Consumer Safety Complaints
Search 2,215,138 safety complaints filed by vehicle owners with NHTSA — including 138,663 crashes, 56,255 fires, and 8,561 deaths.
What is a NHTSA consumer complaint?
A consumer complaint is a free-form report filed by a vehicle owner directly to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) describing a safety concern about their vehicle. NHTSA collects these reports through its Vehicle Owner Defect Report (VOQ) system and publishes them publicly. Each complaint includes the affected component, the date and circumstances of the incident, whether the failure caused a crash or fire, and any reported injuries or deaths. The owner's full narrative description is included verbatim — NHTSA does not edit or moderate the descriptions.
The database below contains over 2,215,138 individual complaints. NHTSA's investigators monitor it for clusters of similar reports — when enough owners describe the same failure mode on the same vehicle, NHTSA may open a Preliminary Evaluation that can lead to a recall. Many of the largest recalls in U.S. history, including the Takata airbag recall and the Hyundai/Kia engine fire recalls, started as patterns visible in this complaint database years before they became formal recalls.
How to interpret what you read
A few principles for reading consumer complaints usefully:
- One complaint is anecdote; a hundred similar complaints is data. NHTSA does not investigate the truthfulness of any individual report — that's the job of the Office of Defects Investigation, which looks at the full pattern. When evaluating a vehicle, look for whether multiple owners describe the same chain of events.
- Crash, fire, injury, and death flags are owner-set. They are not verified by NHTSA. They are still useful as a filter, because owners who tick those boxes are typically reporting more serious incidents than those who don't.
- Component categories are NHTSA-assigned, not owner-assigned. NHTSA standardizes the component field so that complaints can be aggregated. The owner narrative often goes into more detail than the component category captures.
- Complaint volume scales with sales volume. A best-selling model will accumulate more raw complaints than a niche model even at the same defect rate. To compare across vehicles, look at complaints per 100,000 units sold, not raw counts.
If you've experienced a defect
File a complaint. NHTSA's investigators rely on this database to detect emerging defects, and useful complaints — specific, concrete, with dates and mileage and clear descriptions of what happened — feed directly into the agency's pattern detection. The form takes about 10 minutes and is at nhtsa.gov/recalls under "Report a Safety Problem." Your complaint becomes part of the same public record that this page is built from. Owners filing detailed VOQs are how recalls get triggered.
Read more from our blog
Showing 60,583 complaints for KIA
Incident date: Dec 18, 2024
I have had a recurring problem for years that the dealership has been unable to resolve. Occasionally while we are at a stop, and the engine auto off system kicks in, and then I tried to go again, the car stalls completely. Battery tests fine. It does not restart until sometimes after I open and close my driver side door a couple of times which I assume reboots the electrical system in some manner... Read more
Incident date: Jan 4, 2025
The winnebago EKKO has a secondardy alternator (Balmer brand) that charges the coach Lithium battery. There is an existing Winnebago recall regarding this component , Winnebago #174 and I originally had the Balmer alternator fail in summer 2023 and it was repaired by Winnebago under the #174 recall. The Balmer alternator has now failed again as of January 2025, and is appearing to heat beyond n... Read more
Incident date: Feb 20, 2025
I took my Hyundai Ionqi 5 Electric Set AWD in for two recalls. After picking up the car, I left the car dealership and merged onto the highway. Within 1-2 minutes after I left the dealership, the dashboard was flashing red circle with an exclamation point that said the electrical system was low. I could no longer accelerate. I proceeded to move to the right with traffic traveling 60-70 mph. I w... Read more
Incident date: Nov 12, 2024
Loud clicking when turning sharply left and right, believe it’s related to faulty axel or CV joints on vehicle. Only 1500 miles on odometer.
