Toyota Tercel vs Volkswagen Touareg

Both cars' complete complaint records, side by side.

Read the totals carefully. NHTSA publishes no sales figures, so the car that sold more collects more complaints regardless of quality. The rows worth weighing are the proportions — the share of complaints that involved harm, and which part dominates.

Measure	Toyota Tercel	Volkswagen Touareg
Complaints on file	389	945
Model years covered	1982–2000	2004–2017
Worst model year	1993	2004
Best model year	1997	2009
Crashes reported	105	22
Fires reported	18	30
Injuries reported	75	30
Deaths reported	4	0
Most complained-about part	Airbags	Fuel & Propulsion
Share of complaints involving harm	51.9%	8.7%

Toyota Tercel by year

2 9 12 5 8 15 9 32 23 18 27 50 45 58 45 25 4 1 1

82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 00

Complaints filed with NHTSA, by model year. Bar colour is the FaultScore grade: A B C D F ungraded

What breaks

Airbags 82 21.1%

Seat Belts 53 13.6%

Engine & Cooling 52 13.4%

Brakes 31 8.0%

Electrical System 24 6.2%

Fuel & Propulsion 24 6.2%

Windows, Mirrors & Wipers 19 4.9%

Tires 18 4.6%

Volkswagen Touareg by year

373 106 52 9 73 25 37 20 37 42 35 35 67 34

04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17

Complaints filed with NHTSA, by model year. Bar colour is the FaultScore grade: A B C D F ungraded

What breaks

Fuel & Propulsion 152 16.1%

Engine & Cooling 134 14.2%

Electrical System 102 10.8%

Transmission & Drivetrain 83 8.8%

Tires 54 5.7%

Airbags 53 5.6%

Steering 46 4.9%

Other & Unspecified 46 4.9%