2025 Honda Pilot
This year drew an ordinary 178 complaints for a Honda Pilot — the model's median is 211. What they were about is the unusual part: 17.4% of them mention cruise, against 6.9% across the model's other years.
Generation 4 of the Honda Pilot, which began in 2023. Everything below compares this year against the others in that generation, not against a different car wearing the same name.
NHTSA opened a defect investigation into this model year.
| Complaints filed | 178 |
|---|---|
| Median for this model | 211 |
| Involving a crash | 10 |
| Recalls | 4 |
| NHTSA crash rating | 5/5 |
| EPA combined | 21 mpg |
What the complaints were about
- cruise — 17.4% of this year's complaints, against 6.9% across the model's other years (2.5×). Owners wrote it as: cruise, cruise control, adaptive, adaptive cruise.
- brand — 14% of this year's complaints, against 4.4% across the model's other years (3.2×). Owners wrote it as: brand, brand new, new vehicle, new 2025.
- message — 9.6% of this year's complaints, against 1.6% across the model's other years (6×). Owners wrote it as: message, see dealer, continue driving, clean area.
Words owners used for the same problem are counted together, so a fault written four different ways is measured once. Grouped by which complaints they appear in, not by a list anyone wrote in advance.
What owners wrote
Some Drive Assist Systems cannot operate: Clean Area shown. This message keeps appearing without any weather factors or anything to cause it. Happens nearly daily while using adaptive cruise. Then the next day without doing anything (like cleaning area) it sta…
while operating the vehicle with the Adaptive Cruise Control activated, the adaptive cruise control erroneously deactivated, causing the vehicle to suddenly decelerate. The contact stated that the failure once occurred while driving up a steep hill while being…
Verbatim from NHTSA complaint filings, with identifying details removed.
Recalls for this year
- 24V900000 FUEL SYSTEM, GASOLINE Fixed free of charge.
- 25V031000 FUEL SYSTEM, GASOLINE Fixed free of charge.
- 25V056000 SEAT BELTS Fixed free of charge.
- 25V391000 SERVICE BRAKES, HYDRAULIC Fixed free of charge.
How this was worked out
Every year of the Honda Pilot was compared against its own history rather than against other cars, which removes popularity and age from the answer — a common car draws more complaints at equal reliability, and an older one has had longer to accumulate them. A year is flagged when it drew at least 2.5× this model's median and at least 50 complaints.
This is a fault record, not a review. Nobody files a federal complaint to say the car was fine, so it shows what tends to go wrong — not whether owners liked it, and not whether it is a good car.
Source: NHTSA complaints, recalls and investigations, retrieved . Look this vehicle up directly on NHTSA's site to check anything here.
Own a 2025 Honda Pilot? What happened to yours?
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