What is MacPherson Strut?
The MacPherson strut is a widely used front suspension design that combines the shock absorber and steering pivot into a single compact strut assembly.
The MacPherson strut is a suspension design named after Earle S. MacPherson, an engineer who developed the layout in the 1940s while working for General Motors before it saw wider adoption at Ford. The design combines the shock absorber and coil spring into a single strut unit that also serves as the upper steering pivot point, reducing the number of separate suspension components compared to older designs.
Because the strut assembly handles multiple jobs at once, MacPherson strut suspensions are relatively compact and lightweight, and they require less space than more complex multi-arm suspension designs. This makes them well suited to smaller, front-wheel-drive cars where engine bay space is at a premium, and the design has become one of the most common front suspension layouts on mainstream production vehicles worldwide.
The tradeoff for this simplicity is generally less precise control over wheel geometry as the suspension moves through its travel compared to a double wishbone setup, since the strut's single upper mounting point limits how camber and other geometry factors can be tuned independently. For this reason, many performance-focused or luxury vehicles use double wishbone or multi-link suspension instead, reserving MacPherson struts mainly for cost- and space-conscious applications.