all vehicles · every Elantra year · method

Hyundai Elantra 2009

Safety complaints filed by owners in the first three years, per 1,000 sold.

0.29 per 1,000

better than this nameplate’s own median · from 29 complaints filed in the first three years, of 286 ever. 95% lower bound 0.19.

Against its own model years

The model year carries far more information than the badge, so this is the comparison that matters.

Model year	Per 1,000	Complaints
2008	0.98	93
2009	0.29	29
2010	0.47	55
2011	0.37	59
2012	0.60	116
2013	1.53	345
2014	0.28	67
2015	0.17	39
2016	0.27	61
2017	0.76	154
2018	0.39	78
2019	0.31	59
2020	0.71	99
2021	0.88	101
2022	0.89	107
2023	1.11	140

What owners describe

Phrases over-represented in these complaints compared with the same component on every other vehicle. Counts are complaints containing the phrase.

Steering 144 complaints

eps	78	53%
light	69	47%
eps light	38	26%
column	37	26%
campaign	33	23%
steering column	33	23%

Air Bags 50 complaints

light	29	58%
passenger seat	12	25%
sensor	12	25%

When it breaks

17% of reported failures happened before 30,000 miles (median 78,000 miles, from 214 complaints that recorded one).

Failures arrive late and spread out, which looks like wear. Service history matters more than model year here.

What NHTSA did

2 investigations covering this model year, 1 of which list a recall campaign.

Throttle control system vulnerabilities

What owners and forums say

Not built yet. This panel is meant to carry community sentiment beside the filed-complaint data, so the two can be compared. Showing something weaker here would defeat its purpose.

Check this yourself

Example records behind this page:

10281582 · 10289117 · 10291175 · 10299954 · 10310796 · 10311308

Limits of this figure. It counts safety complaints filed with the federal government, which is a floor on failures and not a census: problems that only cost money are under-reported. Complaint rates also reflect how likely a brand’s owners are to file, which cannot be separated from how often the car fails. Sales are calendar-year and the denominator for this nameplate is verified against a published figure.