Does the Kia Optima fail the MOT on seat belts and airbags more than it should?

The Kia Optima records 0.32 seat belts and airbags failure items per 100 initial MOT tests (2019–2024), against 0.36 expected for a car of the same age mix: about as expected for its class and age (the difference is within its interval or under 0.5 items per 100 tests) (−0.04, 95% interval −0.09 to +0.01). It ranks 292 of 627 models on seat belts and airbags (1 = most failures above expected).

Data release dvsa-2024-v2 (24 Sep 2026) · page updated 30 Sep 2026 · all models on seat belts and airbags · check a Kia Optima by registration

What exactly fails on seat belts and airbags?

The most frequent DVSA defect wording in this group on the Kia Optima is “An SRS malfunction indicator lamp (MIL) indicates a system malfunction”, recorded 110 times in 2019–2024.

Kia Optima: most frequent seat belts and airbags defect wordings, 2019–2024 (30+ items each)
DVSA defect wording	Items	Per 100 tests
An SRS malfunction indicator lamp (MIL) indicates a system malfunction	110	0.19
Seat belt buckle missing, damaged or not functioning as intended	37	0.06

Source: DVSA MOT bulk data (OGL v3.0) · Window: 2019–2024 · n = 57,208 (initial tests) · Method: failure items (major and minor) grouped by DVSA's defect tree; wordings with 30+ items · Updated: 30 Sep 2026 · Release: dvsa-2024-v2 · CSV

Does the Kia Optima fail the MOT on seat belts and airbags more than it should?

What exactly fails on seat belts and airbags?

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