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What breaks

Which Cars Have the Most Engine Problems

Every complaint filed about this part since 1995, by model, by model year, and by the mileage it failed at.

4 min read · 242 figures, all from the federal record · rebuilt 3 weeks ago

Owners have filed 289,593 complaints with NHTSA about the engine — 13.4% of every complaint in the file. This is where those complaints land.

The heaviest single model year is the 2017 Ford Escape, with 2,073 complaints about this part alone, 63% of everything reported about that car.

Where owners recorded an odometer reading, the typical engine failure on this list happened at about 79,000 miles.

Worst model years

Vehicle Complaints Share of that year Median failure Crashes Fires
F 2017 Ford Escape 2,073 63% 77,000 mi 8 12
F 1995 Ford Windstar 1,849 39% 80,539 mi 12 11
F 2018 Ford Escape 1,486 68% 85,725 mi 4 5
F 2013 Ford Escape 1,442 39% 79,000 mi 8 70
D 2011 Hyundai Sonata 1,013 22% 96,000 mi 21 86
F 2017 Ford Edge 938 56% 73,000 mi 0 1
F 2014 Ford Escape 910 34% 79,039 mi 3 87
D 2016 Honda Pilot 812 34% 71,500 mi 5 8
F 2000 Dodge Intrepid 800 65% 77,204 mi 6 15
B 2010 Ford Fusion 794 11% 55,000 mi 8 2
F 2013 Hyundai Sonata 781 29% 96,500 mi 19 73
D 1993 Ford Taurus 760 34% 78,050 mi 3 21
F 2002 Nissan Altima 752 57% 90,000 mi 8 24
F 2016 KIA Sorento 725 44% 84,994 mi 4 34
F 1999 Dodge Intrepid 720 58% 84,000 mi 4 6
F 2015 KIA Soul 688 56% 97,407 mi 4 63
F 2018 Ford Ecosport 669 69% 67,000 mi 10 2
F 2017 Hyundai Santa FE 668 52% 63,250 mi 1 14
F 2016 KIA Soul 663 57% 90,000 mi 5 34
F 2013 KIA Optima 655 35% 100,000 mi 12 90
F 2015 KIA Optima 653 47% 88,000 mi 11 54
F 2015 Hyundai Sonata 645 39% 66,684 mi 4 38
F 2018 Ford Edge 612 62% 73,443 mi 1 1
C 2015 Chrysler 200 611 18% 48,000 mi 18 12
F 2017 Hyundai Tucson 611 42% 60,000 mi 3 21

By brand

Across whole ranges rather than single years. On Ford vehicles this part accounts for 100% of everything owners reported about the brand.

Ford 57,203 24.2%

100% of all Ford complaints, across 136 models

Chevrolet 27,525 11.6%

100% of all Chevrolet complaints, across 181 models

Dodge 19,735 8.4%

100% of all Dodge complaints, across 83 models

KIA 17,336 7.3%

100% of all KIA complaints, across 40 models

Hyundai 16,487 7.0%

100% of all Hyundai complaints, across 51 models

Jeep 15,718 6.7%

100% of all Jeep complaints, across 36 models

Honda 14,833 6.3%

100% of all Honda complaints, across 117 models

Nissan 13,776 5.8%

100% of all Nissan complaints, across 52 models

Toyota 12,233 5.2%

100% of all Toyota complaints, across 78 models

Chrysler 9,829 4.2%

100% of all Chrysler complaints, across 46 models

GMC 8,341 3.5%

100% of all GMC complaints, across 100 models

Volkswagen 7,130 3.0%

100% of all Volkswagen complaints, across 40 models

BMW 7,051 3.0%

100% of all BMW complaints, across 241 models

Pontiac 4,928 2.1%

100% of all Pontiac complaints, across 24 models

Mercury 4,173 1.8%

100% of all Mercury complaints, across 21 models

Complaints about this part, by make.

Where this sits in the whole record

Engine & Cooling 289,593 13.4%
Electrical System 247,927 11.5%
Brakes 196,879 9.1%
Airbags 155,744 7.2%
Steering 143,665 6.7%
Fuel & Propulsion 127,655 5.9%
Other & Unspecified 115,955 5.4%
Body & Structure 103,383 4.8%
Suspension 89,005 4.1%

Every complaint in the file, by part.

Source — NHTSA Office of Defects Investigation complaint file.

How this was made. Nobody wrote this article and left it to age. It is generated by a query against the complaint database, and rebuilt every time the data is — so the numbers in the sentences above are the numbers as they stand today, not as they stood when somebody last had time to update them. How the grading works.