Can I use 285/35/18 rear and 275/35/18 front tires on a Chevrolet Corvette C5?

Yes, you can absolutely run a 285/35/18 rear and 275/35/18 front setup on your C5.

The main concern when changing tire sizes on this platform is keeping the Active Handling and Traction Control (AH/TC) systems happy. The factory setup uses a staggered diameter, and the computers expect the rear tires to be taller than the fronts. If the fronts are taller than the rears, or if the height difference is too extreme, the system will throw codes and intervene prematurely.

A 285/35/18 tire is approximately 25.9 inches tall, while a 275/35/18 is about 25.3 inches tall. This gives you a 0.6-inch front-to-rear stagger. The community consensus for the C5 is that as long as your rear tires are between 0.5 and 1.5 inches taller than the fronts, you will not trigger any AH/TC faults ⁷.

Other C5 owners have run this exact 285/275 combination on 18-inch wheels and confirmed that it works perfectly without making the traction control system act up ¹⁰.

Just make sure your 18-inch wheels are appropriately sized for these widths—typically, an 18x9.5 up front and an 18x10.5 in the rear will support this setup nicely.

Difficulty: Easy (Standard tire shop mount and balance)