2021 Nissan Altima
This year drew an ordinary 69 complaints for a Nissan Altima — the model's median is 424. What they were about is the unusual part: 21.7% of them mention brakes, against 7.1% across the other years of this generation.
Generation 3 of the Nissan Altima, which began in 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 | 69 |
|---|---|
| Median for this model | 424 |
| Involving a crash | 6 |
| Involving a fire | 1 |
| Recalls | 2 |
| NHTSA crash rating | 5/5 |
| EPA combined | 30 mpg |
What the complaints were about
- brakes — 21.7% of this year's complaints, against 7.1% across the other years of this generation (3.1×).
- automatically — 10.1% of this year's complaints, against 2.3% across the other years of this generation (4.5×). Owners wrote it as: automatically, various, begin.
- trying — 11.6% of this year's complaints, against 3.4% across the other years of this generation (3.4×). Owners wrote it as: trying, though, even though.
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
I was driving with my child in the car and the volume on the radio spiked to an extremely high level. This has happened multiple times and the volume control knob is defective so I cannot turn down the volume or the radio off. I brought the vehicle into the Ni…
My car is supposed to have an automatic braking system/collision detection. Two cars in front of me slammed on their brakes and the car in front of me slammed on his brake, and I didn't have enough time to react. I totalled my car, but my car is supposed to ha…
Verbatim from NHTSA complaint filings, with identifying details removed.
Recalls for this year
- 21V138000 STEERING Fixed free of charge.
- 23V628000 BACK OVER PREVENTION Fixed free of charge.
How this was worked out
Every year of the Nissan Altima 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 2021 Nissan Altima? What happened to yours?
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