2017 Jeep Patriot: what breaks, and at what mileage
What breaks on the 2017 Jeep Patriot
On the 2017 Jeep Patriot, the failure owners report most often is seat belt or retractor failure, with 11 reports on file. Across every failure mode on this year, half the dated reports were filed before 32,500 miles. Overall it scores 69 out of 100, high risk for a 2017.
High risk for a 2017 — 207th riskiest of the 263 2017 vehicles we can rate. 98 owner reports; fleet size borrowed from other years of the same model.
The failures owners actually file about
Owners have reported 24 named failure modes on the 2017 Jeep Patriot, and the three most-reported carry 28% of everything filed, which is an unusually even spread for one model year.
Seat belt or retractor failure leads with 11 reports and about 0.2 per 1,000 vehicles.
Other powertrain problem follows with 9 reports, median 30,000 miles.
Other body or interior problem follows with 7 reports, median 40,000 miles.
By system, the reports fall mostly into body (13), airbag (11) and transmission (10).
The mileage the reports cluster at
51 of the reports on the 2017 Jeep Patriot came with an odometer reading, and half of those were filed before 32,500 miles.
Cumulatively, 73% by 50,000 miles and 98% by 100,000 miles of the dated reports had been filed.
The busiest stretch is between 0 and 10,000 miles, which alone holds 18% of the dated reports.
59% of the dated reports were filed below 36,000 miles, which is early enough that a fair number of these cars were still under a factory warranty when the owner complained.
Tick median reported mileage Solid middle half of reports Faint 10th to 90th percentile Colour how bad the failure is when it happens
Showing the 12 most-reported failure modes of 24. The full list is in the table below.
How reports accumulate
Every report with an odometer reading, cumulative, from 0 to 200,000 miles. A curve that climbs early is a car with early problems, whatever its total.
- Line share of reports filed by that mileage
- Dashed the median reported mileage
Severity, and what it costs
Across the named modes, 10 mention a crash, 1 a fire and 10 an injury. Those are the words owners used in their own complaints, and NHTSA does not verify them, but they are the closest thing in this data to a measure of what a failure actually did.
The average severity weight across every report on this year is 5.59, where a stalled engine or a failed airbag weighs many times more than a rattling trim panel, and a figure this high means the reports are dominated by failures with safety consequences rather than annoyances. The weighting is set out in full on the methodology page.
What the top failures cost to put right, as editorial estimates for an independent US shop rather than figures from NHTSA: seat belt or retractor failure at $200–$900, other powertrain problem at $400–$4,500, other body or interior problem at $200–$2,000 and sunroof failure or glass breakage at $700–$4,500. Dealer labour, a seized bolt or a part that is no longer made can push any of these past the top of its range.
23% of the reports on this year sit in the engine, transmission, drivetrain or cooling systems — the four where a repair bill is usually four figures.
Every reported failure mode
| Failure mode | System | Reports | With reading | 25th | Median | 75th | Per 1,000 | Typical repair | Severity |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Seat belt or retractor failure | airbag | 11 | 7 | — | 28k | — | 0.2 | $200–$900 | High |
| Other powertrain problem | transmission | 9 | 6 | — | 29k | — | 0.1 | $400–$4,500 | High |
| Other body or interior problem | body | 7 | 2 | — | 41k | — | 0.1 | $200–$2,000 | Moderate |
| Sunroof failure or glass breakage | body | 6 | 2 | — | 31k | — | 0.1 | $700–$4,500 | High |
