a quality lift kit. 

A good quality lift kit will let you make the most of your Jeep, both off-road and on-road. If on the highway, you might need to use a plow or pull a trailer. A plow is of particular concern if you live in an area badly affected by cold weather. A lower quality kit might look good but will run the risk of failing when you need it most.

If you’re plowing on the highway, you need to account for many things. First, be sure that your Jeep’s wheels aren’t being crushed by the bumper or fender, which can occur if the plow weighs too much for the stock level of clearance. A quality lift kit will have the strength and support to lift a plow. Also, you need the proper height to see over traffic and obstacles to ensure that you’re plowing safely. Finally, you need to retain full handling and suspension to account for winter conditions. With a cheap kit, all of these factors are at risk.

How to Install Jeep Lift Kit 

Lifting a Jeep requires getting your hands a little dirty. If you have a little mechanical knowledge, you can do much of this work yourself. If you are unfamiliar with your Jeep’s specs, then leave modification work to a trained professional. Jeopardizing the integrity or safety of your Jeep isn’t worth saving a few bucks!

Here are the basic steps involved in lifting a Jeep:

1. Remove wheels and tires.
   
   
2. Remove the bolt securing the front track bar to the axle.
   
   
3. Remove sway bar links.
   
   
4. Remove the shock.
   
   
5. Remove the brake line bracket if necessary.
   
   
6. Remove coil springs.
   
   
7. Remove lower control arm bolts.
   
   
8. Install new control arm.
   
   
9. Install arm on the axle.
   
   
10. Install bump stop.
    
    
11. Install front coil springs.
    
    
12. Remove the tie rod.
    
    
13. Remove pitman arm.
    
    
14. Install a new pitman arm.
    
    
15. Install the shock.
    
    
16. Remove the stock stabilizer.
    
    
17. Install track bar bracket and crush sleeve.
    
    
18. Install hardware.
    
    
19. Move the bracket required amount and rotate the tie rod a sufficient amount.
    
    
20. Install stabilizer.
    
    
21. Install track bar.
    
    
22. Repeat work on the rear sway bar.
    
    
23. Install the brake line bracket.
    
    
24. Reinstall brake line.
    
    
25. Repeat work on rear shocks.
    
    
26. Repeat work on rear coil springs.
    
    
27. Adapt track bar.
    
    
28. Install sway bar links.
    
    
29. Install bump stop spacers.
    
    
30. Install rear shocks.
    
    
31. Attach brackets.
    
    
32. Tighten control arms.
    
    
33. Adjust the drag link to the center steering wheel.

We have provided a quick overview of the steps involved in lifting your Jeep. For a more thorough breakdown of the process, please watch the video included below.  

Visit this article to know more about How to Get Jeep Factory Build Sheet.

Conclusion 

There are a lot of great lift kits out there. The right one for you depends largely on the job at hand. In this case, we were looking specifically at highway driving. 

Quick Summary – Best Jeep Lift Kits For Highway Driving

Before you head out, here’s a quick recap of the best Jeep lift kits for highway driving:

1. TeraFlex 1155200
2. Rough Country 635 Lift Kit
3. MotoFab Full Lift Kit

People Also Ask

Of course, there is a lot more that we could say about lifting a Jeep. We barely scratched the surface in this guide. 

We also know that you’re likely itching to get back out there. To make things easy, we threw together a quick FAQ.