Incident date: Feb 13, 2025
When making turn left or right there is a noticeable cracking, ticking, knocking noise coming from suspension, sometimes it feels that i am about to loose the control of the steering. Went to Honda Dealership where I purchased the vehicle located at 35 Magee Ave, Stamford, CT 06902 they diagnosed the vehicle and confirmed that there was a noise due to faulty CV Axle Joint, however refused to fix i... Read more
Incident date: Feb 14, 2025
The car is a 2020 Kia Telluride. It was purchased in August 2023 at the time it was leaking oil took it back to the dealer and they replaced the housing put in a new filter and said all was good .For a year. it constantly needed oil took it back to the dealer, said that everything was fine. I would be driving and the car would stop. The oil lamp would come on and I would have to drive and put more... Read more
Incident date: Feb 14, 2025
Parasitic battery drain when vehicle is turned off. The DCM module in these vehicles will not shut off properly and continue to drain the battery. Subaru has firmware on the vehicle that will not fully charge the battery when driving to save fuel. The vehicle has had 6 or more instances over the past two weeks where the car was undriveable unless jumped from another vehicle or a boost device is us... Read more
Incident date: Feb 14, 2025
Parasitic battery drain when vehicle is turned off. The DCM module in these vehicles will not shut off properly and continue to drain the battery. Subaru has firmware on the vehicle that will not fully charge the battery when driving to save fuel. The vehicle has had 6 or more instances over the past two weeks where the car was undriveable unless jumped from another vehicle or a boost device is us... Read more
KIA
CARNIVAL HYBRID
(2025) — POWER TRAIN
Feb 20, 2025
Incident date: Feb 20, 2025
My 2022 Manual transmission has been making a scraping sound when cold since I bought it. I've had 2 dealerships not do anything about it and I feel for paying $65,000 for a vehicle, it shouldn't be making this noise and it could be a safety concern.
KIA
CARNIVAL HYBRID
(2025) — ENGINE
Feb 20, 2025
Incident date: Feb 19, 2025
I just got on the freeway and traveled about two miles into driving without any warning engine begin to lose power than stalled. I immediately pulled over checked out all fluid levels were good. There were no leakage present and no codes came up on instrumental panel,and still unable to start car.We had my pilot towed to a mechanic shop 20 miles from where incident happened. When mechanic looked o... Read more
Incident date: Feb 14, 2025
To whom it may concern, I spun out on the highway in slippery conditions and hit the guard rail, probably at 50-60mph and none of the airbags deployed. I contacted KIA and even though the car is located at their dealership they have not even bothered to move this along and get it inspected. The insurance company sent an estimator to check, and I am waiting to see if they would repair or total i... Read more
Crash
Incident date: Feb 18, 2025
My EV6 lost power while driving on a busy street. It went into 'Turtle Mode' which allowed me to pull off onto a side road and then all power to the car went out and the car stopped on the side road. I was honked at a couple of times while trying to get off the busy street. The tow truck driver put a power pack on the car and shifted it into neutral and was able to move the car. The dealer d... Read more
Incident date: Feb 18, 2025
vehicle has 2900 miles, it has a noticeable hum/whining sound coming from rear end area. sound is very pronounced at 46-50 mph under throttle. Issue has been addressed with a local dealership. They found metal shavings in the rear end assembly. Their assessment is such that the rear differential has prematurely failed. They recomend replacing the rear differential carrier at 2900 mi, mind you. Tha... Read more
Incident date: Feb 18, 2025
There's alot of time while I'm driving in line going slowly and break pedal become hard and it will seem like the truck it's not stopping.
