10.0

really awful
Crashes / Fires:
3 / 0
Injuries / Deaths:
3 / 0
Average Mileage:
8,030 miles

About These NHTSA Complaints:

The NHTSA is the US gov't agency tasked with vehicle safety. Complaints can be spread across multiple & redundant categories, & are not organized by problem. See the Back button — blue bar at the very top of the page — to explore more.

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problem #11

Dec 232022

Atlas

  • miles
Steering assist failure at low and highway speed. Lurching and speed fluctuating at low and highway speed. Adaptive cruise control failure at low and highest speed. Yes, it is reproducible.

- Merritt Island, FL, USA

problem #10

May 132022

Atlas

  • 29,900 miles
The contact owns a 2019 Volkswagen Atlas. The contact stated that while waiting in a drive-thru line with the brake pedal depressed, the vehicle lurched forward crashing into the vehicle in front. The contact stated that she attempted to shift into the park however, the vehicle shifted to reverse while the brake pedal was still depressed and the vehicle crashed into the vehicle in the rear. No warning lights were illuminated. The contact stated that no one was injured. A police report was filed. The vehicle was taken to the dealer where no failure cause could be determined as well as the failure was unable to be duplicated. The manufacturer was made aware of the failure and the contact was awaiting a callback. The approximate failure was 29,900.

- West Allis, WI, USA

problem #9

Apr 142022

Atlas

  • miles
Front passenger side tire on vehicle ruptured after the driver struck a rock in the road during the morning commute. Driver stopped vehicle and changed damaged tire using the provided spare tire. The spare tire provided with the vehicle by Volkswagen is not a full-sized spare. Upon continuing the commute, the car began to malfunction. The electronic stability control featured engaged, braking the car to almost a stop. Driver was unable to accelerate. Each time acceleration was attempted the electronic stability control would engage causing the car to come to almost a complete stop. The tire air pressure sensors were also malfunctioning with the spare. In order to get the car safely to the destination, the driver had to manually turn off the electronic stability control feature and reset the air pressure sensors. This practice had to be completed each time the car was started. However, the driver discontinued using the car until the tire could be replaced. Once the tire was replaced, the car systems went back to driving normally. Volkswagen should recall these cars and provide a full-size spare tire as the VW Atlas is basically nonoperational on the small spare tire provided. It puts the driver of the vehicle in a very unsafe situation.,

- Prospect, KY, USA

problem #8

Jun 302021

Atlas

  • miles
Windows roll down by themselves. Parking brake applies itself without warning. Multiple warning lights saying parking brake error, start stop error, hill assist error, window sensor code, and constant dinging. Hill assist will come on even when not on a hill jarring you at higher speeds. Airbags deployed late during no fault Accident. The flaws in the vehicle didn-??t cause the car accident, yet it wasn-??t protecting me as it should have, but could very well cause an accident with the abrupt stopping, for no reason. I do have videos of the caution codes, it wouldn-??t let me up load them so I took pictures of the videos.

- Hixson , TN, USA

problem #7

Dec 052021

Atlas

  • miles
On 5 Dec 20212, at approximately 1:30 while driving to the Fairfield Inn & Suites, 1707 69th Street, North Bergen, New Jersey 07047, we turned onto 69th street but missed the right turn to the hotel, so I went up the hill and made a U-turn back and the accelerator got stuck somehow and the brake pedal did not work. We were going down the hill extremely fast pumping the brakes with no luck. Rather than hit the car waiting for the Red Light I turned my car toward a power pole, and crashed extremely hard. My wife and I were both transported by ambulance to the Hackensack University Medical Center. My wife has to have spinal neck repair surgery, is still in the hospital with no sensation in her arms & fingers and is being sent to Kessler Institute of Rehabilitation for 5 weeks of Rehabilitation, with a prognosis of up to two years to fully recover. I suffered whiplash, bruising, tissue damage and in severe pain in my neck, back and stomach. The vehicle was towed and is in the Tominos Towing lot at 5419 Tonnelle Ave. Telephone 201-223-0235, and the accident police report is at the police dept. at 4233 Kennedy Blvd. Case#21-116842.

