Recall Intelligence

Key findings

• NHTSA has recorded 30,320 vehicle safety recalls since 1966, covering 1,388,831,990 vehicles in total.
• Recall volume has more than tripled since the 1990s: an average of 319 a year then, against 1,002 a year over the last decade.
• The busiest year on record is 2021, with 1,094 recalls filed.
• Do Not Drive advisories are rare: 209 of 30,320 recalls carry one, about 1 in 145.
• The largest single recall on record is 99E007000, covering 32,000,000 vehicles.
• The most recalled component group is equipment, named in 4,425 recalls.

Recomputed from NHTSA’s published recall files each day. See methodology for how each figure is derived.

The data behind each finding

Each of these pages carries the full dataset for one question — every row, not a top-ten excerpt — with the date it was computed and what it does and does not mean.

• Are recalls increasing?Every year on record, with vehicles affected and advisory counts.
• What is the largest recall ever?The 100 biggest campaigns by vehicles affected.
• Which brand has the most recalls?The 100 most recalled makes, and why the ranking is not a reliability table.
• Which part fails most often?All 37 NHTSA part groups, ranked.
• How many recalled cars never get fixed?Repair completion across every campaign manufacturers report on.
• How common is a Do Not Drive recall?Every advisory on record, by make and by year.
• Vehicle, equipment, tire or child seat?The full split by recall type, with average campaign size.

Every year also has its own page, from 1966 to 2026: the makes, parts and largest campaigns of that year.

Recalls filed each year

Recall volume has more than tripled since the 1990s, from an average of 319 a year to 1,002. 2026 is still in progress, with 656 so far, so it is left off the chart.

See every year on record.

How rare is an urgent advisory?

Almost every recall is handled by booking a repair. A small number go further and tell owners to stop driving, or to keep the vehicle away from buildings because it can catch fire while parked. Both flags were added to the public record in May 2025.

Shown as a ratio rather than a pie chart on purpose: at roughly 99% to 0.7% to 0.3%, the only way to make the small slices of a pie visible is to draw them larger than they are. See every recall under an advisory.

See every advisory on record.

Most recalled makes

The 20 makes with the most campaigns on record. Counted by campaigns, not vehicles — a high count tends to track how many models a make sells and how long it has been selling them, rather than how reliable it is.

See the 100 most recalled makes.

Most recalled components

NHTSA’s own top-level classification, and the 20 groups that appear most often. A recall naming several components is counted under each, so these overlap.

See all 37 part groups.

Largest recalls on record

Ranked by the manufacturer’s own estimate of vehicles potentially affected. The biggest are equipment and tire campaigns, which span every make the part was fitted to.

1. Pennzoil — Tires99E00700023 March 199932,000,000
2. Ford — Power Train: Gear Position Indication (prndl)81V00800012 January 198121,000,000
3. Takata — Air Bags: Inflator Module15E04000018 May 201517,600,000
4. JTW — Tires78T03100011 December 197814,500,000
5. Ford — Tires: Tread/Belt00T00500021 August 200014,400,000
6. Ford — Tires: Tread/Belt01X00100022 May 200113,000,000
7. Takata — Air Bags: Frontal20E0010002 January 202010,000,000
8. Takata — Air Bags: Inflator Module16E04200016 May 20168,500,000
9. Ford — Electrical System: Ignition96V07100025 April 19967,900,000
10. Takata — Air Bags: Inflator Module15E04100018 May 20157,700,000

See the 100 largest recalls.

Lowest repair completion

Of recalls covering at least 100,000 vehicles, these have the smallest share repaired at the manufacturer’s most recent quarterly report. A low figure usually means the vehicles are old, the owners untraceable, or the part one people never notice has failed.

1. Goodyear — Tires22T009000173,220 of 173,237 unrepaired0.0%
2. AMP — Tires: Markings24T001000672,255 of 673,000 unrepaired0.0%
3. Ford — Air Bags: Inflator Module16V036000348,288 of 361,692 unrepaired0.1%
4. Toyota — Equipment12E046000199,652 of 200,000 unrepaired0.2%
5. Harmony — Child Seat18C001000146,922 of 148,165 unrepaired0.5%
6. Mazda — Electrical System: Switch15V674000975,323 of 1,368,500 unrepaired0.6%
7. Haul Master — Exterior Lighting15E019000875,029 of 888,122 unrepaired1.0%
8. Ford — Back Over Prevention: Camera25V6950001,349,444 of 1,448,655 unrepaired1.1%
9. Mitsubishi — Structure: Support Device/Strut26V252000101,354 of 108,046 unrepaired1.7%
10. Kenway — Exterior Lighting24E015000138,316 of 141,120 unrepaired1.8%

Completion rates exist only for recalls open since 2015 — about 39% of the record — and are filed quarterly, so they lag by up to three months.

See repair completion in full.