All generations and engines together · 10,835 MOT tests in the 2025 data · typical mileage at age 7: 84k
Worse than most saloons and estates for its age, and about average per mile driven. Watch suspension and brakes. A used buy worth some caution. Check the MOT history for repeating suspension advisories before you go.
Owner folklore from forums and the motoring press, with how well each report stands up. Most of it never shows up in an MOT, which is why this section exists at all.
On cars with the first-generation media control unit, the eMMC memory chip wears out from being written to constantly, so the centre screen gets slow to wake, freezes, or goes black. That kills the reversing camera, defroster controls and climate, which is why it became a safety issue rather than just an annoyance. Tesla was pushed into a recall covering roughly 135,000 UK/US cars, mostly 2012-2018 Model S and 2016-2018 Model X, and now replaces the eMMC or offers an MCU2 upgrade.
The flush handles are motorised and the wiring loom or internal gear inside the handle wears out, so a handle either won't extend when you approach the car or extends but won't release the door. Most reports are on 2013-2018 cars, sometimes from as little as 20,000 miles. Tesla treats it as a known manufacturing defect and will usually fix it under warranty or goodwill, but out of warranty a single handle can run £170-£450 in labour even though the part itself is cheap. No formal recall, but Tesla's own service documentation acknowledges the fault.
Owners on Tesla forums report clunks and knocks from the front end, usually traced to worn control-arm bushes or ball joints, sometimes after water gets into the joint and washes the grease out. On 2015-2017 cars specifically, Tesla issued a service bulletin in February 2017 warning that some front suspension fore links didn't meet its own strength spec and could fail at the knuckle ball joint; NHTSA investigated but closed the case without a recall. The measured MOT data backs the general pattern of suspension wear on this model, which lines up with what owners describe, even though the exact part blamed varies by year.
Cars fitted with air suspension can develop a compressor that runs almost continuously trying to hold ride height, then fails outright, leaving the car sat low or refusing to lift. It's a widely repeated complaint on Tesla owner forums rather than something Tesla has formally acknowledged as a defect. The compressor part itself isn't dear, but Tesla labour and diagnosis push a full repair well into four figures if it's out of warranty; independent EV specialists doing it for less.
A rising whine from the back of the car, worse at low speed or light acceleration, was common enough on early Large Drive Units that owners nicknamed it 'the funny noise'. It's put down to the steel rotor bearings in the early units. Tesla initially resisted covering it outside the drive unit warranty (4 years/50,000 miles), and a full replacement out of warranty has been quoted anywhere from around £4,000 at an independent EV specialist to well over that at a Tesla service centre.
Real-world data suggests packs hold up well, typically losing only around 1% range a year for the first several years, and there are well-documented UK and US cars past 300,000 miles on an original pack. The dispute is about what happens if a pack does fail or drop below warranty threshold once it's out of Tesla's 8-year/150,000-mile cover: a replacement pack has been quoted from roughly £8,000 up to £20,000 depending on size and age, which can write off the value of an older car. Buyers disagree on how real a risk this is versus normal battery ageing.
Ranked from this model’s own MOT record, then from what owners report.
Saveable checklistThe physical checks its own defect data says are worth your time, most telling first.
These judge the seller’s upkeep rather than the model, and they are where the haggling money is.
Drawn from the reports above rather than the MOT data. These are the model-specific ones.
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. 8,198 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.
Same segment (Saloons & estates), best MOT record first. Compare before you shortlist.