| Overheating | cooling | 5 | 4 | — | 35k | — | 0.1 | $400–$3,500 | High |
| Control arm, ball joint or bushing failure | suspension | 5 | 5 | — | 3k | — | 0.1 | $400–$2,200 | High |
| Tail light, brake light or signal failure | lighting | 5 | 0 | — | — | — | 0.1 | $100–$900 | Moderate |
| Other engine problem | engine | 5 | 3 | — | 23k | — | 0.1 | $300–$4,000 | High |
| Other brake problem | brakes | 5 | 3 | — | 50k | — | 0.1 | $300–$1,800 | High |
| Other speed control problem | adas | 5 | 3 | — | 16k | — | 0.1 | $250–$2,000 | Critical |
| Other fuel system problem | fuel | 3 | 3 | — | 58k | — | 0.0 | $300–$2,200 | High |
| Other steering problem | steering | 3 | 3 | — | 29k | — | 0.0 | $350–$2,400 | High |
| No-start or intermittent start failure | engine | 2 | 2 | — | 22k | — | 0.0 | $200–$1,800 | Moderate |
| Blower motor or climate control failure | hvac | 2 | 2 | — | 58k | — | 0.0 | $250–$1,200 | Moderate |
| Complete engine failure or seizure | engine | 1 | 0 | — | — | — | 0.0 | $4,500–$12,000 | Critical |
| CVT failure | transmission | 1 | 0 | — | — | — | 0.0 | $3,000–$8,500 | Critical |
| Fuel pump failure | fuel | 1 | 0 | — | — | — | 0.0 | $600–$2,600 | High |
| Premature brake pad or rotor wear | brakes | 1 | 0 | — | — | — | 0.0 | $300–$1,400 | Moderate |
| Loss of power steering | steering | 1 | 0 | — | — | — | 0.0 | $600–$2,800 | Critical |
| Exhaust leak or fumes in the cabin | emissions | 1 | 0 | — | — | — | 0.0 | $250–$2,000 | High |
| Other electrical problem | electrical | 1 | 0 | — | — | — | 0.0 | $250–$2,000 | Moderate |
| Other wheel or tire problem | wheels | 1 | 1 | — | 16k | — | 0.0 | $200–$1,500 | High |
| Other lighting problem | lighting | 1 | 0 | — | — | — | 0.0 | $120–$1,200 | Moderate |
| Other visibility problem | glass | 1 | 1 | — | 23k | — | 0.0 | $150–$1,400 | Moderate |
| Unclassified problem | other | 15 | 4 | — | 54k | — | 0.2 | — | Moderate |
This year had no usable recall paperwork, so the fleet-size estimate is the median of other years of the same model. Repair costs are typical independent-shop ranges for the failure, not figures from these reports.
How often, against how many were built
Scaled by an estimate of how many of these cars exist, the 2017 Jeep Patriot draws about 1.6 per 1,000 vehicles, which puts it in the 75th percentile of complaint rates among 2017 vehicles we can rate.
That denominator is the weakest number on the page and it is fair to say so plainly. This year had no usable recall paperwork, so the fleet-size estimate is the median of other years of the same model.
The working figure is 62,418 vehicles. If the true number is twice that, every rate on this page is half what it says; the ranking against other 2017 vehicles, which is what the risk score uses, is far more robust than the rate itself.
What owners wrote
Verbatim from NHTSA complaint narratives, trimmed for length. The odometer reading is the one the owner gave.
Seat belt or retractor failure
I have two non verbal autstic boys, I heard my son gasping I pulled over and the rear seat belt had retracted under his rib cage, I kicked out the booster seat and lifted him into my leg higher to attempt to pull the belt, he could not breath, it only got tighter and the tension was so tight the lap lock would not release, I called 911, they had no choice but to cut the belt. It only got tighter. The dealership guy checked the other belt and said it only locks also when it wants, and remember me complaining to him the day I bought it. At this time it's in shottenkirk at mount pleasant iowa I'm in a loaner, chrysler assigned a case manager and I've heard nothing, the sales guy said report it because chrysler will sweep it under the rug, my autistic child now has to be re taught to get back into a car, he is terrified, I did get him to his doctor.
