MOT Risk Index.co.uk

BMW X6 — MOT statistics 2024

The BMW X6 failed 17.4% of 15,622 first MOT attempts in 2024 ("first-time", excluding retests). Adjusted for the age of the fleet, its initial-failure ratio is 67.3 (100 = expected for its age profile). This car fails its MOT about 33% less often than expected for its age.

MOT risk index 67.3, 95% CI 65.0–69.6 (100 = national average) 100 67.3 0 200
Index
67.3
100 = age-normal
Raw fail rate
17.4%
n = 15,622
Dangerous /100
8
national ≈11
Diesel − petrol
+3.2 pp
fail-rate gap
Rank
171 of 761
lower index = better

Age-adjusted peer: Ford Puma (index 67.3) — the two published results are 0.0 index points apart.

BMW X6 common problems: what actually fails the MOT

Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment are well below the reference at 5.3 per 100 tests, against 11.2 per 100 tests across UK vehicles of the same ages.

higher bar = fails more oftenrate per 100 tests

BMW X6 common problems: what actually fails the MOT — 2024 UK MOT data

family vs national — matched to UK vehicles of the same ages — top component groups, per 100 tests. Legend: This family · National avg. Combined labels: family / national average. A gap here reflects how these vehicles are driven, used and maintained as well as how they were built — an MOT defect is a test outcome, not a breakdown.

Component-group comparison table

Each ratio carries a 95% interval. With 6 groups compared here, roughly one apparent difference in twenty is chance alone.

GroupThis familyCases behind itUK, same agesFamily / national
Tyres9.98,2218.31.19×1.16–1.21
Suspension6.15,08610.00.61×0.59–0.63
Visibility5.44,5266.60.82×0.80–0.85
Lamps & electrical5.34,38011.20.47×0.46–0.49
Brakes3.52,8988.00.44×0.42–0.45
Body & structure1.91,6093.00.64×0.62–0.69
Named defects — items per 100 initial tests, this family vs UK national average; this model measured on 83,150 tests, 2019-2024, national column 2024
What failedper 100 tests (this family)per 100 tests (UK average)ratio family / UKWhat to check
Tyre cords visible or damagedA tyre cords visible or damaged3.561.632.18×Check tyre tread depth across the full width
Number plate does not conform to the specified…Number plate does not conform to the specified requirements0.970.204.83×Ask the seller about: Number plate does not conform to the specified requirements
Tyre seriously damagedA tyre seriously damaged3.302.541.30×Check tyre tread depth across the full width
Transmission shaft constant velocity joint boot…A transmission shaft constant velocity joint boot severely deteriorated1.191.480.81×Ask the seller about: A transmission shaft constant velocity joint boot severely d
Windscreen or window damaged or seriously…Windscreen or window damaged or seriously discoloured but not adversely affecting driver's view2.022.360.86×Check wipers, washers and windscreen chips in the driver's view
Windscreen washers not working or not providing…Windscreen washers not working or not providing sufficient fluid to clear the windscreen1.091.620.67×Check wipers, washers and windscreen chips in the driver's view
Spring or spring component fractured or seriously…A spring or spring component fractured or seriously weakened2.202.860.77×Ask the seller about: A spring or spring component fractured or seriously weakened
Wiper blade missing or obviously not clearing the…Wiper blade missing or obviously not clearing the windscreen1.132.220.51×Check wipers, washers and windscreen chips in the driver's view
Tyre tread depth not in accordance with the…Tyre tread depth not in accordance with the requirements2.493.590.69×Check tyre tread depth across the full width
Suspension pin, bush or joint excessively wornA suspension pin, bush or joint excessively worn2.264.870.46×Listen for knocks over bumps — worn joints show up on the test

Named defects ranked by how much more often they appear than the national average — not by raw rate.

BMW X6 MOT advisories: what gets flagged

Tyres are highest at 36.7 per 100 tests; Identification is lowest at 0.8 per 100 tests — the gap is 35.9 per 100 tests.

higher bar = flagged more oftenadvisory items per 100 initial tests

BMW X6 MOT advisories: what gets flagged — 2024 UK MOT data
Advisory rates table
GroupAdvisories per 100
Tyres36.7
Brakes15.3
Suspension11
Non-component advisories6.5
Emissions & leaks3.9
Identification0.8

Advisories are wear the tester noted but didn't fail — what will need money soon.

Tyres, brakes and suspension: BMW X6 against cars of the same age

AgePartBMW X6Same age, petrol and dieselDifference
3 yearsTyres7.764.173.59
3 yearsBrakes0.711.77-1.06
3 yearsSuspension0.520.63-0.11
4 yearsTyres6.354.541.81
4 yearsBrakes1.072.43-1.36
4 yearsSuspension0.431.21-0.78
5 yearsTyres5.595.060.53
5 yearsBrakes1.413.09-1.68
5 yearsSuspension0.732.19-1.46
6 yearsTyres6.595.541.05
6 yearsBrakes1.353.81-2.46
6 yearsSuspension1.413.72-2.31
7 yearsTyres6.855.950.90
7 yearsBrakes2.074.55-2.48
7 yearsSuspension2.55.68-3.18
8 yearsTyres6.436.310.12
8 yearsBrakes2.415.38-2.97
8 yearsSuspension3.387.78-4.40

Failing items per 100 initial tests, 2019-2024. The comparison group is every petrol or diesel car tested at the same age, so weight and drivetrain show up rather than fleet age.

If a car like this fails, does it fail again?

A failure rate does not say whether a failure is a one-off or the start of something. This follows the same vehicles into their next ordinary MOT a year later — retests after a repair are excluded, because they follow a failure by definition. 2019-2024.

After this year's testFails next yearVehicles followed
It failed20.6%2,763
It passed15.6%50,795

A failed test raises next year's chance of failing again by 5.0 percentage points. The failure most likely to come back is seat belts and supplementary restraint systems — 28.6% of those vehicles fail again next year. Some of this is the vehicle and some is the owner: a car that was let go once tends to be let go again. One caveat: a car that fails may be sold or scrapped rather than tested again, so these figures describe the vehicles that came back.

Adjusted for how much these are actually driven

The headline index adjusts for the fleet's age. Wear, though, follows mileage: a three-year-old taxi and a three-year-old garage queen sit in the same age band. These two rows compare every car with vehicles of the same age, and then with vehicles of the same age and the same annual mileage, 2019-2024, on 82,649 tests. Both stand on the six-year corpus so they are measured on identical data — compare them with each other, not with the headline index above, which is measured on 2024 alone.

Standardised forIndexReading
Age only68.9fails less often than expected
Age and annual mileage64.3fails less often than vehicles driven as much
Share doing under 3,000 miles a year1.3%a normal spread of use

Mileage matters here: matching on how much these are driven moves the figure by 4.6 points — this fleet works harder than the vehicles it is measured against, so the age-only view penalises it — but it does not change which side of normal the car sits on. One limit to keep in mind: mileage is partly a result of how often a car breaks down — one that spends weeks in the workshop covers fewer miles — so the mileage-matched figure can understate a real weakness. Tests with no usable odometer reading are left out of it.

