Other powertrain problem on the 2011 Hyundai Sonata
5 crashes 3 fires 4 injuries 12 of the 121 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 other powertrain problem gets reported
Owners of the 2011 Hyundai Sonata report other powertrain problem at a median of 49,000 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 13,000 miles and a quarter after 89,000 miles, from 101 reports that carried an odometer reading.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 92,000 miles. It is the 9th most-reported problem on this model year.
The mileage distribution
The reported range runs from 3,000 miles at the tenth percentile to 109,000 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 105,587 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.
45% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 3,213 miles | 13,000 miles | 49,000 miles | 88,605 miles | 108,800 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, 3 a fire and 4 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.
Putting it right typically runs $400–$4,500 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 24 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2020, at a median of 5,000 miles, and latest on the 2008 at 105,000 miles.
By volume the 2011 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.
Over the past 3 days I have been unable to depress the brake pedal and start my car with the electronic starting system. The problem is intermittent and the time frame varied from 2 minutes to 15 minutes before the car would start.I called my dealer to make a service appointment ant the service department commented they never heard of this before but I see other complaints online. Besides the danger of being stuck somewhere I am concerned that the braked may not work for stopping or a fire if it is electrical. *tr
Tl* the contact owns a 2011 hyundai sonata. The contact stated while he stopped on an incline, he shut the vehicle off while it was shifted into drive and removed the key from the ignition. Once he exited the vehicle, it began to roll forward independently. The contact re-entered the vehicle and was able to shift into park to stop the vehicle from rolling away. An authorized dealer was notified and he was informed the vehicle was functioning as normal. The vehicle was not repaired and the failure continued to recur intermittently. The failure mileage was 1,500 and the current mileage was 5,200.
El hyundai sonata 2011 cuando es k lo van a recojer ?tengo uno con el problema de la direccion,ya lo lleve al dealer supuestamente lo arreglaron y ahora esta peor y ellos no me dan informacion de cuando lo sacan de circulacion dicen no estan enterados de nada, por favor ayudenme,condusco con 3 ninas,gracias. *tr
Also reported on the 2011 Hyundai Sonata
Other steering problem
Other engine problem
Steering column or shaft failure
Airbag warning light or occupant sensor fault
Other electrical problem
Tail light, brake light or signal failure
How far this goes
Complaints are voluntary, so 121 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 other powertrain problem happen on the 2011 Hyundai Sonata?
Across 101 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 49,000 miles. A quarter were filed before 13,000 miles and a quarter after 89,000 miles. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is other powertrain problem on the 2011 Hyundai Sonata?
121 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 0.5 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