Vehicle Problems Feed — NHTSA Complaints, Recalls & Mileage

Vehicle Problems Feed: NHTSA complaints, recalls and mileage at failure

What goes wrong with this car, and when? Give a model year, make and model (or a VIN). You get one clean record per vehicle built from official US government data (NHTSA):

• complaints ranked by component, with each component's share
• mileage at failure: median, quartiles and a histogram, from NHTSA's own mileage field
• recurring symptoms: the short phrases owners repeat most, per component
• crash, fire, injury and death counts from the complaints
• complaints by year filed, to show the trend
• recalls with remedy, defect investigations, and manufacturer communications (technical service bulletins and similar notices) with titles
• a problemScore comparing this model year with the same model's nearby years

Monitor mode alerts you to new complaints and recalls since the last run. Optional detail records give individual complaints, with personal details removed.

No repair-cost estimates. This tool reports what owners told NHTSA and what NHTSA and manufacturers published. Complaints are owner-reported and not verified by NHTSA. Counts are reports, not failure rates, and popular models naturally get more complaints.

Use this when…

• Used-car dealers and buyers want to check a model's known issues before buying, stocking or pricing a car.
• Extended-warranty and insurance analysts compare model years and see at what mileage problems show up.
• Repair shops and parts sellers want content and marketing about common problems ("2019 Cherokee power transfer unit failures") based on real data.
• Auto journalists and lemon-law researchers need complaint counts, trends, recalls and investigations for a model, with source links.
• Apps and websites show a "common problems" panel for a car from a VIN or a year, make and model.

Price

Price: $0.01 per vehicle summary and $0.001 per individual complaint record (complaint records are off by default). A run over the three example vehicles would cost $0.03.

Input

Field	What it does
vehicles	One per line: 2019 Jeep Cherokee. Year ranges give one record per year: 2017-2019 Honda CR-V. CRV = CR-V, F150 = F-150.
vins	17-character VINs, decoded with NHTSA's free vPIC decoder into year, make and model.
components	Optional filter, e.g. POWER TRAIN, ENGINE, ELECTRICAL SYSTEM, SERVICE BRAKES, AIR BAGS. Partial names work. It applies to complaints, recalls and service bulletins.
maxComponents	Components listed per vehicle (default 10). The rest are summed in otherComponents.
compareYears, compareWindow	problemScore against up to 3 model years before and after (default on).
includeInvestigationsAndCommunications, maxCommunications	Investigations and manufacturer communications (default on; the newest 15 are listed by title, and all are counted).
complaintDetails, maxComplaintDetails	Also output individual complaints, newest first (default off, 25 per vehicle).
onlyNew, monitorId	Monitor mode: output a vehicle only when NHTSA has new complaints or recalls since the last run with the same monitor name. The first run sets the baseline.
maxVehicles	Safety cap per run (default 30).

With an empty input, the tool runs three example vehicles (2019 Jeep Cherokee, 2017 Honda CR-V, 2020 Ford Explorer) in about 30 seconds.

Output

Vehicle summary (real record, run of 2026-11-12, shortened: 1 of 10 components, 1 of 11 recalls, 1 of 15 bulletins)