How the BMW X6 compares with cars of its own age and size

Not against the whole fleet — against cars of the same size class tested at the same age, 2019-2024.

AgeBMW X6Same class, same ageDifferenceTests
3 years13.39%10.75%+2.63 pp9,015
4 years12.69%12.34%+0.35 pp8,687
5 years12.96%14.17%-1.22 pp8,999
6 years14.1%16.1%-2 pp9,478
7 years15.8%18.26%-2.46 pp8,523
8 years17.2%20.56%-3.36 pp7,837
9 years19.76%23.11%-3.36 pp6,859
10 years21.72%25.62%-3.9 pp6,486
11 years22.59%28.26%-5.67 pp5,577
12 years23.97%30.59%-6.62 pp4,176
13 years24.71%32.65%-7.94 pp3,067
14 years24.54%34.61%-10.06 pp2,196
15 years25.41%36.05%-10.64 pp1,338
16 years28.47%37.09%-8.62 pp411

Raw first-time failure rates within each age, so fleet age cannot flatter either side. A positive difference means this model fails more often than its own class at that age.

How does the BMW X6 perform as it gets older?

The X6 at age 15 is well below the reference at 24.6%, against 41.6% for all vehicles of the same age.

higher = larger sharecompare shares in percentage points

How does the BMW X6 perform as it gets older? — 2024 UK MOT data

Chart axes: car age, years · failure-rate scale 0–47%.

Takeaway: a 10-year-old X6 has roughly a 20% chance of failing its MOT.

Data table
AgeBMW X6All vehiclesGap
317.2%12.4%+4.7 pp
413.3%13.1%+0.2 pp
512.9%15.1%-2.3 pp
614.2%17.5%-3.3 pp
713.5%20.2%-6.6 pp
811.9%23.3%-11.4 pp
914.1%26.5%-12.4 pp
1019.6%30.1%-10.5 pp
1120.5%33.2%-12.6 pp
1223.2%35.7%-12.5 pp
1324.7%38.2%-13.4 pp
1424.1%40.4%-16.4 pp
1524.6%41.6%-17.0 pp
1628.5%43.1%-14.6 pp

Is a BMW X6 ULEZ compliant?

The share of classifiable 2024 BMW X6 MOT tests likely ULEZ compliant by first-registration date is 57.3%.

Based on 15,569 classifiable initial MOT tests. This describes the tested fleet, not a specific car. MOT data do not record Euro class, so likely compliance is inferred from fuel and first-registration date. For the only authoritative answer, check the registration with TfL's official ULEZ checker.

higher = larger share likely compliantinferred from fuel and first-registration date; not a recorded Euro class

Age-band estimate from classifiable initial MOT tests
Vehicle age at testLikely ULEZ-compliant shareTests
Under 3 yearsSuppressed — sample below publication threshold
Check a registration with TfL
n = 45
3–5 years100.0%
Check a registration with TfL
n = 2,744
6–7 years100.0%
Check a registration with TfL
n = 3,500
8 years100.0%
Check a registration with TfL
n = 1,785
9 years55.3%
Check a registration with TfL
n = 1,259
10–14 years2.5%
Check a registration with TfL
n = 4,973
15–17 years2.1%
Check a registration with TfL
n = 1,263
18 yearsSuppressed — sample below publication threshold
Check a registration with TfL
n = 0
19 yearsSuppressed — sample below publication threshold
Check a registration with TfL
n = 0
20+ yearsSuppressed — sample below publication threshold
Check a registration with TfL
n = 0

How dangerous are BMW X6 MOT failures?

Major defects are well below the reference at 20.6 per 100 tests, against 52.8 per 100 tests nationally.

higher bar = fails more oftenrate per 100 tests

How dangerous are BMW X6 MOT failures? — 2024 UK MOT data
Severity table
SeverityThis family /100National /100Family / national
Minor6.7414.220.47×
Major20.5852.750.39×
Dangerous8.3911.150.75×

Chart values: Minor 6.7 · Major 20.6 · Dangerous 8.4.

Per 100 tests on this family. National average: Minor 14.2 · Major 52.8 · Dangerous 11.2 per 100.

Does the month of a BMW X6 MOT matter?

Apr is highest at 18.1%; Sep is lowest at 16.3% — the gap is 1.8 percentage points.

higher = larger sharecompare shares in percentage points

Does the month of a BMW X6 MOT matter? — 2024 UK MOT data

Chart scale: 15%–33%.

bars: BMW X6 · dashed: all class-4 cars

Month-by-month table
MonthBMW X6All vehiclesGap
Jan17.81%31.12%-13.3 pp
Feb18.06%29.99%-11.9 pp
Mar17.1%28.26%-11.2 pp
Apr18.07%29.78%-11.7 pp
May17.37%28.79%-11.4 pp
Jun16.89%28.15%-11.3 pp
Jul17.54%29.33%-11.8 pp
Aug17.31%29.2%-11.9 pp
Sep16.31%28.19%-11.9 pp
Oct17.06%30.34%-13.3 pp
Nov17.2%30.58%-13.4 pp
Dec16.59%29.33%-12.7 pp

Takeaway: the spread between best and worst month is 1.8 percentage points — booking month barely matters for this family. Seasonality partly reflects registration-date clustering, not weather.

Before reading the shape: most of it is not about cars. Britain changes its registration plates twice a year, and 18.9% of these cars were first registered in March with another17.1% in September — 36% in two months against the 17% an even spread would give. An MOT falls due three years after first registration, so the buying calendar becomes the testing calendar. That shapes how many cars are tested each month — not how often they fail: the busiest months here are not the worst ones, so read the failure line on its own and the volume behind it separately.

BMW X6 average mileage by age

At age 8, the middle half of X6s runs from 54,794 miles to 84,701 miles, against 69,125 miles as the median.

further right = more milesmedian is the typical car; band is p25–p75

Bars: BMW X6 · dashed: all class-4 cars — 2024 UK MOT data

Chart axes: car age, years · odometer scale 0–154k mi.

Does high mileage mean more BMW X6 MOT failures at the same age?

Within the same age group, split by odometer (2024 MOTs), so this separates wear from age: at ages 6–9, 10.4% of those with under 40,000 miles failed first time versus 18.1% of those with over 140,000 miles.No clear mileage gap inside this age group, among cars still being tested.

