For context, I drive a Toyota Yaris on 17 inch wheels. I hit a pothole and got a bubble on my front right tire (the pain of running low profile tires). Anyway, I bough these tires something like 6 months ago and only have 5000-ish kilometers on them. The other 3 still look in perfect condition. I know it’s normally recommended to replace tires in pairs, but is that really needed here considering how new the set is? Feels stupid to replace a tire that is practically new.
If you bought them only six months ago you’d be fine. I replaced a tire after a year of driving the new set and had no issues. If you’re worried you could measure the tread depth of the old ones to confirm they have most of the tread on them.
Might be worth getting a realignment also if you hit a pothole that big. That will make sure you don’t have any uneven wear issues in the future
Depending on where you live, you may be able to locate a used tire shop nearby that has a one-to-one replacement for the one with the bubble, but as @simulacra_simulacrum@lemmy.world said, six months and 5k should mean your bad tire is still basically new, and you shouldn’t have any issues replacing it with a new one
I might be wrong, but my understanding is that wheels connected by a differential need to match or you’ll cause extra wear on the diff/transmission and possibly jerky driving. Since your car is FWD, just make sure the front wheels match. Honestly 5k is hardly anything assuming you don’t hoon. I wouldn’t worry about it
