Researching and selecting the right parking lift is a challenging task. What will you do with a parking lift? Do you need full access to the underside of the car or just enough to do braking jobs and tire rotations? How big are the cars you’ll work on? How thick is the concrete slab. Is it cracked, overly coarse, out of level? Think all this through, then match the lift to your shop and needs.

Two-post lifts use two hydraulic cylinders to power four arms to lift the car in a compact space. These lifts have a wide range of capacities, install easily, and leave all the car’s mechanical systems accessible. There are several types. Base-plates run safety cables and hydraulic lines at floor level, and their shorter posts fit in lower garages. Overheads run those features in a brace tying the posts together at the top for more stability but require more clearance. Symmetrical lifts have equal-length arms and carry heavier loads, but car doors hit the posts. Asymmetrical car hoists use unequal-length arms so car doors miss the posts.

Force comes from a single hydraulic cylinder driving a maze of high-strength steel cable guided by pulleys in four-post lifts. These lifts are excellent for power train and exhaust work but difficult for suspension maintenance. A four-post lift is expensive but can be used on floors with surface-quality and thickness problems since the load is distributed more evenly and doesn’t have to be anchored down.

The least expensive and the least versatile, the scissor car elevator, or midrise lift, packs the machinery in its center, so there’s no reliable way to work on the underside of the car. It is the easiest to install though, normally requiring only 120-volt power, three inches of solid concrete, and minimal overhead clearance. This lift works by using hydraulics to open a scissor mechanism, and the car rests atop two platforms that fit inside its wheelbase. If all you want is an easy time of lifting a vehicle off all four wheels or of getting it up to a comfortable working height for brake, tire, suspension, or body work, the scissor-type lift is a good choice.