{
  "recordType": "vehicle-summary",
  "vehicle": "2019 JEEP CHEROKEE",
  "modelYear": "2019",
  "make": "JEEP",
  "model": "CHEROKEE",
  "input": "2019 Jeep Cherokee",
  "headline": "POWER TRAIN: 839 of 1682 complaints (50%), often \"warning light\", \"power transfer unit\", \"service 4wd\", median 50,500 miles",
  "totalComplaints": 1682,
  "problemScore": {
    "score": 2.06,
    "label": "much higher than this model's other years",
    "thisYearComplaints": 1682,
    "averageComplaints": 815,
    "rankMostComplaints": "1 of 7",
    "complaintsByModelYear": { "2016": 1415, "2017": 1342, "2018": 692, "2019": 1682, "2020": 337, "2021": 183, "2022": 52 }
  },
  "safety": { "complaintsWithCrash": 40, "complaintsWithFire": 19, "injuries": 37, "deaths": 0, "complaintsWithInjuryOrDeath": 22 },
  "components": [
    {
      "component": "POWER TRAIN",
      "complaints": 839,
      "share": 0.499,
      "complaintsWithCrash": 8,
      "complaintsWithFire": 1,
      "injuries": 3,
      "deaths": 0,
      "mileageAtFailure": {
        "complaintsWithMileage": 316,
        "median": 50500,
        "p25": 12300,
        "p75": 89800,
        "histogram": { "0-10k": 74, "10k-25k": 29, "25k-50k": 52, "50k-75k": 55, "75k-100k": 44, "100k-125k": 33, "125k-150k": 23, "150k-200k": 6, "200k+": 0 }
      },
      "topPhrases": [
        { "phrase": "warning light", "complaints": 191 },
        { "phrase": "power transfer unit", "complaints": 138 },
        { "phrase": "service 4wd", "complaints": 87 },
        { "phrase": "recall repair", "complaints": 71 },
        { "phrase": "rear differential", "complaints": 58 },
        { "phrase": "loss of power", "complaints": 35 }
      ],
      "recalls": 4,
      "firstFiled": "2018-08-24",
      "lastFiled": "2026-11-09"
    }
  ],
  "mileageAtFailure": { "complaintsWithMileage": 758, "median": 21600, "p25": 4200, "p75": 60000 },
  "complaintsByYearFiled": { "2018": 103, "2019": 237, "2020": 163, "2021": 111, "2022": 94, "2023": 137, "2024": 126, "2025": 425, "2026": 286 },
  "recallCount": 11,
  "recalls": [
    {
      "campaignNumber": "26V290000",
      "reportDate": "2026-05-07",
      "component": "POWER TRAIN",
      "summary": "Chrysler (FCA US LLC) is recalling certain 2019-2023 Jeep Cherokee vehicles. The power transfer unit (PTU) may fail.",
      "consequence": "A failed PTU may result in a loss of drive power or vehicle rollaway, increasing the risk of a crash or injury.",
      "remedy": "Dealers will update the Drivetrain Control Drivetrain Control Module, PTU, and Electronic Park Brake software, and replace the PTU, as necessary, free of charge. …",
      "url": "https://www.nhtsa.gov/recalls?nhtsaId=26V290000"
    }
  ],
  "investigationCount": 0,
  "manufacturerCommunicationCount": 407,
  "latestManufacturerCommunications": [
    {
      "number": "03-001-26",
      "date": "2026-07-09",
      "components": ["POWER TRAIN"],
      "title": "Unable to Complete 01C Recall Drive Cycle C14A7-97 Active",
      "documentsUrl": "https://api.nhtsa.gov/safetyIssues/byNhtsaId?nhtsaId=11035038&filter=issueType&filterValue=manufacturerCommunications"
    }
  ],
  "mileageDataAsOf": "2026-11-12"
}

Each record also has otherComponents, investigations, manufacturerCommunicationsByComponent, latestComplaintFiled, newSinceLastRun (monitor mode), sourceLinks, notes and checkedAt.

The other two example vehicles in the same run:

Vehicle	Complaints	Top component (share, median miles)	Top phrases	problemScore	Recalls / investigations / bulletins
2017 HONDA CR-V	1,782	ENGINE (30%, 15,000)	oil level, oil change, engine oil	1.76 (2 of 7 years)	7 / 2 (both "Inadvertent Automatic Emergency Braking") / 291
2020 FORD EXPLORER	1,252	POWER TRAIN (40%, 43,000)	warning light, transmission needed, recall repair	1.81 (2 of 7 years)	33 / 3 / 365

Complaint detail (optional; real record from a run of 2026-11-12)