Incident date: Feb 13, 2025
The contact owns a 2018 Ford Focus. The contact stated while driving 14 MPH, the accelerator pedal was depressed; however, the vehicle failed to accelerate as intended, and the transmission was slipping while shifting between first and second gear. No warning light was illuminated. The vehicle was taken to an independent mechanic; however, no cause of the failure was found. The vehicle was not rep... Read more
Incident date: Feb 13, 2025
The contact owns a 2018 Ford Focus. The contact stated while driving 14 MPH, the accelerator pedal was depressed; however, the vehicle failed to accelerate as intended, and the transmission was slipping while shifting between first and second gear. No warning light was illuminated. The vehicle was taken to an independent mechanic; however, no cause of the failure was found. The vehicle was not rep... Read more
Incident date: Feb 14, 2025
The windshield wiper sprayers don't work properly when it gets significantly below freezing. This is incredibly dangerous on highways where it snows and the roads are salted, allowing for the snow to be thrown up as mud. This ends up in the windshield wipers just spreading mud all over the windshield and reducing visibility to near 0. Having this occur while driving at lower highway speeds makes t... Read more
Incident date: Feb 14, 2025
So I found a recall on a twenty twenty two malibu l t one point five liter turbo, which is exactly what I have, and the recall describes my exact issue to the t. It spits out a code for a bad fuel pump. G d I fuel pump, and a couple other codes that are secondary like the camshaft sensor fuel bank 1, solenoids, which both I had replaced this week? The car barely has a 100000 miles, and despite ... Read more
Incident date: Feb 4, 2025
The ABS module is reporting a C2200 error indicating replacement of the module and it seems to be a systemic problem with this module. Chrysler has the part backordered and I understand people have been waiting over a year to get one. I hope you can put pressure on Jeep to get these parts out or issue a recall.
Incident date: Feb 18, 2025
I have had a recurring problem for years that the dealership has been unable to resolve. Occasionally while we are at a stop, and the engine auto off system kicks in, and then I tried to go again, the car stalls completely. Battery tests fine. It does not restart until sometimes after I open and close my driver side door a couple of times which I assume reboots the electrical system in some manner... Read more
Incident date: Feb 19, 2025
Intermittent air bag light come and goes Window fluid leaking Power steering leaking Bad reception AM radio (Lots static)
Incident date: Feb 19, 2025
Water leaked into front floors of vehicle soaking the carpet and the fuse panels in the floor. Yes it is available. Fuse boxes had standing water building up behind them slowly dumping water into them causing shorts in electrical system which could have caused the car to catch on fire. Yes the problem has been confirmed. No the vehicle has not been inspected by anyone other than mechanic. The ... Read more
Incident date: Feb 19, 2025
Water leaked into front floors of vehicle soaking the carpet and the fuse panels in the floor. Yes it is available. Fuse boxes had standing water building up behind them slowly dumping water into them causing shorts in electrical system which could have caused the car to catch on fire. Yes the problem has been confirmed. No the vehicle has not been inspected by anyone other than mechanic. The ... Read more
Incident date: Aug 15, 2024
We were going south on [XXX] about 25 mph intending to make a left turn onto [XXX] My wife said “slow down or you won’t make the turn” to which I replied “I am trying but it won’t slow down” As I applied the brakes to slow down to turn, instead the car started to speed up and I could not make the left turn. I continued down the road trying to slow down enough to attempt a left turn o... Read more
Crash
2 injured
Incident date: Aug 15, 2024
The contact owns a 2020 Ford Explorer. The contact stated that the vehicle was taken to an independent mechanic for a routine oil change. While driving at 35 MPH, the vehicle began to make an abnormal knocking and squealing sound. The vehicle began to jerk. The driver turned off the vehicle. There were no warning lights illuminated. The contact stated that the failure was like the failure listed i... Read more
Incident date: Aug 15, 2024
The contact owns a 2020 Ford Explorer. The contact stated that the vehicle was taken to an independent mechanic for a routine oil change. While driving at 35 MPH, the vehicle began to make an abnormal knocking and squealing sound. The vehicle began to jerk. The driver turned off the vehicle. There were no warning lights illuminated. The contact stated that the failure was like the failure listed i... Read more
Incident date: Feb 19, 2025
The contact owns a 2024 Honda Prologue. The contact stated that while making left turns, there was a knocking sound coming from the front driver’s side wheel well. The cause of the failure was not yet determined. The local dealer was notified of the failure. The manufacturer was not contacted. The failure mileage was 2,401.
