Headlight failure or clouding on the 2015 Chevrolet Impala
1 crash 1 of the 10 reports for this failure mention a crash, a fire, an injury or a death. Those are the owner's words on the complaint form, not a verified finding, and one report can mention more than one.
When headlight failure or clouding gets reported
Owners of the 2015 Chevrolet Impala report headlight failure or clouding at a median of 5,000 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 100 miles and a quarter after 10,000 miles, from 8 reports that carried an odometer reading.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 88,000 miles. It is the 12th most-reported problem on this model year.
The mileage distribution
The reported range runs from 5 miles at the tenth percentile to 10,000 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 10,595 miles across the middle 80% of reports.
A window that narrow is the signature of a part that fails on its own schedule rather than on how the car is driven — which is usually a design or supplier problem rather than wear and tear.
100% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 5 miles | 58 miles | 4,900 miles | 10,000 miles | 10,600 miles |
Read the 10th percentile as “one report in ten arrived this early”. Exact figures are shown in this table because it is the table of record; everywhere else on the site they are rounded to the precision the sample can carry.
What a percentile can and cannot tell you here
These five numbers describe the readings owners gave, in order. The median is the middle one: half the reports arrived below it. The 10th and 90th are the edges of the bulk of the distribution, and the distance between them is the part worth reading. A tight spread — say 70,000 to 95,000 miles — points at something that wears out on a schedule, and the schedule is knowable. A wide one, 20,000 to 190,000, points at a fault that hits some cars and never troubles others, which means the mileage on the listing in front of you tells you very little about your odds.
What these figures are not is a survival curve. Every reading here comes from a car whose owner filed a complaint, so the sample contains only failures: it cannot say what share of the fleet made it past 150,000 miles untouched, because those owners had nothing to report. Nor is the mileage the moment of failure — it is the odometer reading as recalled at the time of filing, which may be weeks later and is sometimes rounded to the nearest ten thousand by the person typing it.
Percentiles are shown at all only once 8 readings exist for the vehicle and mode. Below that the middle of a handful of numbers is noise wearing a decimal point, so the figures are withheld rather than dressed up.
What happens, and what it costs
Of these reports, 1 a crash is mentioned. Owners write their own complaints and the agency does not verify them, so read this as what the reports say happened rather than as a confirmed count.
Putting it right typically runs $150–$1,800 at an independent US shop. That range is an editorial estimate held in this site's failure-mode catalogue, not a figure from NHTSA, and it is a repair cost rather than a diagnosis cost.
The same failure on other years
The same failure is reported on 16 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2017, at a median of 100 miles, and latest on the 2008 at 150,000 miles.
By volume the 2002 carries the most reports, with 53; the 2015 has 10. A mode that appears across most years of a model is usually a design choice rather than a bad batch.
If one year stands out to the left, that is the year to avoid; if the whole line sits at a similar mileage, this is wear rather than a defect in one production run.
Tick median reported mileage Solid middle half of reports Faint 10th to 90th percentile Colour how bad the failure is when it happens
What owners wrote
Verbatim from NHTSA complaint narratives, trimmed for length. The mileage is the one the owner gave.
Extremely disappointed and shocked while driving at night for the first time on a country road in this vehicle. The projector beam halogens utterly fail to illuminate the roadway in a manner any competent driver would consider to be adequate or most importantly safe! Dealer of course says this is "factory" and considered normal. I have concluded that this headlight design is adequate for most urban (semi lighted) highway but necessarily dangerous for rural drivers. I will be on the lookout for a newly designed headlamp offering from gm. My fix is to intentionally aim the (low beams) extremely low and just use the (high beams) full time which at least allows all the available light to be utilized with no ill affect to oncoming drivers since the beam is so dim! Oh, also it seems there are no provisions (adjustability) that I can see for side to side aiming? *tr
When I received my brand new car from the dealer, before I even drove it, there was excess moisture inside of both headlights. This moisture can diminish the headlight and turn signal function,and corrode the electrical components. The moisture is an ongoing problem. Working with dealer to fix this if possible. *tr
Lt model. Headlights are extremely inadequate such that they represent a hazard when driving on unlit roads. They send forward a focused beam with no light covering the sides or overhead. This makes it very difficult to turn on to a side road because there is no illumination of the road you are turning onto until you have actually made the turn. It is also easy to miss exit ramps. Overhead signs and signs at the sides of exits are usually unreadable. The low beams actually have a shutter covering the top of the bulb (I guess that's what makes them low beams) so objects much above the level of the top of the car are not illuminated. When driving on hilly country roads, the cutoff on top makes the approaching hill just about invisible. When driving in the rain, it is nearly impossible to see lane markings, etc. The car also does not offer fog lights as an option so there is no supplemental lighting to alleviate the problem. I strongly urge a recall to either change the headlight design or to install supplementary lighting such as fog lights to better illuminate the pavement and the areas to the sides of the roadway.
Also reported on the 2015 Chevrolet Impala
Other electrical problem
Lane keep or steering assist fault
Other steering problem
Other lighting problem
Other body or interior problem
Parking brake failure
How far this goes
Complaints are voluntary, so 10 is a floor and not a count of affected cars. Mileages are typed in by owners and cluster on round numbers. And the mode itself is assigned by software reading the complaint text, which is reliable in bulk and fallible one report at a time.
Questions this page answers
At what mileage does headlight failure or clouding happen on the 2015 Chevrolet Impala?
Across 8 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 5,000 miles. A quarter were filed before 100 miles and a quarter after 10,000 miles. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is headlight failure or clouding on the 2015 Chevrolet Impala?
10 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 0.3 per 1,000 vehicles. Complaints are voluntary, so this is a floor rather than a count of affected cars.
What this is and is not. These are the mileages at which owners chose to complain to a federal agency, which is not the same as the mileage at which the part fails on every car. It skews toward failures that happened outside warranty, cost real money, or frightened someone. It is still the only public dataset that carries failure mileage at all, and the shape of a few hundred readings is informative even when a single one is not. Methodology · JSON · this failure on other cars
Source Owner complaints and recall records published by the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, model years 1996–2027 Figures rebuilt Published by AtWhatMileage How every figure is computed