Coscienzios

Model years to avoid

Chevrolet Impala

What it says about you

Opinion

Enormous inside, cheap to buy, and the default hire car for a decade. Yours is comfortable and you do not care what it signals.

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

16 model years on record, 7,221 complaints filed. No year stood out against this model's own history — which means it has not drawn unusual complaints, not that it is a good car.

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.

  • engine 2011, 2016 peak 44.7% of that year's complaints
  • abs 2010, 2013, 2014 peak 30% of that year's complaints
  • bag 2009, 2010 peak 21.4% of that year's complaints

Every year

  1. 2020 0 recalls 15 complaints
  2. 2019 1 recall 28 complaints
  3. 2018 1 recall 59 complaints
  4. 2017 0 recalls 116 complaints
  5. 2016 0 recalls 897 complaints
  6. 2015 3 recalls 587 complaints
  7. 2014 12 recalls 631 complaints
  8. 2013 1 recall 270 complaints
  9. 2012 3 recalls 258 complaints
  10. 2011 2 recalls 505 complaints
  11. 2010 4 recalls 441 complaints
  12. 2009 5 recalls 824 complaints
  13. 2008 2 recalls 810 complaints
  14. 2007 3 recalls 627 complaints
  15. 2006 2 recalls 544 complaints
  16. 2005 4 recalls 609 complaints

What does a Chevrolet Impala 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.