all vehicles · every Forester year · method

Subaru Forester 2015

Safety complaints filed by owners in the first three years, per 1,000 sold.

0.83 per 1,000

1.6 times this nameplate’s own median · from 140 complaints filed in the first three years, of 613 ever. 95% lower bound 0.70.

Against its own model years

The model year carries far more information than the badge, so this is the comparison that matters.

Model year	Per 1,000	Complaints
2008	0.15	9
2009	0.48	33
2010	0.53	43
2011	0.24	19
2012	0.34	27
2013	0.21	21
2014	0.56	80
2015	0.83	140
2016	0.50	89
2017	1.12	200
2018	1.12	195
2019	2.98	525
2020	2.29	408
2021	0.79	131
2022	0.52	70
2023	0.46	61

What owners describe

Phrases over-represented in these complaints compared with the same component on every other vehicle. Counts are complaints containing the phrase.

Engine 131 complaints

shoulder	22	17%
normally	10	8%
oil light	10	8%

Air Bags 102 complaints

occupant detection	16	14%
wum	13	12%
detection system	13	12%
heated seats	12	11%
heated	12	11%
recall wum	11	10%

Power Train 95 complaints

cvt	11	12%
shoulder	11	12%

When it breaks

36% of reported failures happened before 30,000 miles (median 44,000 miles, from 410 complaints that recorded one).

No clear early or late pattern.

What NHTSA did

No NHTSA investigation covers this model year.

That is not a clean bill of health, and not a criticism of the agency: investigations open for many reasons and complaint volume is only one of them.

What owners and forums say

Not built yet. This panel is meant to carry community sentiment beside the filed-complaint data, so the two can be compared. Showing something weaker here would defeat its purpose.

Check this yourself

Example records behind this page:

10595021 · 10630298 · 10641030 · 10654869 · 10662955 · 10667330

Limits of this figure. It counts safety complaints filed with the federal government, which is a floor on failures and not a census: problems that only cost money are under-reported. Complaint rates also reflect how likely a brand’s owners are to file, which cannot be separated from how often the car fails. Sales are calendar-year and the denominator for this nameplate is automated checks only, not verified against an external source.