All generations and engines together · 231,744 MOT tests in the 2025 data · typical mileage at age 7: 40k
Split by first-registration year. Cars registered in a changeover year can belong to either generation.
Computed from DVSA MOT results, all of Great Britain, 2025. Nothing here is opinion.
Share of tests where each item was recorded. The dark tick is the class average across all tracked models; bars are scaled within each group.
The rows that judge the model rather than its keeper. 85,383 tests in this band.
Tyres, pads and stone chips say more about how the car was driven and maintained than about how it was built.
Owner folklore from forums and the motoring press. Most of it never shows up in an MOT, which is why this section exists at all.
Owners across both the first and second generation i10 report rear pads and discs wearing out far sooner than expected, in some cases from as little as 5,000 to 19,000 miles, along with rusty discs, seized rear calipers and a parking brake cable that can stick or even snap. Brakes are also the standout MOT fail for this model, and this looks like the folklore version of that same weak point: cheap rear hardware that doesn't cope well with town stop-start driving. Budget roughly £100-250 for a rear pad and disc job if a seller hasn't already had it done.
A shaky, juddering clutch when pulling away, often worse after the car has sat unused for a couple of weeks, was reported by enough early i10 owners that Hyundai UK acknowledged the problem and said it was resolved by August 2010. Owner reports either side of that date still turn up clutches failing well short of 60,000 miles, one as early as 13,800 miles, usually down to a worn release bearing or a stretched cable rather than normal wear. A replacement clutch kit fitted typically runs £300-500.
The 1.2-litre chain-cam Kappa engine in the first-generation i10 is generally rated more dependable than the 1.1, but a number of owners have reported camshaft sensor failures that trigger a warning light and rough running. A separate pattern of overheating has been traced to cars leaving the factory underfilled with coolant, so it's worth checking header tank level and colour rather than trusting the gauge alone. Neither issue has a confirmed recall attached, so treat it as something to budget for rather than a guaranteed free fix.
A repeated theme in owner write-ups is a flat battery after the car sits for a few days, put down to a control module that doesn't reliably drop into sleep mode. Alongside that, window regulator motors and central locking actuators are reported to wear out and stick, and owners on both generations complain the radio or infotainment loses its settings or freezes. None of this shows up on an MOT, so it's easy to miss on a quick test drive.
The automatic gearbox paired with the 1.2-litre engine is widely described as undergeared for motorway driving, holding low gears and returning real-world economy well below the official figure, some owners report high 30s mpg against a 47.9mpg claim. There are also owner reports of it slipping out of 4th gear at particular revs. Manual i10s don't share this complaint.
Clonks and creaks from the front end, along with the odd drop-link failure, come up often enough in owner reports to be worth listening for, particularly on cars that have done a lot of speed-bump-heavy town driving. It isn't consistent enough across sources to call it a defined pattern fault, and plenty of owners never experience it, so treat a noisy example as a haggling point rather than proof of a design flaw.
Built from the two sections above.
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Head to head with the other popular cars in its class on reliability and common faults.