Incident date: Dec 11, 2024
Small amount of weight such as keys or phone is triggering the Occupant sensor in the front passenger seat. This issue just started and I am finding a lot of complaints regarding this.
KIA
CARNIVAL HYBRID
(2025) — SUSPENSION
Feb 19, 2025
Incident date: Feb 14, 2025
The vehicle violently shakes after hitting minor bumps on the road. The steering wheel shakes not allowing you to have control of the vehicle. The vehicle can hit another vehicle or roll over due to this defect. This is a serious issue linked to poor quality parts and craftsmanship from the manufacturer. This can cause serious injury or death if not fixed immediately. This also causes the ali... Read more
Incident date: Jan 19, 2025
A significant knocking sound can be heard from my truck during cold start and when at idle and remains an issue that Ford did not address as part of their Customer Satisfaction Program 21N03 issued on March 21, 2021. That specific CSP specifically excluded my model (Ford F-150 Raptor) from the program; however, my vehicle exhibits the exact same cam phaser issues and has already been identified b... Read more
Incident date: Feb 17, 2025
All warning lights cycle through on vehicle dashboard after turning on vehicle. Vehicle was taken to Honda Auto Service Center, where issue is diagnosed as Carbon Buildup, causing misfires. Error Diagnostic Code is one of P0300 - P0304. After maintenance, error clears out. However, there is a Honda Service Bulletin 23-042 which provides a warranty extension for Honda Fits of the same year, make, a... Read more
Incident date: Oct 7, 2024
While driving almost complete loss of steering. Very hard to turn. After a battery reset, it corrected, but very short lived. I was able to get the vehicle home, but has been undriveable since. Now there is absolutely no steering at all, the rack and pinion is completely locked. The only warning light is the "service power steering" light on the dash, no codes in the computer. Through research, ... Read more
Incident date: Oct 7, 2024
Front is very low. Right side is tilted without anyone inside. Very unusual tire wear on inside edges of both front tires. Immediately after starting the engine the front ricked side took side and made loud noises.
Incident date: Feb 18, 2025
The rear self leveling shocks continually break. They do not last, no recall given even though multiple people say they have same problem.
Incident date: Jan 24, 2025
In a car accident I got into, my car’s airbags did not deploy like they should have and therefore I got greater injuries than I should have. I believe I hit the steering wheel and I did hurt my chest. Both my elbows were sore as well and as well as both my knees had big bruises on them. My right knee to this day still has a bruise/mark on it, which still does not feel the same since then. Very... Read more
Crash
1 injured
Incident date: Jan 24, 2025
The contact owns a 2022 Ford Bronco Sport. The contact stated while driving on the highway at 55 MPH, the vehicle lost automotive power. The contact was left stranded in the middle of the highway. The contact stated that after 10 minutes the "Battery Charging" message was displayed. The contact restarted the vehicle and was able to continue driving to the residence. The vehicle was towed to a loca... Read more
Incident date: Jan 24, 2025
FUEL RAIL SYSTEM - The check engine light came on after only three days/156 miles! OnStar was contacted and a diagnostic was run indicating "The Engine and Transmission System is not performing as expected. An issue has been detected in the Fuel Management System used to maintain control and monitor fuel consumption." I took the vehicle back to the dealership and was advised that the fuel rail ... Read more
Incident date: Feb 12, 2025
The vehicle has an oil consumption issue whereby I top off the oil in about every 400 miles. The dealership indicated that this is a known problem with Audi. The issue first started with warnings that engine is overheating and with further warnings that oil level is low
Incident date: Feb 12, 2025
Spark plug for damaged due to oil seeping into it. This could lead to overheating of engine or cylinders getting damaged potentially leading to vehicle malfunction when I drive. Audi inspected the part and recommended to reseal the top of the engine. There was a warning for check engine which led to identifying the problem
Incident date: Feb 17, 2025
The contact owns a 2014 Ford Escape. The contact stated while driving at an undisclosed speed, the contact became aware of white smoke coming from the engine compartment. The vehicle was driven to the residence. The vehicle was later taken to an independent mechanic where it was diagnosed with a coolant leak from the radiator hose. The contact was informed that the radiator hose needed to be repla... Read more
Incident date: Nov 9, 2024
The rear self leveling shocks continually break. They do not last, no recall given even though multiple people say they have same problem.
