Vehicle safety · NHTSA data
Vehicle complaints by make, model and year.
See how many consumer complaints the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration holds for a vehicle, and which components people reported. Counts only: no individual narratives and no VINs.
Look up a vehicle
This lookup sends the vehicle details you enter to NHTSA through TNAADO's lookup service to fetch the record. TNAADO does not store them.
Result
Enter a make, model and year to see complaint counts.
How the counts are built
NHTSA's Complaints API (complaintsByVehicle) returns every consumer complaint filed against a make, model and model year. This tool counts them and discards everything else. A complaint can name more than one component, so it is counted once under each component it names; component counts therefore add up to more than the total. The share shown for a component is complaints naming it ÷ total complaints.
Worked example: 2018 Honda Accord
On 2026-09-30 the API returned 1,882 complaints for the 2018 Honda Accord, filed between 2017-10-30 and 2026-09-25. 555 of them named the engine, which is 555 ÷ 1,882 = 29.5%. 35 complaints were flagged as involving a crash and 4 as involving a fire. These figures grow as new complaints arrive, so your result will be higher than this snapshot.
Reading the numbers
A count is not a rate. Popular models sell more units and collect more complaints, and NHTSA publishes no sales denominator here, so do not rank vehicles by raw counts. Complaints are unverified consumer reports. They are not defect findings, not recalls and not a statement by NHTSA that a vehicle is unsafe. To see whether a safety recall applies to a specific car, use the VIN decoder and recall lookup or NHTSA's own recall search.
Data source: NHTSA, Datasets and APIs, endpoint https://api.nhtsa.gov/complaints/complaintsByVehicle. Each result is stamped with the date it was fetched.
Frequently asked questions
Does a high complaint count mean a car is defective?
No. Complaints are unverified reports from consumers. NHTSA does not confirm them, and a count says nothing about how many vehicles were sold. Use it as a prompt to look further, such as checking recalls and technical service bulletins.
Why do the component counts add up to more than the total?
One complaint can name several components, for example both engine and electrical system. It is counted once under each.
Why did I get zero results?
Either NHTSA has no complaints for that combination, or the make or model is spelled differently from NHTSA's records. Try the short model name without trim, such as “Accord” rather than “Accord EX-L”.
Does this cover Canadian vehicles?
The data is NHTSA's, which covers complaints filed in the United States. Many models are sold in both countries, but Canadian-only trims and Transport Canada complaints are not included.
Unverified consumer reports
Complaint data is not a defect finding, a recall, or a safety rating, and individual narratives and VINs are not shown. Counts are a snapshot fetched on the date shown and are cached for up to seven days.