Does high mileage mean more BMW X6 MOT failures at the same age? — 2024 UK MOT data
BMW X6: first-time failure by mileage within each age group (2024)
AgeOdometer% failing95% intervalTests
3–5<40k miles14.3%12.7–16%1,777
3–540-70k miles14.8%12.6–17.3%845
3–570-100k miles18.6%12.5–26.7%113 (rough estimate)
6–9<40k miles10.4%8.6–12.5%906
6–940-70k miles12.3%11.2–13.6%3,054
6–970-100k miles15.7%14.1–17.4%1,919
6–9100-140k miles15.6%12.9–18.8%589
6–9140k+ miles18.1%10.9–28.5%72 (rough estimate)
10–14<40k miles13.1%7.5–21.9%84 (rough estimate)
10–1440-70k miles18.8%16–22%638
10–1470-100k miles21.2%19.4–23.2%1,730
10–14100-140k miles22.5%20.7–24.4%1,956
10–14140k+ miles27.4%23.8–31.2%563
15+40-70k miles29.4%19.9–41.1%68 (rough estimate)
15+70-100k miles25.4%20.2–31.5%224 (rough estimate)
15+100-140k miles26.2%22.9–29.7%627
15+140k+ miles25.7%21.3–30.6%335 (rough estimate)

line: median · band: middle half of the fleet (p25–p75)

Mileage by age (p25 / median / p75)
Agep25Medianp75Tests
320,66527,61436,3821,026
425,64334,01145,1641,057
534,85744,17357,960661
640,25351,74365,4512,096
748,57961,70276,7321,404
854,79469,12584,7011,785
963,15178,93198,5581,259
1071,80688,871108,9131,330
1178,48597,105116,0651,168
1284,584104,019124,3621,020
1390,850110,152130,658732
1495,841113,281134,781723
1599,298119,023138,781854
16105,127125,778146,470410

A typical 8-year-old X6 has ~69,125 miles on the clock. Much more — ask why; much less — check for gaps in the MOT history.

Where in Britain the BMW X6 fails its MOT most

Aberdeen area is highest at 25.5%; London N area is lowest at 10.6% — the gap is 15.0 percentage points.

higher = larger sharecompare shares in percentage points

BMW X6 line: median · band: middle half of the fleet (p25–p75) — 2024 UK MOT data
Toughest areas% failingvs model overall
Aberdeen (AB)25.52%+8.3 pp
Dundee (DD)24.68%+7.4 pp
Plymouth (PL)24.6%+7.4 pp
Brighton (BN)24.17%+6.9 pp
Portsmouth (PO)23.68%+6.4 pp
Easiest areas% failingvs model overall
London N (N)10.55%-6.7 pp
London E (E)11%-6.2 pp
Enfield (EN)11.09%-6.1 pp
Uxbridge (UB)11.21%-6.0 pp
Oldham (OL)12.21%-5.0 pp

Why do areas differ?

For each external factor we correlate the area fail rate with the factor across postcode areas that have ≥800 tests of this family, then compare the bottom vs top fifth (quintile) of the factor. Correlation, not causation — factors travel together (the north is colder and often poorer; urban areas are denser and less salted). Road surface condition is joined now, for the 91 English areas the DfT publishes, and it explains nothing: the correlation with suspension failures is −0.01 and with body and structure failures 0.07. Potholes wreck wheels and tyres between tests, but by the time a car reaches the bay the road it drives on leaves no measurable trace.

In areas with the highest urban share this model fails 5.5 pp less often than in the lowest fifth (r=-0.61, n=45 areas with ≥800 tests).

In areas with the highest mot centre density this model fails 4.9 pp more often than in the lowest fifth (r=0.58, n=45 areas with ≥800 tests).

In areas with the highest terrain gradient this model fails 6.2 pp more often than in the lowest fifth (r=0.53, n=29 areas with ≥800 tests).

BMW X6 Why do areas differ? — 2024 UK MOT data
Values shown in the quintile chart
FactorLow QHigh QGapCorrelation
Urban share18.6%13.2%-5.4 ppr=-0.61
MOT centre density13.7%18.7%+5.0 ppr=0.58
Terrain gradient15.3%21.6%+6.3 ppr=0.53

Factors that only mean something combined

Some conditions are useless on their own and informative multiplied together. Frost days alone say little — Britain barely freezes. Salt tonnage alone says little — it tracks frost. Distance to the sea alone says little. Multiply the first two and divide by the third and you get an index of how hard an area attacks a car's underside, and it lines up with the corrosion defects we actually record. We built five such combinations and tested each against our own data. Three survived; two did not, and the failures are listed here on purpose — a proxy that was never checked is decoration. One survivor only survived on the second attempt: built from a crude stand-in for street parking it failed outright, and rebuilt from the census — terraced streets carrying more cars than they have driveways — it works, and carries information the salt index does not.

Composite area indicators, each tested against a defect rate we measure
CompositeBuilt fromTested againstrVerdict
Underbody corrosionfrost days × salt load ÷ (distance to coast + 1)share of tests with a corrosion defect+0.42holds (116 areas)
Tyre wearrain days × annual miles ÷ age at first tyre advisoryshare of tests failing on tyres+0.45holds (116 areas)
Overnight corrosionterraced housing × cars per household × frost daysshare with a corrosion defect+0.41holds (102 areas) — and adds signal beyond the first index
Deferred maintenancedeprivation × advisory-to-failure conversion ÷ labour ratecars repeating the same advisory−0.26fails (118 areas)
Powertrain stressengine capacity ÷ kerb weightsuspension, brake and emissions failures−0.16fails (22 models)

The deprivation result is the one worth dwelling on. The intuition that poorer areas defer repairs is strong enough that most people treat it as established. We tested it twice — once on raw failure rates (r = 0.04) and again, more fairly, on whether an advisory turns into a failure — and it did not hold any of the three times we tried it — on raw failure rates, on advisory-to-failure conversion, and again with deprivation measured properly inside each nation rather than England alone. We are closing it. What does predict local failure rates is the density of test centres, which is a statement about testing, not about cars.

All external-factor correlations (machine-readable)
Factorrn areasLow-Q fail %High-Q fail %Gap ppLow-Q factorHigh-Q factor
Urban share (0–1)-0.6134518.613.2-5.50.61
MOT centre density (per 10k vehicles)0.5774513.718.7+4.94.97.3
Terrain gradient (% grade)0.5252915.321.6+6.20.52.6
Road-salt proxy (g/m²-yr)0.4374514.819.0+4.2235.8542.2
Frost days (days/year)0.3914517.119.3+2.212.730.8
Income deprivation (score)-0.3074118.614.7-3.90.10.2
Distance to coast (km)-0.2504519.716.2-3.58.389.3

Deprivation uses England IMD 2019 income score only (Scotland SIMD is a different scale). Salt proxy is a simplified NWSRG-style dry-salt sum from air Tmin; coastalness is distance from the area centroid to the nearest coastline.

Every dot is a postcode area — size = how many were tested there, colour = share failing. These figures are not age-adjusted: coastal and rural areas often run older fleets and salted roads, so higher raw fail rates do not automatically mean a worse local stock of this model.

Map labels: Scotland · N. England · Wales · London · S. West. Colour scale: 13%–24% failing.

BMW X6 survival: which cars are still on the road

By age 16 is well below the reference at 4.5%, against 100.0% at the ages 4–6 reference level.

higher = larger sharecompare shares in percentage points

BMW X6 survival: which cars are still on the road — 2024 UK MOT data

Chart axes: car age, years · survival vs ages 4–6 · scale 0–105%.

Survival vs fail rate by age
AgeTestsSurvival vs ages 4–6Fail %
39,01599.6%13.39%
48,68795.9%12.69%
58,99999.4%12.96%
69,478100%14.1%
78,52394.1%15.8%
87,83786.6%17.2%
96,85975.8%19.76%
106,48671.6%21.72%
115,57761.6%22.59%
124,17646.1%23.97%
133,06733.9%24.71%
142,19624.3%24.54%
151,33814.8%25.41%
164114.5%28.47%

By age 15, only about 15% as many cars of this family present for MOT as at ages 4–6 (reference n≈9,054); survivors still fail at 25.4% vs 12.7% at age 4. Older cars that still appear are a selected subset — weaker ones have already left.