Incident date: Feb 18, 2025
The engine hesitated going up a hill by my house. I’ve gone up the hill many times in this truck and other cars and never had the problem. I turned it off and started it again but I do t know if I should keep driving. The dealer says I can’t get the recall done yet.
Incident date: Feb 2, 2025
The brakes randomly stop working. At random times you go to brake and have to push the pedal all the way to the floor to start stopping. 2nd issue. The car dies and looses all power at intermittent times while driving. The car has to be restarted while driving. Could be driving 70 on a hwy or 30 on a residential street. Either coast to the side of the road to restart... or quickly put t... Read more
Incident date: Feb 7, 2025
UNKNOWN WHEN I GET SHUT OFF AND IT GIVE ME SIGNAL WITH ENGINE AND I BRING IT TO KIA DEALER AND FOUND OUT THAT MY 2022 KIA SOUL HAD PIN IN CVVT BROKEN AND REPLACE EXHAUST CAM AND CVVT ASSEMBLY AND ITS COST ME ALMOST 3000 DOLLAR TO FIX AND I HAD IT AS 2022 AND PURCHASED BY CHEVELOTE AND IT WAS NOT COVERAGE BY WARRANTY BUT I BOUGHT IT WAS 18,000 MILEAGE AND NOW I AM AT 64525 MILEAGE AND I HAD ONLY L... Read more
Incident date: Feb 7, 2025
Vehicle was recently purchased and brought in to service recall 22-01-030H (TCU Update and IVT Replacement) Fred Bean Hyundai of Langhorne (1106 E Lincoln Highway, Langhorne, PA, 19047) did the software update, but refuses to honor the IVT replacement as part of the recall, despite the transmission not working and needing to be towed to the dealership. They are attempting to charge me a minimum $... Read more
Incident date: Feb 7, 2025
The complaints describe instances where the engine shuts off unexpectedly, often while the vehicle is moving at a slow speed. Sometimes, the vehicle shifts into park and applies the emergency brake automatically. Additionally, the vehicles sometimes cannot be restarted, and drivers have reported seeing a malfunction warning light with a battery fault symbol on the dashboard. This i found on the i... Read more
Incident date: Feb 12, 2025
On Friday, February 14. 2025 at approximately 9:05 am I was leaving a parking lot to make a right hand turn on to a busy three lane road. Since this issue with the brakes has occurred three times previously I make it a point to drive no more than 10 mph in parking lots. The pavement was dry, then there was a 3 foot patch of thin ice, then the pavement was dry to the stop sign at the road. I presse... Read more
Incident date: Dec 19, 2024
My car has a start and stop problem and the dealer reprogram the ecm but it didn't work got back on the road and almost got hit twice bc my car went into limp mode. And they won't fix up unless I pay even know it's a recall and my drive shaft has a recall but they said that was close out
Incident date: Feb 14, 2025
Vehicle has been experiencing intermittent instances of non movement when gas pedal has been pushed. This has come about sporadically and only been rectified only when vehicle driver has repeated action of "pumping" the gas pedal. In this instances, the situation has put driver and occupants at risk as it happens without warning, not allowing vehicle to drive when cars are fast approaching. Driver... Read more
Incident date: Oct 26, 2024
The Alternator/MGU has failed. There was a mild whuring noise at first. Within a few days, the truck died at a stop light and would no longer start or go into neutral. I got two warnings, one the day before the failure saying "Battery saver activated", then right before the truck died, I got this again and the alternator light lit up on the dash. With almost zero warning of this failure, we ended ... Read more