{
  "recordType": "complaint",
  "vehicle": "2018 HONDA CR-V",
  "odiNumber": 11717035,
  "dateFiled": "2026-02-10",
  "dateOfIncident": "2026-02-08",
  "components": ["ENGINE AND ENGINE COOLING"],
  "crash": false,
  "fire": false,
  "injuries": 0,
  "deaths": 0,
  "mileageAtFailure": 70000,
  "summary": "The contact owns a 2018 Honda CR-V. The contact stated that while driving at 70 MPH, several unknown warning lights illuminated. The contact pulled into a gas station. The vehicle was towed to the dealer, where it was diagnosed and determined that the turbocharger had failed and needed to be replaced. The vehicle was not yet repaired. The manufacturer was not contacted. The failure mileage was approximately 70,000.",
  "source": "https://api.nhtsa.gov/complaints/complaintsByVehicle?make=HONDA&model=CR-V&modelYear=2018"
}

How it works

• Complaints and recalls come live from NHTSA's public APIs on every run.
• Mileage at failure is NHTSA's own "vehicle mileage at failure" field. The live API doesn't include it, so the tool carries a compact table (complaint number to miles, 835,443 complaints) built from NHTSA's bulk complaint files. mileageDataAsOf gives its date. Complaints filed after that date, or filed without mileage, are left out of the mileage figures; for the 2019 Cherokee, 758 of 1,682 complaints have mileage.
• Recurring phrases come from fixed rules, not AI: 2–3 word phrases that many complaints for the component share, ignoring filler words and NHTSA's standard call-centre wording. Each phrase is counted once per complaint. No long complaint text appears in the summaries.
• problemScore is this model year's complaint count divided by the average of the same model's years within ±3 (only years NHTSA has data for). 2.0 means twice the average. Older years have had more time to collect complaints, and newer ones less.
• Investigations and manufacturer communications come from the NHTSA endpoint behind nhtsa.gov's own vehicle pages. NHTSA doesn't list it in its API documentation. If it fails, the record still has complaints and recalls, and notes says what is missing.

Limitations

• No repair costs, labour times or prices.
• Complaints are unverified owner reports. A high count can reflect a popular model, media attention or a recall campaign that prompted filings.
• NHTSA files a complaint under the components the owner or NHTSA picked. "UNKNOWN OR OTHER" is common.
• One complaint can name several components, so shares add up to more than 100%.
• Phrases are word patterns, not diagnoses. "warning light" says owners saw one, not why.
• US vehicles only. Make and model names follow NHTSA's naming. Very new or rare models may have no data.
• Manufacturer communications are listed by title and number. The PDFs are behind each documentsUrl (an NHTSA API listing).

Legitimacy and data use

• Sources: official NHTSA data only: api.nhtsa.gov (complaints, recalls, product lists, vehicle issues), vpic.nhtsa.dot.gov (VIN decoding and model lists), and static.nhtsa.gov bulk complaint files (mileage table, built offline). These are US government works, published as open data; no login, key or account.
• Robots and terms: api.nhtsa.gov and static.nhtsa.gov serve no robots.txt (both return an error page for it), and vpic.nhtsa.dot.gov returns 404. These are data APIs and download files meant for programs. The tool never visits www.nhtsa.gov pages, which block automated clients; it only links to them.
• Politeness: at least 350 ms between requests to api.nhtsa.gov and 500 ms to vPIC, two vehicles at a time, retries with backoff on errors. A typical vehicle needs about 15 requests (45 for the three example vehicles).
• Personal data: NHTSA redacts complaint narratives before publishing them. This tool never outputs the partial VIN NHTSA publishes with each complaint, or any location. The mileage table holds only complaint numbers and miles. Detail records also remove e-mails, phone numbers, VINs, links and obvious names ("my name is…", "Mr. …", sign-offs) from the text.
• No actions: read-only. It files nothing and contacts no one.