How many miles does a BMW X6 last?

100,000+ miles is highest at 19.8%; 150,000+ miles is lowest at 2.6% — the gap is 17.2 percentage points.

higher = larger sharecompare shares in percentage points

OdometerTests ≥ thresholdShare of sample
100,000+ miles16,39719.83%
150,000+ miles2,1612.61%

Of 82,703 tests of this family with a usable odometer in 2024, 19.8% had reached 100k miles, 2.6% had reached 150k miles. This is a cross-section of cars still presenting for MOT, not a full birth cohort.

How many years is a BMW X6 likely to last?

Bought at age 5 is highest at 6.6 years; Bought at age 15 is lowest at 0.5 years — the gap is 6.1 years.

bigger number = longer remaining lifeyears on the observed survival curve

Age nowTypical mileage (p50)Expected years left
5—6.6
8—4.3
10—3
12—at least 2.1
15—at least 0.5

estimateEstimate only — not a warranty: a typical 10-year-old example of this family has about 3.0 expected years of further MOT-present life on the 2024 survival curve. Derived from how many cars of each age still appear for test, not from a longitudinal panel.

BMW X6 faults that come together

Brakes + Steering stand out at 7.85×, against 1.00× if the faults were independent.

above 1.0× = more than expectedbelow 1.0× = less

Group AGroup BTogetherLift
BrakesSteering267.85× (rough estimate)
BrakesSeat belts and supplementary restraint systems427.35× (rough estimate)
BrakesNoise, emissions and leaks1147.23× (rough estimate)
Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipmentSeat belts and supplementary restraint systems657.02× (rough estimate)
BrakesRoad Wheels856.6× (rough estimate)
Noise, emissions and leaksRoad Wheels296.46× (rough estimate)
SteeringSuspension366.2× (rough estimate)
Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipmentRoad Wheels1225.85× (rough estimate)
Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipmentNoise, emissions and leaks1465.72× (rough estimate)
BrakesLamps, reflectors and electrical equipment4165.67× (rough estimate)
Identification of the vehicleNoise, emissions and leaks275.66× (rough estimate)
Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipmentSteering305.59× (rough estimate)
Road WheelsSuspension1225.4× (rough estimate)
Noise, emissions and leaksSuspension1485.35× (rough estimate)
Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipmentSuspension6695.21×
BrakesSuspension4125.19× (rough estimate)
Body, chassis, structureSuspension2564.52× (rough estimate)
Seat belts and supplementary restraint systemsVisibility474.09× (rough estimate)
Body, chassis, structureLamps, reflectors and electrical equipment2114.03× (rough estimate)
Seat belts and supplementary restraint systemsSuspension403.99× (rough estimate)
Body, chassis, structureBrakes1283.96× (rough estimate)
Identification of the vehicleLamps, reflectors and electrical equipment863.88× (rough estimate)
Road WheelsTyres1423.85× (rough estimate)
Body, chassis, structureNoise, emissions and leaks423.73× (rough estimate)
Body, chassis, structureRoad Wheels343.7× (rough estimate)
Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipmentVisibility5433.69×
BrakesTyres4633.57× (rough estimate)
SteeringTyres333.48× (rough estimate)
Noise, emissions and leaksVisibility1093.44× (rough estimate)
Identification of the vehicleSuspension813.37× (rough estimate)
SteeringVisibility223.3× (rough estimate)
Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipmentTyres6863.27×
Noise, emissions and leaksTyres1483.27× (rough estimate)
BrakesIdentification of the vehicle443.21× (rough estimate)
Identification of the vehicleTyres1233.13× (rough estimate)
BrakesVisibility2833.11× (rough estimate)
Seat belts and supplementary restraint systemsTyres513.11× (rough estimate)
SuspensionVisibility4873.05× (rough estimate)
Identification of the vehicleVisibility802.91× (rough estimate)
Road WheelsVisibility732.82× (rough estimate)
TyresVisibility6982.68×
Body, chassis, structureIdentification of the vehicle262.66× (rough estimate)
SuspensionTyres5752.53×
Body, chassis, structureVisibility1592.45× (rough estimate)
Body, chassis, structureTyres1711.85× (rough estimate)
Noise, emissions and leaksSeat belts and supplementary restraint systems19too few (rough estimate)
Body, chassis, structureSeat belts and supplementary restraint systems16too few (rough estimate)
Road WheelsSeat belts and supplementary restraint systems15too few (rough estimate)
Body, chassis, structureSteering15too few (rough estimate)
Identification of the vehicleRoad Wheels11too few (rough estimate)
Noise, emissions and leaksSteering7too few (rough estimate)
Identification of the vehicleSeat belts and supplementary restraint systems7too few (rough estimate)
Seat belts and supplementary restraint systemsSteering6too few (rough estimate)

Defects in «Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment» and «Suspension» appear together 5.21× more often than chance (669 co-occurrences in the same test; lift≥1.3, n≥500).

Lift = how many times more often both groups appear on the same test than if independent. A pair is listed from 5 tests with both faults; the lift is shown from 20, and called above chance only when its 95% interval excludes 1 (see rough estimates).

Is low mileage better for a BMW X6?

Cars driven under 5,000 miles a year is well below the reference at 11.1%, against 14.9% for cars driven 8,000–12,000 miles a year.

higher = larger sharecompare shares in percentage points

BandFail %Tests
<5k miles/year11.05%2,607
8–12k miles/year14.86%14,803
Gap (low − normal)-3.81 pp—
By fuel and age

Diesel

AgeLow-use fail %nNormal fail %nGap pp
59.5368212.593,464-3.06 pp
610.9964614.93,865-3.91 pp
710.149515.53,549-5.4 pp
814.1644517.733,514-3.57 pp
912.0334921.043,236-9.01 pp
1014.5131722.713,268-8.19 pp
1115.5625722.872,803-7.3 pp
1218.5919924.962,071-6.37 pp
1319.8816624.931,496-5.05 pp
1423.8513026.361,032-2.51 pp

Petrol

AgeLow-use fail %nNormal fail %nGap pp
512.37979.92121+2.45 pp
610.879216.36110-5.49 pp
79.789218.4892-8.7 pp
813.795810.2388+3.57 pp
96.984317.3969-10.41 pp
106.453127.6647-21.21 pp
1111.433526.8341-15.4 pp
1212.53220.5934-8.09 pp

At matched ages 5–14, cars averaging under 5k miles/year fail at 11.1% vs 14.9% for 8–12k miles/year — 3.8 pp lower (n_low=2,607, n_normal=14,803). In this family low annual use is associated with fewer MOT fails, not more — the ‘garage queen’ penalty is not visible in overall fail rates. Diesel alone: 10.2% low-use vs 13.7% normal (-3.5 pp).

