2015 Kia Soul
Complaints about this year name engine cooling far more often than the other years of this generation — 9% of them, about 6× the usual rate of 1.4%.
Generation 2 of the Kia Soul, which began in 2014 and ran to 2019. 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 | 1,804 |
|---|---|
| Median for this model | 271 |
| Involving a crash | 72 |
| Involving a fire | 164 |
| Recalls | 4 |
| NHTSA crash rating | 5/5 |
| EPA combined | 26 mpg |
What the complaints were about
- engine engine — 10.2% of this year's complaints, against 3% across the other years of this generation (3.4×). Owners wrote it as: engine engine, cooling, engine cooling, under nhtsa.
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.
Also unusual this year
- engine engine — 9% of complaints, 4× usual
What owners wrote
THE CHECK ENGINE INDICATOR FLASHED, THERE WAS A DRASTIC REDUCTION IN SPEED, AND THE VEHICLE STALLED INTERMITTENTLY NUMEROUS TIMES. THE [VIN] ADDED THE VEHICLE TO NHTSA CAMPAIGN NUMBER: 19V120000 (ENGINE AND ENGINE COOLING) ON APRIL 16, 2019; HOWEVER, THE VEHIC…
WHILE DRIVING AT APPROXIMATE 40 MPH, THERE WAS AN ABNORMAL NOISE COMING FROM THE FRONT OF THE VEHICLE AND SHORTLY AFTER THE VEHICLE STALLED. THE VEHICLE WAS TAKEN TO A LOCAL MECHANIC WHERE IT WAS DIAGNOSED THAT THE ENGINE NEEDED TO BE REPLACED. THE CONTACT REF…
Verbatim from NHTSA complaint filings, with identifying details removed.
Recalls for this year
- 20V750000 ENGINE Fixed free of charge.
- 19V120000 ENGINE Fixed free of charge.
- 17V608000 STEERING Fixed free of charge.
- 15V123000 VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL Fixed free of charge.
How this was worked out
Every year of the Kia Soul 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 2015 Kia Soul? What happened to yours?
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