I was rear ended while stopped in heavy traffic on a major highway. I was sitting on the drivers seat. My car seat had a seat back failure as soon as the at fault car impacted me. Meaning instead of holding me in place it just flipped back with my head and shoulders ending on backseat. I was pushed into the car in front and the airbag didn't deploy but the headrests did. I sustained head back and neck injuries as well as bruises on the back of my calves from hitting the rear/forward bar on bottom of seat. As the car impacted me my pelvic area was trust slightly because the seatbelt in place didn't hold me as I basically slid a bit of it when bending backwards on my seat. The vehicle was stationary on drive but my foot firmly planted on brake. The driver who hit me pushed me into the front seat but by the time I hit it I was already on my back, so car seat failure happened on rear impact, before I hit car in front. Since we where in the middle of the highway I had to move the car to the right shoulder and while dazed pulled up side lever to bring car seat back, and it did. So this defect is basically invisible unless you actually…
Other powertrain problem
I was driving up to a red light, stopped and the engine started to revve up all by itself. I proceeded through the green light with my foot on the gas the vehicle did not want to accelerate ,I pulled into a parking lot, put in park and shut the vehicle off. This happened after my first oil change around 5000 miles. I restarted the vehicle about 10 minutes later and it drove fine. I drove to the dealership where I had the oil changed. The attendant hooked the vehicle up to a computer check and nothing showed up. I drove without any issues until after my last oil change, I drove from phoenix to prescott az. I took the exit to prescott and slowed down to 35 when I got to mayer az, I stepped on the gas after going through town to accelerate, it would only accelerate to 40 MPH with my foot pressed all the way down on the gas pedal. I pulled over and put it in park. I let it sit and stepped on the accelerator the vehicle went again, I came up to a stop light and when I proceeded to go it started revving again. I made it through the stop light and pulled over and turned the vehicle off. Since I restarted it and am back in phoenix I have…
How it ranks in the 2017 field
The score at the top of the page, placed among its peers. The zones are the same thresholds the scorer applies, read out of the scorer itself, so the picture and the band word cannot disagree.
Scores are ranked within the model year, never across years, because an older car has had longer to accumulate reports.
- Left fewer and less serious reports
- Right more, or worse
- Marker this vehicle
Where 2017 sits in the model line
High risk for a 2017 — 207th riskiest of the 263 2017 vehicles we can rate. Every score on this site is a rank inside its own model year, which is what makes a 2004 and a 2019 comparable at all.
Across the 11 model years of this car that carry enough reports to score, 2007 comes out best at 56 and 2016 worst at 75, with 2017 itself at 69.
If the model year is negotiable, 2007, 2008 and 2010 score lower than 2017 by a margin worth acting on. Same body, same engines, different luck — usually a supplier change or a mid-cycle fix, which the complaint data can show but never explain.
Within the 2010–2017 generation specifically, 2010 is the strongest year at 66 and 2016 the weakest at 75.
Scores compare each year against other cars of the same model year, so a low number on an older car is a real result and not an artefact of age.
Shorter is better. Years with too few reports to score are shown without a bar rather than as a zero, because no data is not good news.
Within the 2010-2017 generation, 2010 Jeep Patriot scores best at 66 and 2016 Jeep Patriot worst at 75.
The limits of complaint data
98 owner reports; fleet size borrowed from other years of the same model. Every count on this page is therefore a floor: it is the number of owners who went to the trouble of filing with a federal agency, which is a small and self-selected fraction of the owners who had the fault.
Of those 98 reports, 51 carried an odometer reading, so the mileages here describe 52% of the sample rather than all of it. Owners also round: readings pile up on multiples of ten thousand, which is why this site publishes "about 90,000 miles" and not "91,438".
The failure modes are assigned by software reading the owner's own words, which is accurate in bulk and wrong in individual cases. A mode with a handful of reports may contain a misfiled one.
And nothing here predicts what one car will do. These are other people's complaints, filed years apart, on cars maintained by strangers. Read the page as a map of where this model year has previously gone wrong, then have the specific car in front of you inspected.
Questions this page answers
What are the most common problems with the 2017 Jeep Patriot?
The most-reported failures are seat belt or retractor failure (11 reports, median 30,000 miles), other powertrain problem (9 reports, median 30,000 miles) and other body or interior problem (7 reports, median 40,000 miles). Counts come from owner complaints filed with NHTSA, which are voluntary, so they show what owners bothered to report rather than every fault that occurred.
Is the 2017 Jeep Patriot reliable?
It scores 69 out of 100 on our risk index, which is high — 207th riskiest of the 263 2017 vehicles we can rate. The score is a comparison against other 2017 vehicles, not a prediction about any individual car, and it is built from complaint rates, severity and how early failures appear.
Which year of the Jeep Patriot is best?
Within the 2010–2017 generation, 2010 scores best at 66 out of 100 and 2016 worst at 75. Same body, same engines, different luck.
Where this comes from. Every figure above is computed from NHTSA owner complaints and recall records for this exact make, model and year. Complaints are voluntary and self-selected, so treat counts as a floor. The methodology page writes out each formula, and the same numbers are available as JSON.
What breaks at my mileage Compare with another car
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