All generations and engines together · 34,791 MOT tests in the 2025 data · typical mileage at age 7: 52k
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. 11,865 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.
The pre-facelift SX4's 1.9 DDiS diesel is prone to a cluster of related faults: the EGR valve and inlet swirl chambers clog up, which stops the DPF regenerating properly on short runs, and the swirl flaps themselves can snap off and get pulled into the engine. Turbos fail often enough that owners are advised to replace the oil feed pipe at the same time to stop it happening again, and the timing belt, water pump, oil pump and dual-mass flywheel are common wear items around the 40,000-mile belt interval. When the DPF does need replacing it isn't cheap, one owner was quoted over £3,000.
Suzuki fitted three different automatics across the range: a CVT on early S-Cross (2013-16), which some owners find drones under load, a conventional 6-speed torque-converter auto from the 2016 facelift, and a dual-clutch (DCT) box on higher-powered petrols. The DCT is the one to watch, with clutch-pack judder reported from around 32,000 miles and at least one owner finding the DCT clutch pack excluded from a warranty claim. A separate case involved a full gearbox fault that took four months and several courtesy cars to resolve. Manual cars aren't affected by any of this.
S-Cross owners have reported water getting onto the door sills after heavy rain, traced to a failed inner door membrane, plus paint problems and a protective panel film that can look like early corrosion. One owner also reported a panoramic sunroof dropping on one side at 52,000 miles, quoted at close to £1,900 to put right. None of this is officially acknowledged as a pattern, it's a spread of individual reports rather than a single well-documented fault, so treat it as something to check for rather than an inevitability.
The measured MOT data for this class flags brakes as the most common fail, and there's a thin thread of owner reports that points the same way: a parking brake that briefly failed to hold the car on a slope, and a rear axle found out of alignment at a 9,500-mile service, which will wear rear pads and discs unevenly over time. It isn't a widely documented fault in the way the diesel or gearbox issues are, more a handful of reports that happen to line up with what the numbers show.
Several owners report high bills once the car is out of warranty and back at a main dealer, with one quoted around £1,400 for a 62,000-mile service on an S-Cross. Whether that reflects genuinely higher parts and labour costs or dealers charging what the market will bear is something owners argue about, but it's worth budgeting for if you plan to keep the car long term and use franchised servicing.
Built from the two sections above.
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