Volkswagen Passat vs Jeep Wrangler

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	Volkswagen Passat	Jeep Wrangler
Complaints on file	10,345	23,013
Model years covered	1990–2022	1986–2026
Worst model year	2003	2021
Best model year	1994	2025
Crashes reported	335	779
Fires reported	366	741
Injuries reported	266	477
Deaths reported	13	26
Most complained-about part	Airbags	Steering
Share of complaints involving harm	9.5%	8.8%

Volkswagen Passat by year

50 30 60 90 36 142 48 57 476 854 625 558 772 816 348 172 779 341 240 211 226 27 662 1,027 791 389 179 177 65 18 31 28 20

90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 00 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22

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

What breaks

Airbags 1,661 16.1%

Engine & Cooling 1,590 15.4%

Electrical System 1,199 11.6%

Brakes 1,023 9.9%

Fuel & Propulsion 1,019 9.9%

Steering 584 5.6%

Transmission & Drivetrain 487 4.7%

Suspension 416 4.0%

Jeep Wrangler by year

1 51 55 86 105 100 100 134 184 259 2 548 401 262 311 235 139 130 281 757 852 793 1,254 501 907 682 1,289 1,046 857 693 654 423 2,646 1,092 800 1,529 657 594 1,465 121 17

86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 00 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26

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

What breaks

Steering 3,542 15.4%

Electrical System 2,994 13.0%

Engine & Cooling 2,753 12.0%

Fuel & Propulsion 2,567 11.2%

Transmission & Drivetrain 2,253 9.8%

Suspension 1,599 6.9%

Airbags 1,484 6.4%

Other & Unspecified 1,307 5.7%