Headlight failure or clouding on the 2015 Hyundai Sonata
Only 7 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 12 reports of headlight failure or clouding on the 2015 Hyundai Sonata, 7 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 29th most-reported problem on this model year.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| — | — | 30,000 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
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 2015 has 12. 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.
I wish to call attention to a terribly dangerous condition that seems to be inherent on autos equipped with projector type headlights. An overly technical explanation of the phenomena is: 'while going down a slope the projector's cut-off of light shifts downward and the headlight's beam distance is significantly diminished out in front of the car (headlights appear to be driven down into the road surface). Obviously, this creates a safety issue because the driver cannot see pedestrians and animals out in front of the car to allow adequate and safe stopping distances. Additionally, road safety signs cannot be read on undulating roads because they are not illuminated on the down-slopes.' in much simpler language, if you are driving on a very dark and hilly road and go down a hill, you will swear that someone has suddenly put a black sheet over the upper portion of the windshield; the entire upper portion of the windshield appears to have instantly taken on a very dark tint and the field of vision has diminished to just a few feet in front of the auto. It is a terrifying, very confusing and dangerous condition the first time you…
Put blinker on for right hand turn, made the turn, when the blinder stalk (which also contains headlight controls) returned to home position, the headlights went out, and the instrument panel indicated my lights had switched off. My light knob remained in auto, with the computer thought I turned them off. This was at night. I could not see when my lights turned off. It is very unsafe to be in motion and have your lights cut out!!! This problem happens frequently now, getting worse. It's obviously a bad connection within the blinker stalk, causing the light mode to change on its own when turning.
Put blinker on for right hand turn, made the turn, when the blinder stalk (which also contains headlight controls) returned to home position, the headlights went out, and the instrument panel indicated my lights had switched off. My light knob remained in auto, with the computer thought I turned them off. This was at night. I could not see when my lights turned off. It is very unsafe to be in motion and have your lights cut out!!! This problem happens frequently now, getting worse. It's obviously a bad connection within the blinker stalk, causing the light mode to change on its own when turning.
Also reported on the 2015 Hyundai Sonata
Other engine problem
Other electrical problem
Excessive oil consumption
Other powertrain problem
Other body or interior problem
Other steering problem
How far this goes
This page is kept out of search results because 12 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 12 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 Hyundai Sonata?
Across 7 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 30,000 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 2015 Hyundai Sonata?
12 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