2020 Nissan Altima
This year drew an ordinary 177 complaints for a Nissan Altima — the model's median is 424. What they were about is the unusual part: 7.9% of them mention whole, against 1.4% across the other years of this generation.
Generation 3 of the Nissan Altima, which began in 2019. 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 | 177 |
|---|---|
| Median for this model | 424 |
| Involving a crash | 16 |
| Involving a fire | 7 |
| Recalls | 6 |
| NHTSA crash rating | 5/5 |
| EPA combined | 30 mpg |
What the complaints were about
- whole — 7.9% of this year's complaints, against 1.4% across the other years of this generation (5.5×). Owners wrote it as: whole, accidents, freeway car, abrupt.
- department — 9% of this year's complaints, against 2.4% across the other years of this generation (3.7×). Owners wrote it as: department, flames, fire department, car 2020.
- message — 7.3% of this year's complaints, against 2.4% across the other years of this generation (3×). Owners wrote it as: message, inspect, description.
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
Driving on the freeway car started losing power, pulled over and then caught fire in matter of minutes the whole car was engulfed in flames. Fire department said it was an electrical fire near the battery and the fire wall on the driver side.
Vehicle caught on fire while inside home @ 4:00am cst. Fire department and police department were at the scene as well. Fire department was forced to pry open the trunk to stop fire from spreading. Police gave police report at the scene due to the incident. St…
Verbatim from NHTSA complaint filings, with identifying details removed.
Recalls for this year
- 21V138000 STEERING Fixed free of charge.
- 21V169000 TIRES Fixed free of charge.
- 20V570000 VISIBILITY Fixed free of charge.
- 20V685000 TIRES Fixed free of charge.
- 23V628000 BACK OVER PREVENTION Fixed free of charge.
- 25V437000 ENGINE AND ENGINE COOLING Fixed free of charge.
How this was worked out
Every year of the Nissan Altima 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 2020 Nissan Altima? What happened to yours?
Loading comments…