Vehicle Reliability Statistics
Headline findings from the federal owner-complaint and recall record — each one a live count from the database, with the full dataset free to download and cite. The numbers update every week.
Vehicles With the Most Complaints and No Recall
Across model years 2005–2025, 1,035 distinct vehicle-and-component failure patterns have drawn enough NHTSA owner complaints to clear our threshold without a single recall for that component. The largest gap: the 2018 Ford Escape engine, with 1,142 complaints and no recall on record.
1,035 unrecalled failure patterns ›The Failures That Hit Right After the Warranty Ends
4,782 failure patterns have a median reported failure mileage past the 60,000-mile powertrain warranty. The median across all of them is 80,000 miles — the typical covered defect surfaces just after coverage ends.
4,782 post-warranty failure patterns ›The Worst Transmissions, 2005–2025
The Ford 6F35 leads with 30,437 NHTSA complaints across 61 model-year entries, against 112 recalls.
10 transmission families ›Engine Families by Complaint Volume
The Hyundai/Kia Theta II 2.4L leads with 26,427 NHTSA complaints — about 629.2 per model-year entry across 42 of them.
21 engine families ›Where Owners Report Fires, Crashes, and Injuries
Owners alleged 10,672 fires and 1,049 deaths across 13,539 failure patterns in the federal complaint record. These are unverified consumer allegations, ranked here to show where the most severe outcomes are reported.
13,539 harm-flagged failure patterns ›Every figure derives from NHTSA public-record complaints and recalls. Methodology is documented on each page; raw datasets live in the Data Center.