Model years › Kia Sportage

2023 Kia Sportage

Complaints about this year name check hybrid far more often than the other years of this generation — 8% of them, about 19× the usual rate of 0.4%.

First year of a new generation. The Kia Sportage was redesigned for 2023. A first year carries problems nobody has found yet, and they are found by the people who buy it — which is worth knowing before you become one of them.

NHTSA opened a defect investigation into this model year.

What the complaints were about

• screen — 11.5% of this year's complaints, against 0.6% across the other years of this generation (18.6×). Owners wrote it as: screen, infotainment, blank, infotainment screen.
• multiple — 17.6% of this year's complaints, against 5.2% across the other years of this generation (3.4×). Owners wrote it as: multiple, multiple times, stop safely, 12v.
• message — 9.2% of this year's complaints, against 0.7% across the other years of this generation (13.4×). Owners wrote it as: message, displayed.

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

• battery — 9% of complaints, 6× usual
• brakes — 12% of complaints, 4× usual
• needed — 6% of complaints, 15× usual

What owners wrote

I was driving my vehicle on the freeway when all of a sudden I got a warning light that came on that said check hybrid system it looked up my brakes and steering the car completely shutdown in the middle of the freeway it happened so fast I couldn't get to the…

12 V battery fails everyday and needed to press the 12 V boost button. Sometimes alarm turns on middle of the night.

Verbatim from NHTSA complaint filings, with identifying details removed.

Recalls for this year

• 22V651000 ELECTRICAL SYSTEM Fixed free of charge.
• 22V878000 AIR BAGS Fixed free of charge.
• 23V298000 ELECTRICAL SYSTEM Fixed free of charge.
• 23V410000 SERVICE BRAKES, HYDRAULIC Fixed free of charge.
• 23V531000 POWER TRAIN Fixed free of charge.
• 24V025000 STRUCTURE Fixed free of charge.

Own a 2023 Kia Sportage? What happened to yours?

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How this was worked out

Every year of the Kia Sportage 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.

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