Headlight failure or clouding on the 2010 Hyundai Sonata
Only 3 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 headlight failure or clouding gets reported
There are 3 reports of headlight failure or clouding on the 2010 Hyundai Sonata, 3 with a mileage attached. That is too few to place the failure on the odometer with any confidence.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 88,000 miles. It is the 24th most-reported problem on this model year.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| — | — | 1,500 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
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 13 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2010, at a median of 1,500 miles, and latest on the 2012 at 120,000 miles.
By volume the 2011 carries the most reports, with 48; the 2010 has 3. 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.
Tl*the contact owns a 2010 hyundai sonata. While driving 15 MPH at night the headlight displayed a black line which impairs the drivers vision. He also stated that while driving at night on a country road up a hill he lost all vision. His ability to see became more limited as he drove up and down hills. The vehicle was taken to the dealer and he was advised to use the high beams. He was also informed by the dealer that there were no recalls and the cost to replace the headlights was $950. The failure mileage was 100 and the current mileage is 5,900. Updated 12/23/10*lj updated 01/04/11. *jb
My 2010 hyundai sonata has a low beam defect that is a danger to drive at night , especially on hilly country roads. There is a black band that erases the field of view for objects on or alongside the road. By the time the car had 5k miles on her - she had been in twice to have the headlights checked and I was told they were adjusted as high as they could go and to use high beams if I couldn't see. I called hyundai customer service and after getting nowhere I finally got a manager on the line and he promised that an engineer would be sent to my dealership and look over the problem -this never happened so when I called I was told to go back to the dealership so they could look at the lights again I get flashed by oncoming cars because they think my highs are on when they are not. I can't imagine what they see when my highs are on. If I drive under streetlights or have oncoming cars in my view I don't see the black band but what I do see is my lights bouncing off road signs with only splotches of letters being illuminated and the rest of the sign dark. If something , like a deer, were in the road or by the side of the road I would…
My 2010 hyundai sonata has a low beam defect that is a danger to drive at night , especially on hilly country roads. There is a black band that erases the field of view for objects on or alongside the road. By the time the car had 5k miles on her - she had been in twice to have the headlights checked and I was told they were adjusted as high as they could go and to use high beams if I couldn't see. I called hyundai customer service and after getting nowhere I finally got a manager on the line and he promised that an engineer would be sent to my dealership and look over the problem -this never happened so when I called I was told to go back to the dealership so they could look at the lights again I get flashed by oncoming cars because they think my highs are on when they are not. I can't imagine what they see when my highs are on. If I drive under streetlights or have oncoming cars in my view I don't see the black band but what I do see is my lights bouncing off road signs with only splotches of letters being illuminated and the rest of the sign dark. If something , like a deer, were in the road or by the side of the road I would…
Also reported on the 2010 Hyundai Sonata
Other body or interior problem
Door latch or handle failure
Other powertrain problem
Other brake problem
Other engine problem
No-start or intermittent start failure
How far this goes
This page is kept out of search results because 3 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 3 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 2010 Hyundai Sonata?
Across 3 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 1,500 miles. A quarter were filed before — and a quarter after —. 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 2010 Hyundai Sonata?
3 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 0.1 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