- Centreville, MD, USA

problem #6

Jan 062021

Atlas

  • 10,555 miles
The rear window rolls down by itself with nobody touching any of the buttons. The light pops up on the dash and says faulty electrical. The vehicle was in motion, in the city. The vehicle will suddenly attempt to stop in the middle of a drive/middle of the road. Almost as if the emergency break has been pulled, only nobody has touched it. The emergency brake light does come on. Again, in motion, on the highway (has happened a few times). Now, the remote start does not work.

- Wichita, KS, USA

problem #5

Aug 192020

Atlas

  • 5,800 miles
Car disengaged adaptive cruise control and emergency braked suddenly ("slammed on the brakes"), while dashboard lights flashed warnings of front end impact and disengagement of acc and all assistance systems. The car was traveling 68mph on a straight line, flat bridge over water. Other cars were to the side and rear of the vehicle, but no front end collision was possible at the time. Dealership claims this is a radar issue that "every car has." Extremely dangerous!

- Covington, LA, USA

problem #4

Jun 012020

Atlas

  • 7,000 miles
Whether SUV is turned on using remote start or manual start the cruise control will not work. Reads error: Acc. Dealership states they are unable to fix - hopeful for a manufactured update to fix. Entertainment screen flashing and will not turn off until 5 attempts to turn off and on SUV. Dealership stated it needed an update.

- Fall River, WI, USA

problem #3

Jun 292020

Atlas 6-cyl

  • 30,480 miles
I have been having problems with the car slamming on brakes for no reason, no cars in front of us we were on the highway driving at about 70 mph. The acc system works sporadically. We were told that when they did the recall repair it deprogrammed the acc which they say there is no software update. My daughter was parking the car and the car shut off on the middle of the road and told her to manually restart the car. There is a grinding noise when accelerating the dealership said this was 'normal and related to the torque converter. The cruise control also works sporadically since the recall repair. The car stalling and slamming on brakes are both very serious safety concerns.

- Ocala, FL, USA

problem #2

Mar 092020

Atlas

  • 3,100 miles
Automatic braking system deploys without cause. Situation: Driving on interstate, no cars within a half mile, going 75 with acc and breaks automatically slammed on with a collision warning. Sensor and car were clean, no cars or possible impacts. This has happened 3-4 times. Additional situations: Acc turns off both on interstate and on long highway bridge. Situations were different, both day and night time/ with other cars and without. All situations had no possible chance of impact. Acc will turn off while car is going in 50-70 mph range and suddenly break, in the middle of the road, without any warning. Dealership responded "nothing is perfect" this has now happened roughly 7 times, with no advice from the dealer other than to "see if I can just turn the assistance systems off." They were not able to see my car immediately when I took it in after the braking incident today and have scheduled me for a later date.

- Covington, LA, USA

problem #1

Jul 012019

Atlas

  • 1,500 miles
1) radar auto-brake: When parallel parking and backing ( going in reverse ) parallel to the curb, at maybe 2 mph and 10 inches from curb, I got yellow stop, stop !!!!!!! message followed by sensation of hitting an object and being thrown into the seat. Only there was no object. Ran out of a car, nothing and nobody there, at least for 50 yards. An auto-brake engaged. That is really broken. Interference caused it to do that " overheated computer in 90 degree sun " 2) transmission logic: Unrelated to above, when going in slow traffic 2-10 mph, pressing gas shifts transmission into higher gear instead of lower, resulting in hit-like engagement and actual inability to rev the engine and accelerate. Slow and deep pedal movement does downshift and accelerate but too much. All cars are like that and I test drove several. 3) transmission logic: Related to (2) above, paradoxically in sport driving mode, when trying to accelerate and merge highway from 10 mph, transmission shifted up several gears, not allowing to rev the engine, and resulted in RPM decay /power loss -- very scary. That launch was timely aborted, and driver later merged the road in manual "tiptronic" mode. 4) improper gas pedal calibration: Compared to other german, Japanese and american cars, VW Atlas has abnormal and unsafe gas pedal calibration. From a stop, only lightly feathering the pedal results in civilized controlled motion. Normal gas pedal pressure results in a car rocketing forward uncontrollably. VW has to talk to some other manufacturers and get their gas calibration consistent with other cars, so it can be driven steady and safely at slow speeds when necessary.

- Brooklyn, NY, USA