Brake pads - 2026 edition

[E30SPDFRK]

What is the current opinion on the best brake pads in 2026? Looking for a performance pad that works on the street mostly, but is capable in performance situations, and doesn't dust like crazy (pick 2/3, I know)

I've been running Porterfield R4-S pads for years, and while they're pretty good at everything, I feel there must be something better out there by now. The Porterfield's take 1 or 2 stops to get some heat in them, and they make quite a bit of dust. Never had a squeal, I like the pedal feel, and I haven't had them fade in the canyons or at an autocross ever. I have Porterfield R4 on a track only car, and the pedal feel is a bit better, but they dust way more, take longer to heat up, and require quite a bit of cooling on the track. Not what I'm looking for on a street car.

I tried the Hawk pads that everyone recommended back in ~2008 and hated them, is Hawk making anything better these days? I think they were the HP+, but its been so long.

OEM spec Pagid/Jurid/ATE don't last more than 2-3 harder stops before fading away.

I've tried EBC yellow and green pads on other cars and don't tend to like the pedal feel. I haven't tried the blue.

Does anyone have experience with the following as street/canyon pads?

Ferodo DS2500
PFC08
Hawk ER-1

Any others that I'm missing?

[2mAn]

Also interested, I feel like Porterfield is still the best option, but curious to hear from others...

[mtech325]

PFC08 is my preference of the bunch. It's what I used on my e30s previously and have it on my e46 330 daily driver currently based on recommendation from 24 Hour Lemons friends. Takes a few stops on the street to get some heat in them, but otherwise very livable and not too noisy once they break in. They dust like most track pads, but seem to wear very well on track (Sonoma, Laguna, Thunderhill) and have been easy to modulate. If PFC still had the 08 available for the front pad of the e28/e30 m3 front caliper, I would still be using them.

For track pads on my e30 I now have Porterfield R4, but they are horribly noisy like a freight train (even compared to other sporty/track pads) on the street that I had to take them off and run conventional street pads. On track they seemed to require a lot more pedal effort and heat for my driving style, but curious about the R4-S if they can still handle the occasional HPDE.

[digger]

i would just swap front setups (disc and pads) for events its maybe 1 hr to do both fronts