Which BMW X6 engine is best?

diesel over 2.0 is highest at 100.5; petrol over 2.0 is lowest at 90.1 — the gap is 10.4 points.

below 100 is betterabove 100 is worse100 = normal for this model at that age

Engine bands against this model's own failure rate at the same ages
FuelCapacityvs own age normRaw fail %Tests
petrolover 2.0 litre90.113.99%4,159 (rough estimate)
dieselover 2.0 litre100.517.43%77,672

Splitting this model by fuel alone hides the thing that actually differs. Within the same badge, the diesel over 2.0 runs at 100.5 against this model's own age norm while the petrol over 2.0 runs at 90.1 — a spread of 10.4 points between two cars that share a name.

Read this one with more care than the rest of the page. Age is held constant, but who buys which engine is not: the largest capacity in a range is often a performance or executive variant that is garaged, cherished and lightly driven, while the smallest is frequently a fleet or entry car worked hard from new. The gap below is real in the test records; how much of it is the engine and how much is the owner, this data cannot separate. Bands under 100 tests are not shown; bands under 5,000 tests are rough estimates.

Best year for a BMW X6, and the years to avoid

Build year 2019 is highest at 116.6; Build year 2017 is lowest at 85.1 — the gap is 31.5 points.

below 100 is betterabove 100 is worse100 = normal for this model at that age

build year vs the same model at the same age · 100 = as expected

BMW X6 build year vs the same model at the same age · 100 = as expected — 2024 UK MOT data
BMW X6 by build year, tests 2019–2024. Below 100 is better than the model's own age norm.
Every build year with its confidence interval
Build yearvs own age norm95% CIRaw fail %TestsVerdict
2020110.998.4–123.514.03%2,153no different
2019116.6103.4–129.814.7%2,041worse
201899.493.6–105.212.88%8,788no different
201785.179.4–90.811.51%7,525better
201687.382.8–91.912.49%11,275better
201587.682.4–92.913.4%7,923better
2014108.9103.5–114.318.21%8,550worse
2013105.8100.4–111.219.38%7,617worse
2012108.9103.4–114.521.74%6,807worse
2011106.9100.6–113.122.91%4,894worse
2010100.894.9–106.722.93%4,936no different
2009104.899.4–110.124.87%6,011no different
200810193.9–108.125.03%3,100no different

The best build year here is 2017 and the weakest is 2012. Comparing build years sounds simple and is not: within a single year of testing, a car's build year and its age are the same number, so a naive comparison of years is a comparison of ages wearing a disguise. Each year below is measured against the same model at the same age in other cohorts, across six years of testing — 7 of 13 years come out distinguishable from their own model's age norm.

Two limits worth knowing before you act on this. Age, test year and build year are locked together by arithmetic, so the test-year effect is taken from the observed national failure level of each year rather than estimated — it is an adjustment, not a solution.

BMW X6 MOT repair costs

The MOT-failure repair budget per test runs from £32.56 to £61.86, against £54.85 for the test itself.

bigger number = costs morepounds per test, MOT-failing faults only

MOT repairs, budget
£33–62
per test, repairs only
The test itself
£54.85
statutory cap, unchanged since 2010
How the figure is built: chance of failing × typical price of that repair
ComponentFails per 100 testsTypical repairIts priceContribution
Suspension6.1 (nat. 15.36)Suspension coil spring (single corner)£180£10.98
Tyres9.9 (nat. 8.7)Tyre (single mid-range 16" fitted)£90£8.91
Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment5.3 (nat. 18.09)Battery replacement (standard 12V lead-acid)£140£7.42
Brakes3.5 (nat. 11.25)Front brake pads (parts + labour, typical hatchback)£150£5.25

Multiply how often each component fails on this model by what that repair usually costs, and you get the amount an owner should expect to budget per test for MOT-failing faults only — roughly £33 to £62, on top of the test fee itself. It is a budgeting figure, not a quote: the spread between a set of pads and a set of discs is most of the range.

Prices are modal quotes from a hand-kept catalogue of published UK garage guides — we do not scrape the booking sites, their terms forbid it, so this list is short and updated by hand with a source and date against each line. Each line prices one typical repair in that group, not a full remedy, and only groups our catalogue actually covers are counted. The contrast worth noticing is the second card: the legal maximum for the test has been £54.85 since 2010, while the repairs it uncovers have followed inflation the whole time.

For scale from a different direction: Warrantywise, which sees used-car warranty claims rather than test failures, puts the average claim at £2,052 across the ten highest-claim models it ranks and £539 for Honda, the lowest-claim make in its index (Warrantywise index 2026, 1.6 million claims, cars aged 3–15). Those sit an order of magnitude above the figures in this table, and the gap is the point: a warranty claim is a gearbox or an engine, which almost never fails an MOT, while the faults that do fail one are corrosion, lamps and tyres, which no warranty pays for. The two numbers answer different questions and neither replaces the other.

BMW X6 running costs for a fleet

Vehicles failing at age 10 stand out at 20.0%, against 13.0% at age 5, tested in the same year.

higher = larger sharecompare shares in percentage points

Fails per 100 at age 5
13
vehicles needing work (rough estimate: 661 tests)
At age 10
20
other cars of this model tested at age 10 in 2024 (rough estimate: 1,330 tests)
Repairs per 100
£3,256
plus £5,485 in test fees
Off the road
1d
median; 30.71% cleared same day
Failure rate and typical odometer by age
AgeFailsMedian odometerTestsGap vs age 5
317.15%27,6141,026+4.3 pp
413.34%34,0111,057+0.5 pp
512.86%44,173661+0.0 pp
614.17%51,7432,096+1.3 pp
713.53%61,7021,404+0.7 pp
811.93%69,1251,785-0.9 pp
914.14%78,9311,259+1.3 pp
1019.62%88,8711,330+6.8 pp
1120.55%97,1051,168+7.7 pp
1223.24%104,0191,020+10.4 pp
1324.73%110,152732+11.9 pp
1424.07%113,281723+11.2 pp
1524.59%119,023854+11.7 pp
1628.54%125,778410+15.7 pp

No single year stands out as the point where this model starts costing more: the year-to-year steps in its failure rate are too small or rest on too few tests to name one (D1 rule: a step is named only with at least 2,000 tests on both sides and a jump above 3 percentage points).

Repair spend uses the same modal prices as the section above, so it inherits the same limits: one typical repair per component group, not a full remedy. Downtime is the gap between the failed test and the passed re-test, which is the window a vehicle is legally off the road.

BMW X6 rust problems: where they corrode

Age-standardised corrosion susceptibility is well below the reference at <0.1×, against 1.00× for the national age-standardised rate.

above 1.0× = rusts more than averagebelow 1.0× = rusts less

How it rusts
<0.1×
0.07% of tests record a corrosion defect vs 0.77% typical — age-standardised
Salt Belt exposure
41st
percentile among the models published here, from its tests across 45 postcode areas

This BMW X6 virtually never fails on corrosion once age is held constant, and its owners live in areas that are about typical for the models we publish.

Corrosion is the one failure mode that is as much about geography as about the car. We keep the two apart on purpose: a model can look rusty simply because it is popular in Scotland, and a model can look clean simply because it is bought in Surrey. Blending them into a single score would hide which of the two is doing the work.

