All generations and engines together · 13,764 MOT tests in the 2025 data · typical mileage at age 7: 72k
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. 4,051 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-AdBlue D4 twin-turbo diesel is prone to its water-cooled EGR cooler silting up with soot and oil, sometimes within the first year and under 10,000 miles on affected cars. Symptoms range from a check engine light to hesitation and limp mode, with a blocked inlet manifold in bad cases. Honest John reports Volvo initially resisted warranty claims before a safety recall covering melting inlet manifolds on affected cars; full repairs run from around £3,000 up past £8,000 depending on the damage.
Owners on two separate Volvo forums flag the same area on P2 and P3 cars: front lower wishbone bushes, control-arm bushes and tie rods wearing loose, showing up as a clonk over bumps and a vague feel under braking, usually well past 80,000-100,000 miles. It lines up with the measured MOT data for this shape of car, where suspension is the standout signature fault for the saloon and estate segment. The parts are cheap on their own, £50-150 a bush, but labour and doing both sides properly pushes a full front-end refresh into four figures.
Owners on the Autodoc forum describe random stalling, a flat throttle response and occasional limp mode traced back to the electronic throttle module on early petrol cars, with cracked solder joints inside the unit blamed. Volvo has never put out a bulletin for it as far as we can find, so it sits as owner folklore rather than an acknowledged fault, but it comes up often enough among long-term owners to take seriously at a viewing. A clean or replacement module runs to a few hundred pounds.
Cold, damp UK winters catch out the early D5 diesel: water sitting in the fuel filter can freeze and trip limp mode or a no-start, and separately, ageing injector seals have been known to leak and stop the engine firing on a frosty morning. Owners on the Volvo Owners Club forum describe pouring hot water over the injectors as a roadside fix, which tells you how often it's come up. Not something to expect warranty cover for at used-car age, more a fuel filter change or injector service to budget for.
The infotainment system can blow fuses and take other circuits down with it, and separately some owners mention rarer failures of the central electronic module, the box that runs most of the car's electrics. Opinions differ on how common this actually is: some long-term owners report years of trouble-free use, others describe repeat fuse failures needing a dealer to trace. Not cheap when it does go wrong, so worth checking rather than dismissing as a one-off blown fuse.
Built from the two sections above.
Same segment (Saloons & estates), best MOT record first. Compare before you shortlist.