2012 Toyota 4Runner
This year drew an ordinary 96 complaints for a Toyota 4Runner — the model's median is 58. What they were about is the unusual part: 54.2% of them mention takata, against 3.8% across the other years of this generation.
Generation 2 of the Toyota 4Runner, which began in 2010 and ran to 2024. 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 | 96 |
|---|---|
| Median for this model | 58 |
| Involving a crash | 5 |
| Involving a fire | 1 |
| Recalls | 8 |
| NHTSA crash rating | 4/5 |
| EPA combined | 19 mpg |
What the complaints were about
- takata — 54.2% of this year's complaints, against 3.8% across the other years of this generation (14.1×).
- december — 7.3% of this year's complaints, against 0% across the other years of this generation (36.5×). Owners wrote it as: december, december 2017, until december.
- seat — 18.8% of this year's complaints, against 6.3% across the other years of this generation (3×).
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
TAKATA RECALL - I WAS NOTIFIED OVER 6 MONTHS AGO THAT THE AIR BAGS WERE RECALLED. THERE STILL HAS NOT BEEN A REMEDY FOR THIS RECALL. I HAVE BEEN DRIVING AN UNSAFE VEHICLE WITH 2 CHILDREN IN IT THAT CAN POTENTIALLY GET INJURED BY THIS AIR BAG. I LOOKED ONLINE A…
I RECEIVED A NOTICE THAT THE FRONT PASSENGER AIRBAG IN MY 2012 TOYOTA 4RUNNER HAS BEEN RECALLED. WHEN I CALLED THE DEALERSHIP THEY REFERRED ME TO TOYOTA CUSTOMER CARE. CUSTOMER CARE SAID THAT THEY ARE NOT EXPECTING A SOLUTION UNTIL DECEMBER 2017 AND THAT I'M N…
Verbatim from NHTSA complaint filings, with identifying details removed.
Recalls for this year
- 19V005000 AIR BAGS
- 19V741000 AIR BAGS
- 17V425000 STRUCTURE Fixed free of charge.
- 17V006000 AIR BAGS Fixed free of charge.
- 16V577000 ENGINE AND ENGINE COOLING Fixed free of charge.
- 15V515000 ENGINE AND ENGINE COOLING Fixed free of charge.
- 12V120000 EQUIPMENT Fixed free of charge.
- 13V014000 AIR BAGS
How this was worked out
Every year of the Toyota 4Runner 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 2012 Toyota 4Runner? What happened to yours?
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