Exposure is this model's tests weighted by an area corrosion index built from frost days, salt load and distance to the coast — the composite validated at r = 0.42 against corrosion defects we actually record. It is published as a rank, not a raw score, because every mainstream model skews towards low-corrosion areas for the simple reason that most of Britain's cars are in the south. Susceptibility is standardised to the national age profile, so an old fleet does not get labelled a rusty model.

Does a BMW X6 advisory become a failure?

Suspension is highest at 12.0%; Non-component advisories are lowest at 0.0% — the gap is 12.0 percentage points.

higher = more likelypercentage is the observed transition probability

chance the same component fails at the next MOT, given an advisory now

BMW X6 chance the same component fails at the next MOT, given an advisory now — 2024 UK MOT data
BMW X6, advisory → failure conversion by component group, chained tests 2019–2024. Chart labels and rates: Suspension 12.1% · Tyres 9.4% · Brakes 4.5% · Noise, emissions, leaks 2.6% · Non-component 0%.
Advisory today → failure at the next test, with how long you have
ComponentFails next timeTypical lead timeMiles of warningAdvisories tracked
Suspension12.0%12.1 months6,9724,150
Tyres9.4%12.1 months7,51213,556
Brakes4.5%12.1 months7,0866,312
Noise, emissions and leaks2.6%12.2 months8,4312,106
Non-component advisories0.0%——3,736

This is the question an advisory note actually raises, and it needs six years of test history to answer. We followed the same vehicles from one MOT to the next across 2019–2024 and measured how often a component that was merely advised came back as a genuine failure at the next test.

Read it as a budgeting horizon, not a prophecy: the most likely component above turns into a failure for about 12 in 100 cars, and the median gap is 12.1 months and roughly 6,972 miles. The rest were repaired, sold, scrapped, or simply held. Rows with fewer than 500 tracked advisories are not shown.

What will fail next on a BMW X6?

Suspension after a failure at age 15-19 is highest at 20.4%; Identification of the vehicle after a passed at age <3 is lowest at 0.7% — the gap is 19.7 percentage points.

higher = more likelypercentage is the observed transition probability

Probability of each component failing at the next test, by age and last result
AgeLast testMost likely next failuresCars tracked
<3passedTyres 6.2% · Visibility 4.7% · Identification of the vehicle 0.7%3,943
<3advisoryVisibility 6.8% · Tyres 6.2% · Brakes 0.9%925
<3failureTyres 6.7% · Visibility 5.2% · Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment 1.2%736
3-5passedTyres 5.1% · Visibility 3.7% · Brakes 1.1%14,754
3-5advisoryTyres 7.5% · Visibility 4.7% · Brakes 1.8%4,689
3-5failureTyres 7.2% · Visibility 5.4% · Brakes 1.8%2,865
6-8passedTyres 5.1% · Visibility 3.9% · Suspension 3.6%10,849
6-8advisoryTyres 9.1% · Visibility 4.9% · Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment 4.5%4,956
6-8failureTyres 8.6% · Suspension 5.9% · Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment 5.8%3,368
9-11passedSuspension 7.0% · Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment 6.1% · Tyres 5.0%6,635
9-11advisorySuspension 9.9% · Tyres 8.3% · Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment 8.2%3,786
9-11failureSuspension 11.8% · Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment 10.3% · Tyres 8.6%3,060
12-14passedSuspension 10.0% · Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment 8.1% · Visibility 4.9%2,202
12-14advisorySuspension 15.3% · Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment 11.3% · Visibility 8.4%1,586
12-14failureSuspension 16.0% · Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment 13.8% · Visibility 10.4%1,331
15-19passedSuspension 13.6% · Visibility 10.2%59 (rough estimate)
15-19advisorySuspension 17.3%52 (rough estimate)
15-19failureSuspension 20.4% · Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment 18.5% · Tyres 13.0%54 (rough estimate)

The same chains, cut differently: given a car's age and how its last test went, which component most often causes trouble at the following one.

The pattern that repeats across every family: a failure at one test roughly doubles the chance of a failure on the same component at the next one, and an advisory sits about half-way between a clean pass and a failure. Age bands in years; probabilities are per car, not per defect item.

BMW X6 ownership: what six years of MOTs show

The ten-day re-test pass rate is highest at 65.6%; The later re-test pass rate is lowest at 3.7% — the gap is 61.9 percentage points.

higher = larger sharecompare shares in percentage points

Fixed same day
30.71%
of failures re-tested
Fails /10k miles
0.221
miles actually driven
Clean streaks
53.46%
3+ tests, nothing noted
Odometer anomaly
1.281%
reading went backwards

Failing is usually a same-week event, not a disaster. Of 10,833 failures followed through to their re-test, 30.71% were repaired and passed the same day and 65.61% within ten days; the median gap is 1 day. 20,950 defect items were cleared in the process.

Per mile driven, not per year. Dividing failures by the miles that actually went onto the odometers between consecutive tests gives 0.221 failures per 10,000 miles, on a median of 6,890 miles a year across 16,146 chains. This is the number to compare between models — an annual rate quietly rewards cars that barely leave the drive.

Two populations hide inside one model. 53.46% of these cars strung together three or more tests with nothing recorded at all, while 16.33% carried the same advisory three times or more — the same fault, noted, ignored, noted again. When you buy used you are buying one of those two histories, and the MOT record shows which.

Odometer anomalies: 1.281% of 16,153 chains show a reading lower than the previous test, with a median drop of 32,036 miles. We call this an anomaly and not fraud on purpose — instrument swaps, imports, unit mix-ups and keying errors all land in the same bucket. Obvious typos (drops under 100 miles or over 90% of the reading) are already excluded.

BMW X6 safety recalls and how to check yours

DVSA recall campaigns stand out at 30.

bigger number = more recorded casescompare like-for-like scope, not sample size alone

