Kia Stinger — what actually breaks, by engine
2018–2021 · 129 federal complaints · 2 engines
Reliability ratings usually stop at the model. But two Stingers with different engines can fail in completely different ways — and the engine is a choice you make at purchase. Here is what owners actually complained about, separated by engine.
Ownership profile
Each axis is this model's percentile within its own segment — comparing a pickup's fuel economy against a compact car's would say nothing. Built from EPA test data.
Value for money
$32,990
Capability per relative dollar, ranked against the same segment. It divides this model's average percentile across the axes above by its price relative to the segment median — so 80 means it delivers more per dollar than 80% of its class.
Price source: CarAPI vehicle trim database — base-trim MSRP, median across 2018-2020 model years. Unlike every other figure on this page, the price does not come from a federal record. It is the manufacturer's list price for the cheapest trim — what people actually paid varies with incentives and options, so treat this one axis as indicative, not exact.
What each engine's complaints are about
Share of component mentions. One complaint can name several components, so these describe what an engine's complaints are about — they are not a failure rate.
LAMDA II · 3.3L V6
Show the numbers
| Component | Share | Mentions |
|---|---|---|
| Transmission & drivetrain | 5.3% | 5 |
| Engine | 20.2% | 19 |
| Brakes | 16.0% | 15 |
| Electrical | 12.8% | 12 |
| Steering | 5.3% | 5 |
| Body & structure | 3.2% | 3 |
| Fuel system | 4.3% | 4 |
| Everything else | 33.0% | 31 |
THETA II · 2.0L I4
Show the numbers
| Component | Share | Mentions |
|---|---|---|
| Transmission & drivetrain | 5.9% | 6 |
| Engine | 20.8% | 21 |
| Brakes | 7.9% | 8 |
| Electrical | 12.9% | 13 |
| Body & structure | 2.0% | 2 |
| Fuel system | 16.8% | 17 |
| Everything else | 33.7% | 34 |
Diagrams show cylinder layout and displacement from the decoded VIN data. Turbo and supercharger marks come from EPA certification records; where EPA cannot tell two engines of the same size apart, the mark is left off rather than guessed.
Recalls on this model
Unlike everything above, recalls are issued for the whole model, not per engine — NHTSA publishes them by make, model and year. These are defects the manufacturer confirmed and filed federally, which makes them a useful counterweight to owner-reported complaints.
NHTSA told owners to park outside, away from buildings
The defect can start a fire even with the car parked and switched off.
- Service Brakes, Hydraulic › Antilock/Traction Control/Electronic Limited Slip › Control Unit/Module — 2018–2021 20V518000
7 recalls · covering 2018–2023
All recalls, with campaign numbers
| Years | Component | NHTSA campaign |
|---|---|---|
| 2018–2021 | Service Brakes, Hydraulic › Antilock/Traction Control/Electronic Limited Slip › Control Unit/Module | 20V518000 |
| 2018–2023 | Engine And Engine Cooling › Engine › Gasoline › Turbo/Supercharger › Hoses/Plumbing | 24V169000 |
| 2018–2021 | Fuel System, Gasoline › Delivery › Fuel Pump | 23V634000 |
| 2020–2021 | Electrical System › Instrument Panel › Fuel Gauge | 21V862000 |
| 2020–2021 | Fuel System, Gasoline › Delivery › Fuel Pump | 20V560000 |
| 2020–2020 | Steering | 20V422000 |
| 2018–2018 | Electrical System › Wiring › Front Underhood | 18V754000 |
Recall repairs are free, always — any franchised dealer, regardless of the car's age, mileage, or how many owners it has had. A great many cars are driving around with recalls nobody ever redeemed.
More recalls does not mean a worse car. Recall counts rise with sales volume and model complexity, and a manufacturer that recalls promptly looks worse than one that drags its feet. Read what the recalls were for, not how many there were.
Check a specific car by VIN at NHTSA →NHTSA crash-test ratings
Official 5-star ratings from standardized federal crash tests. Unlike the complaint figures above, these are directly comparable between models. Where a model year was tested in several versions, the lowest overall rating is shown.
8.7% rollover risk
| Model year | Overall | Frontal | Side | Rollover |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2018 | Not rated | Not rated | Not rated | Not rated |
| 2019 | Not rated | Not rated | Not rated | Not rated |
| 2020 | ★★★★★ | ★★★★☆ | ★★★★★ | ★★★★★ |
| 2021 | ★★★★★ | ★★★★☆ | ★★★★★ | ★★★★★ |
| 2022 | ★★★★★ | ★★★★☆ | ★★★★★ | ★★★★★ |
| 2023 | ★★★★★ | ★★★★☆ | ★★★★★ | ★★★★★ |
Source: NHTSA New Car Assessment Program.
Method, sources and limitations
How this was built
- Source: NHTSA public complaint database (api.nhtsa.gov), retrieved 2026-08-16. Every complaint carries the first 11 characters of the vehicle's VIN.
- Those partial VINs were decoded through NHTSA's vPIC service to identify the exact engine — 98.2% resolved successfully. This is how the data gets to engine level; model-level ratings cannot do this.
- Percentages are the share of component mentions, not of complaints. One complaint can name several components, so the figures describe what a given engine's complaints are about — they do not sum to a failure rate.
What this does not tell you
- This is not a reliability ranking. Complaint totals track how many were sold, not how often they fail. Nobody publishes per-engine sales volume, so comparing totals between engines would be misleading. Read each engine's own breakdown; don't race them against each other.
- Engines with fewer than 50 complaints are omitted — too small to say anything honest about.
- Complaints are self-reported by owners. They skew toward problems that are alarming or expensive, and toward vehicles under active recall attention.
Compare with
Same segment, side by side — engines, running costs and what breaks.
Or see the whole segment at once: Sports car →
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