I would argue against that, based on personal and fleet data. You can search “3.5 EcoBoost” UOAs here, and you will find 99% of the sensationalists screaming
5k OCIs or DIE!! but yet when you look at a good oil (HPL PCEO) going 15-20k OCIs with hundreds of idle hours in some of the harshest conditions known, and there are zero failures or other issues… that’s not a function of the engine.
That’s because the oil is more robust and more resistant to oxidation. I went from subpar 6k OCIs with Ravenol DXG to 15k OCIs using the
cheaper yet more robust HPL PCEO & No VII oils with 2.5x longer OCIs. There certainly are some engines that are super easy on oils (Ford Vulcan 3.0 & 4.6 are some) that can go ridiculous distances on just about any oil. But there is definitely a higher tier of oils that show statistically significant performance differences on some of the more difficult engine families.