Coscienzios

Model years to avoid

Tesla Model S

What it says about you

Opinion

The car that made electric cars desirable rather than worthy. Yours might be very early, which makes you an actual pioneer.

Not measured, not from the data, and offered in fun. Everything below this is not.

15 model years on record, 12,442 complaints filed.

The years to look at closely: 2018 (police report), 2017 (mcu), 2016 (please), 2015 (mcu), 2014 (mcu), 2013 (mcu). Everything else drew a normal number of complaints for this model.

What owners report, and when

Faults that dominated the complaints of more than one model year. Not the same question as which year to avoid — a car can have an ordinary number of complaints every year and have most of them be about the same thing.

  • mcu 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016 peak 27.9% of that year's complaints
  • link 2016, 2017 peak 12.6% of that year's complaints
  • emmc 2013, 2015 peak 8.3% of that year's complaints
  • infotainment 2012, 2017 peak 6.8% of that year's complaints

Every year

  1. 2026 nothing on record 3 complaints
  2. 2025 2 recalls 6 complaints
  3. 2024 6 recalls 38 complaints
  4. 2023 13 recalls 114 complaints
  5. 2022 20 recalls 136 complaints
  6. 2021 24 recalls 176 complaints
  7. 2020 11 recalls 80 complaints
  8. 2019 10 recalls 96 complaints
  9. 2018 police report 387 complaints
  10. 2017 mcu 1,895 complaints
  11. 2016 please 6,040 complaints
  12. 2015 mcu 2,588 complaints
  13. 2014 mcu 365 complaints
  14. 2013 mcu 459 complaints
  15. 2012 8 recalls 59 complaints

What does a Tesla Model S say about you?

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Source: NHTSA complaints, recalls and investigations, retrieved . A year is flagged when it drew at least 2.5× this model's median and at least 50 complaints — compared against itself rather than against other cars, so popularity and age do not decide the answer.