Unclassified problem on the 2016 Honda Pilot
5 crashes 3 injuries 8 of the 218 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.
Only 81 reports for this mode came with an odometer reading, which is too few for percentiles to mean anything. The page is here because someone linked to it; treat the figures as anecdotes, and see the full report for this year instead.
When unclassified problem gets reported
Owners of the 2016 Honda Pilot report unclassified problem at a median of 47,500 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 35,000 miles and a quarter after 62,500 miles, from 81 reports that carried an odometer reading.
It is the 83rd most-reported problem on this model year.
The mileage distribution
The reported range runs from 10,000 miles at the tenth percentile to 80,000 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 71,000 miles across the middle 80% of reports.
A spread this wide points at use rather than design. Towing, climate, service history and city mileage all move a failure like this, so the median is a weak guide to any individual car.
26% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 9,000 miles | 35,000 miles | 47,500 miles | 62,000 miles | 80,000 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, 5 a crash and 3 an injury are 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.
The same failure on other years
The same failure is reported on 20 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2020, at a median of 5,000 miles, and latest on the 2022 at 240,000 miles.
By volume the 2016 is the worst of them, which makes this a problem of this specific year rather than of the model as a whole.
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.
I write to you to convey my safety concerns regarding a new honda 2016 pilot. My attempts to resolve my concerns with american honda motor co., inc. Were met with tepid reluctance and a cavalier neglectful attitude. 1.at high speeds (55-75 MPH) the vehicle oversteers and during emergency avoidance maneuvers becomes unstable. Twice while avoiding dear on interstate highways, I have almost lost control and was seriously concerned about rolling the vehicle over. I own and have driven a 2003 pilot for over 180,000 miles and never experienced this sort of issue. I believe the suspension is incorrectly designed and that unexpected and unnecessary rollovers are imminent. 2.the 'auto idle off' feature turns the engine completely off at certain times and under certain circumstances. It takes between 900 and 1,300 milliseconds to recover power to the wheels when this happens. Unlike hybrid vehicles (from which this feature was taken), there is no alternative electrical motor to provide torque to the drivetrain while the engine restarts and as a result, there is delay in accelerating. In the vast majority of times, this is of no consequence…
2016 honda pilot surge while trying to stop on a city street and 2 times ended up part way in the intersection. No warning lights on dash. Had pilot about a month. Only drove about 500 miles. Concerned, so keep longer distances in traffic. Setup an appointment today with local dealer to inspect per his schedule in 4 days.
I had a 2014 pilot. The navigation worked great. Now I own a 2016 pilot and most of the navigation system is locked out while driving. I now have to pull over in the city or interstate to make changes--both dangerous. As a result, I am now using my iphone for navigation which defeats the purpose of the car navigation system and is much more dangerous. The honda dealer indicated your agency has required these changes. I am happy to discuss at [xxx]. Thanks, [xxx] information redacted pursuant to the freedom of information act (foia), 5 u.s.c. 552(b)(6). *tr
Also reported on the 2016 Honda Pilot
Other engine problem
Other electrical problem
Other powertrain problem
No-start or intermittent start failure
Other fuel system problem
Other body or interior problem
How far this goes
This page is kept out of search results because 218 reports is not enough to publish percentiles from. It stays reachable because somebody looking at this exact car would rather see the reports than be told there are none.
Complaints are voluntary, so 218 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 unclassified problem happen on the 2016 Honda Pilot?
Across 81 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 47,500 miles. A quarter were filed before 35,000 miles and a quarter after 62,500 miles. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is unclassified problem on the 2016 Honda Pilot?
218 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 2.7 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