The tires are closer than the badges suggest

In LT285/70R17 Load Range E, the Falken Wildpeak M/T and the BFGoodrich Mud-Terrain T/A KM3 are both rated 121/118Q and both carry 3,195 lb at 80 psi. If you are choosing between them for payload or towing headroom, you are choosing on nothing — the numbers are the same, because they are the industry-standard figures for the size and load range rather than anything either company engineered independently.

What differs is everything around that: how much rubber you start with, how much mass you are spinning, and how much of the construction each manufacturer is prepared to publish.

Where the Falken wins on paper

The Wildpeak starts at 20/32″ against the KM3’s 18/32″. That is roughly 11% more usable tread, and on a pair of tires where neither manufacturer offers a mileage warranty, depth is the only wear-life number a buyer can actually check before handing over money.

The Falken is also lighter — 63.3 lb against 67 lb, about 15 lb of unsprung, rotating mass across a set of four. On a mid-size truck or a Wrangler that shows up in steering effort, in how the truck stops, and in the fuel figure. Our guide to mud tires and fuel economy covers why mass matters more than tread pattern there.

Falken also publishes its sidewall construction: three-ply DURASPEC with two high ply turn-ups. That is a specification, stated by the manufacturer, that a buyer can hold them to.

What BFGoodrich publishes instead

BFGoodrich does not publish a ply count for the KM3 anywhere we could find. What it publishes instead is a set of comparisons against its own predecessor, the KM2: Krawl-TEK compound for 8% better traction on rock, Mud-Phobic shoulder bars for 5% better mud traction, and a sidewall it describes as 27% tougher on internal puncture testing.

Those are real engineering claims, and the Linear Flex Zone — designed to let the casing wrap around obstacles when aired down — addresses something a ply count does not measure. But they are all measured against a BFGoodrich tire from 2015, not against the Falken. The honest position is that on published specifications, the sidewall question between these two cannot be settled: one company gives you a number, the other gives you a percentage improvement over itself.

A load-rating discrepancy worth knowing about

Sources disagree on the KM3’s rating in this size. Tire Rack and SimpleTire list it as 126/123Q carrying 3,750 lb; 4 Wheel Parts, OnlineTires and tiresize — all citing BFGoodrich article number 53313 — list 121/118Q at 3,195 lb. The lower figure matches the standard for LT285/70R17 Load E and matches every competitor in the size, so that is what we have used.

We flag it rather than quietly picking one because the gap is 555 lb per tire. If you are buying to a specific axle load, read the sidewall on the tire in front of you, not a spec table.

The load range trap in this exact size

Falken offers LT285/70R17 in Load Range C as well as E. The C is a genuinely different tire — 116/113Q, 18/32″ rather than 20/32″, 61.3 lb, and 2,755 lb at 50 psi. It is easy to buy by accident from a listing that shows only the size, and a buyer who wanted the E casing will be short 440 lb per corner.

Check the part number, not the size. Load range explained covers what the letters actually commit the manufacturer to.

What neither of them does

Neither carries a mileage warranty. Neither carries a UTQG rating — normal for light-truck-sized tires, which are exempt. And neither carries the three-peak mountain snowflake, so neither is a severe-snow tire whatever the tread looks like. Falken states the snow position outright on its own site; BFGoodrich simply does not claim it. Our snow guide covers what that certification does and does not mean.

Which one to buy

If you want more tread and less mass, the Falken is the better tire on paper and it tells you more about how it is built. If you want the aired-down casing behaviour BFGoodrich has spent two generations engineering, and you are buying at the low end of the KM3’s price range, the KM3 earns it.

Price is the part that should decide it, and it moves. On 10 September 2026 the KM3 ranged from $339.99 to $404.49 across retailers on the same day, and the Falken from $303.96 to $400.00. There is more spread inside each model than there is between them. Shop the size and the part number; the badge is the least important variable here.