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Since it's the auto industry, there are often many different headlight options available through various packages on vehicles. So IIHS evaluated every possible combination in several scenarios, including traveling straight, veering left sharply or gradually and veering right sharply or gradually. After assessing 82 possible combinations in 31 vehicles, the non-profit said only one — the Toyota Prius v with the highest trim level — qualified as "good." That light combo is available only with the advanced technology package, which includes LED lights and high-beam assist. The standard model, which comes with halogen lights and no high-beam assist, gets a poor rating. Eleven models' best option qualified as "acceptable," while nine were "marginal" and 10 were "poor." Of the poor models, four were General Motors cars (Buick Verano, Cadillac ATS, Chevrolet Malibu and Malibu Limited), two were Hyundai and Kia models (Hyundai Sonata, Kia Optima), two were Mercedes-Benz (C-Class and CLA), one was Nissan (Altima) and one was Volkswagen (Passat). Altogether, 44 of the 82 possible options qualified as poor, with the halogen-light model on the BMW 3 Series posting the worst performance overall. Common problems cited on the models IIHS tested include excessive glare and poor low-beam visibility. Newfangled headlights that adapt to curves in the road helped some vehicles perform better, though not always. To be sure, the automakers aren't necessarily violating any regulations with poor-performing lights. "The ability to see the road ahead, along with any pedestrians, bicyclists or obstacles, is an obvious essential for drivers," IIHS said. "However, government standards for headlights, based on laboratory tests, allow huge variation in the amount of illumination that headlights provide in actual on-road driving." David Zuby, the institute’s executive vice president and chief researcher, told the Associated Press that regulations for headlights "are essentially unchanged" since the 1960s. “In the standard, they are measuring the light coming out of the light source — right in front of the light bulb, in essence — and not looking at how the light is projected down the road, which is what our tests do,” Zuby told the AP.