all vehicles · every Maxima year · method

Nissan Maxima 2009

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

0.56 per 1,000

1.3 times this nameplate’s own median · from 28 complaints filed in the first three years, of 338 ever. 95% lower bound 0.35.

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	0.32	15
2009	0.56	28
2010	0.44	25
2011	0.18	11
2012	0.42	25
2013	0.23	13
2014	0.40	21
2016	0.91	47
2017	0.58	38
2018	0.38	21

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 168 complaints

steering lock	52	31%
tilt	22	13%
start towed	15	9%
start steering	15	9%
wouldn't start	13	8%
key light	12	7%

Electrical System 79 complaints

steering lock	21	27%
wheel lock	11	14%

When it breaks

14% of reported failures happened before 30,000 miles (median 71,000 miles, from 271 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

No NHTSA investigation covers this model year.

That is not a clean bill of health, and not a criticism of the agency: investigations open for many reasons and complaint volume is only one of them.

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:

10257581 · 10269571 · 10274003 · 10279726 · 10282303 · 10288758

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 automated checks only, not verified against an external source.