recall campaigns launched per year

BMW X6 recall campaigns launched per year — 2024 UK MOT data
Campaigns launched per year for the BMW X6. Source: DVSA vehicle safety recalls. Chart values: 2011: 2 · 2012: 3 · 2013: 1 · 2014: 0 · 2015: 0 · 2016: 1 · 2017: 0 · 2018: 2 · 2019: 3 · 2020: 3 · 2021: 3 · 2022: 2 · 2023: 3 · 2024: 4 · 2025: 2.
Most recent safety recall campaigns for the BMW X6
ReferenceLaunchedVehiclesConcern
R/2025/34918/12/20251,143Takata Driver and/or Passenger Airbag Recall (Global VINs)
R/2025/34918/12/2025189Takata Driver and/or Passenger Airbag Recall (Global VINs)
R/2024/40321/10/2024318Check Driver’s Airbag for Conversion Takata SDI & PSDI-5
R/2024/38313/09/2024818Integrated Braking System
R/2024/26220/05/202410Seat Belt Warning (Front Seat Belts)
All 30 campaigns
ReferenceLaunchedBuild datesVehiclesConcern
R/2025/34918/12/202507/08/2007 – 24/06/20141,143Takata Driver and/or Passenger Airbag Recall (Global VINs)
R/2025/34918/12/202519/03/2014 – 22/08/2017189Takata Driver and/or Passenger Airbag Recall (Global VINs)
R/2024/40321/10/202411/05/2014 – 02/09/2017318Check Driver’s Airbag for Conversion Takata SDI & PSDI-5
R/2024/38313/09/202403/10/2022 – 14/08/2024818Integrated Braking System
R/2024/26220/05/202412/04/2024 – 18/04/202410Seat Belt Warning (Front Seat Belts)
R/2024/11907/03/202401/03/2023 – 21/07/2023207Integrated Braking System
R/2024/15620/10/202329/07/2023 – 26/08/202312Checking potential vehicle damage
R/2023/22431/08/202307/08/2007 – 25/06/201444,407The driver and front passenger airbags may deploy with too much explosive force causing sh
R/2023/01624/01/202320/03/2014 – 02/09/20174,432A possible degradation of the propellant tablets could lead to an over-aggressive combusti
R/2022/25522/08/202226/08/2019 – 24/07/2020322,745Undetected EGR System leaks may cause thermal activity in the intake manifold
R/2022/20601/08/202220/03/2014 – 03/04/2019319,399THE EXHAUST GAS RECIRCULATION COOLER MAY LEAK OVER TIME AND CAUSE THERMAL INCIDENT
R/2021/21314/06/202129/04/2017 – 22/08/201818,330THE EXHAUST GAS RECIRCULATION MODULE COULD LEAK OVER TIME
R/2021/05422/02/202118/02/2020 – 19/10/2020139THE INTEGRATED BRAKE SYSTEM HYDRAULIC UNIT MAY HAVE BEEN PRODUCED INCORRECTLY
R/2021/01525/01/202105/07/2020 – 17/11/2020388THE BATTERY CABLES ON THE 48V STARTER GENERATOR MAY NOT HAVE BEEN SUFFICIENTLY SECURED DUR
R/2021/07211/11/202003/06/2020 – 03/06/202010THE FRONT AXLE SUPPORT (SUBFRAME) WELDING PROCESS HAS NOT BEEN COMPLETED ACCORDING TO SPEC
R/2020/06723/03/202004/12/2019 – 23/01/2020167THE REAR SPOILER ATTACHED TO THE TOP EDGE OF THE TAILGATE ADJOINING THE REAR OF THE ROO CA
R/2019/39702/03/202019/03/2014 – 03/04/20198,155THE ISOFIX CHILD RESTRAINT U-LOOP MAY BREAK OFF THE CARRIER PLATE
R/2019/19201/07/201913/12/2006 – 21/08/201131,601MOVEMENTS OF THE CONNECTOR OF THE BLOWER REGULATOR WIRING HARNESS COULD LEAD TO FRICTIONAL
R/2019/05701/03/201902/10/2008 – 22/10/20115,866AUXILIARY WATER PUMP'S ELECTRONIC CIRCUIT BOARD COULD LEAD TO A SHORT CIRCUIT
R/2019/01801/02/201907/08/2007 – 18/03/201021,123THE IDLER PULLEY BOLT COULD BECOME LOOSENED OVER TIME
R/2018/34107/12/201819/03/2014 – 21/05/2017225,449EXHAUST GAS RECIRCULATION MODULE COOLER COULD LEAK
R/2018/26208/10/201812/07/2018 – 01/08/201819DUE TO A FAULT AT THE VEHICLES ASSEMBLY LINE SOME WHEEL BOLTS MAY NOT HAVE BEEN TIGHTENED
R/2016/30021/12/201619/09/2011 – 08/12/201541POWER STEERING MAY NOT PERFORM CORRECTLY
R/2013/09510/09/201301/05/2009 – 30/11/200921,502POSSIBILITY OF FIRE
R/2012/15006/12/201201/06/2006 – 30/11/201222,737DRIVE MAY FAIL
R/2012/07818/07/20125POTENTIAL FIRE RISK
R/2012/04927/04/201221FIRE MAY OCCUR
R/2011/14717/11/201116/11/2007 – 02/02/2011557SHORT CIRCUIT MAY OCCUR
R/2011/12305/10/201120/08/2008 – 12/06/200921,923RISK OF FIRE
R/2009/07421/07/200922/05/2009 – 01/06/200953BRAKES MAY FAIL

DVSA lists 30 safety recall campaigns for the BMW X6, covering roughly 1,071,766 vehicles in total. A recall is the manufacturer fixing a fault for free, so an open recall on your car costs nothing to clear.

Counter-intuitive, and measured on our own data: across the 25 families published here, more recalls go with a lower MOT Risk Index (r = −0.52). Heavily recalled models are not worse cars in the test bay — an active manufacturer removes the fault before it becomes an MOT failure.

Check whether a specific car has an outstanding recall — free, by registration — at DVSA's recall service. Source: DVSA vehicle safety recalls (check-vehicle-recalls.service.gov.uk), OGL.

BMW X6 technical service bulletins: what dealers are told

US market, BMW X6 and its variants, model years 2015–2022 only. A count of bulletins, not a UK failure rate.

NHTSA manufacturer communications are 581.

bigger number = more recorded dealer communicationsnot affected vehicles or confirmed faults

These are the issues the manufacturer fixes quietly: service communications sent to dealers without a public recall campaign. They show what the service network has been told even when the issue never became news.

United States · NHTSA manufacturer communications

US technical service bulletins by communication year; leading subjects cover the full file
Communication yearBulletinsLeading subjects across all years
201413
  • Equipment (205)
  • Electrical system (183)
  • Engine and cooling (53)
  • Structure (45)
  • Engine (35)
  • Adaptive and mobility equipment (35)
  • Visibility (29)
  • Seats (26)
201540
201660
201730
201854
201935
202094
202168
202263
202366
202431
202515
202612

Caveat worth stating plainly: this is NHTSA data about US-specification cars. British cars sold under the same name often use different gearboxes, engines and equipment, so a bulletin may describe a component that was never fitted here. The file counts dealer communications, not affected vehicles or confirmed failures, and it cannot tell you whether an individual UK car has the issue. A communication can carry more than one subject tag, so topic counts do not have to add up to the total. Source: NHTSA Manufacturer Communications API (US-market vehicles; queried model years 2015-2022). Licence: U.S. Government work / public domain · retrieved 2026-09-25.

BMW X6 owner complaints: what goes wrong

US market, BMW X6 and its variants, model years 2015–2022 only. A count of owner complaints, not a UK failure rate; NHTSA has no UK denominator.

Engine (not MOT-tested) is highest at 10; Steering is lowest at 4 — the gap is 6.

bigger number = more recorded casescompare like-for-like scope, not sample size alone

Owner complaints (US) against actual MOT failures (UK) for the same component groups
ComponentComplaintsShareMOT fail items per 100MOT rankAgreement
Engine (not MOT-tested)1019.6%not in top 6—complained about, rarely an MOT failure
Lamps & electrical917.6%5.3#4complained about, fails occasionally
Brakes815.7%3.5#5complained about, fails occasionally
Transmission (not MOT-tested)713.7%not in top 6—complained about, rarely an MOT failure
Steering47.8%not in top 6—complained about, rarely an MOT failure
Restraints47.8%not in top 6—complained about, rarely an MOT failure

Two different populations answering two different questions: the MOT records what an inspector can measure once a year, the complaint file records what annoyed or frightened an owner on the road. A component high in one column and absent from the other is the interesting case — driver-assistance and electronics dominate complaints while almost never appearing as an MOT failure item.

What the reports actually say
The vehicle moonroof shattered for no reason at all it was as if an explosion occurred, forcing the glass upwards.
NHTSA complaint, filed 12/04/2023
I WAS DRIVING HWY 80 THE TRACTION CONTROL MALFUNCTION LIGHT CAME ON AND IN A SPLIT SECOND I LOST CONTROL OF VEHICLE. I STARTED TO SKID TOWARD WALL DIVIDERS AND QUICKLY BRAKED. THEN THE BRAKES LOCKED UP CAUSING ME TO CRASH ON TO THE DIVIDED. THIS VEHICLE WAS PURCHASED WITH ANTI LOCK BRAKES. THIS WAS DEFINITELY A BMW MALFUNCTION!
NHTSA complaint, filed 02/04/2019 · ELECTRONIC STABILITY CONTROL (ESC)

US owners have filed 51 complaints about the equivalent BMW X6 to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, including 3 that mention a crash, 3 a fire and 5 an injury. These are owner reports, not verified findings — but they are the only large public record of what drivers themselves notice, and they cover the years between MOT tests.

Caveat worth stating plainly: US-specification cars, self-selected reporters, no denominator — complaint counts scale with how many cars were sold there and how motivated owners are to file. The mechanical gap matters as much as the statistical one: American cars of the same name often carry different gearboxes, engines and equipment — automatics where Britain buys manuals — so a drivetrain complaint filed in Ohio may describe a part that was never fitted here. Read the ranking inside a model, not between models, and treat drivetrain entries with particular caution. Source: NHTSA ODI consumer complaints (US market, public domain) — US-spec vehicles, indicative only.

BMW X6 inspection results in other countries

Netherlands APK is well below the reference at 36.6%, against 50.8% nationally.

higher = larger sharecompare shares in percentage points

Same model, different national inspection regimes
CountryTestThis model failsNational averagePositionSample
United KingdomMOT (class 4)17.4%26.01%-8.6 pp15,622
NetherlandsAPK36.6%50.8%-14.2 pp1,116
FinlandKatsastus23.1%26.3%-3.2 pp1,013
NorwayPKK39.4%33.7%+5.7 pp581

The countries disagree about this car, and that is worth saying out loud rather than averaging away. A model can sit above its national average in one country and below it in another because the fleets are not the same cars: different model years, different engines, different roads and salt, and inspection rules that weight components differently. Treat each row as evidence from one regime, not as a verdict.

The exact faults Netherlands records — APK defect codes, 2024
CodeFaultRecordedType
210Tyre pressure not at the correct value148failure
AC4Steering or suspension ball joint worn up to 1.0 mm90advisory
205Tyre with insufficient tread87failure
516Dipped headlight incorrectly aimed82failure
AC1Tyre down to 1.6–2.5 mm of tread75advisory
RA2Excessive leak of other fluids51advisory
AC5Mechanical brake parts showing wear39advisory
203Tyre damaged32failure

Worth dwelling on how mundane the top of that list is: tyre pressure, tread depth, headlight aim. The Dutch APK records 0.701 defects per inspection against a much higher national failure rate than Britain's, and the reason is not that Dutch cars are worse — it is that the two regimes draw the line between "note it" and "fail it" in different places. Codes are the RDW's own; the English wording here is our translation of the Dutch original.

Britain is not the only country that inspects every car every year, and the BMW X6 is on the road in all of them. Each national regime writes its own rules, so the pass rates below are not comparable to each other — what does travel across a border is whether a model sits above or below its own country's average.

Rows with fewer than 500 inspections are not published. Sources: RDW open data — Meldingen Keuringsinstantie + Geconstateerde Gebreken + Gekentekende voertuigen (2024), CC0. Not an RDW endorsement.; Traficom — Periodic inspections of cars by model / by model and fault object 2024, CC BY 4.0; Statens vegvesen — Periodisk kjøretøykontroll (PKK) 2024, CC BY 4.0. Adapted; licences and full notice.

BMW X6 MOT: quick answers

BMW X6 MOT Risk Index is well below the reference at 67.3, against 100 for a car with the same age profile.

below 100 is betterabove 100 is worse100 = normal for this model at that age

What is the BMW X6 first-time MOT pass rate?
82.6% of first attempts passed in 2024 (15,622 tests). This is the first-time figure: retests after repair are excluded. Basis: first-time, excluding retests.
Why does this number differ from other sites?
Other sites often report a pass rate that includes retests or counts all attempts. Our 17.4% figure is the first-time initial failure rate, using 15,622 primary tests as the denominator (first-time, excluding retests). The age-adjusted MOT initial-failure ratio 67.3 is shown separately because raw rates compare fleet age as well as cars.

Compare the BMW X6 with other cars

MINI Countryman is highest at 69.3; BMW X6 is lowest at 67.3 — the gap is 2.0 points.

below 100 is betterabove 100 is worse100 = normal for this model at that age

Same brand

All BMW MOT statisticsBMW Z4 MOT statsBMW M4 MOT stats

Similar risk

Ford Puma (index 67.3)Jaguar XJ (index 68.5)MINI Countryman (index 69.3)

Same size class

how BMW M3 compareshow Jaguar F-Type compareshow Chevrolet Spark compares

By build year

BMW X6 2008BMW X6 2009BMW X6 2010BMW X6 2011BMW X6 2012BMW X6 2013BMW X6 2014BMW X6 2015BMW X6 2016BMW X6 2017BMW X6 2018BMW X6 2019BMW X6 2020

By area

BMW X6 MOT failure rate by postcode area

By failure group

BMW X6 body, chassis and structure failuresBMW X6 brakes failuresBMW X6 vehicle identification failuresBMW X6 lamps, reflectors and electrics failuresBMW X6 noise, emissions and leaks failuresBMW X6 road wheels failuresBMW X6 seat belts and airbags failuresBMW X6 steering failuresBMW X6 suspension failuresBMW X6 tyres failuresBMW X6 visibility failures

Inspections abroad

BMW X6 in NorwayBMW X6 in FinlandBMW X6 in the Netherlands


Data details & how to cite

Scope: class-4 vehicles (cars), initial tests only, outcomes pass / fail / fixed-on-the-spot at the station (PRS counts towards the failure rate — the defect was present at arrival). Index = observed initial failures ÷ failures expected for this fleet's exact age profile, ×100; margin of error is a 95% confidence interval. Covers ALL generations together — a 3-year-old and a 15-year-old are very different cars; a generation split is on the roadmap. Dataset release dataset_release_id=dvsa-2024-v2, frozen baseline; headline claim_id=family-stats:bmw-x6:dvsa-2024-v2. Full method: methodology.

Cite: MOT Risk Index (2026). BMW X6 MOT statistics 2024 (data release dvsa-2024-v2; downloadable dataset motriskindex-families-2024-v5, doi:10.5281/zenodo.22975051). https://motriskindex.co.uk/cars/bmw-x6/ · Published 2026-07-30.