Excessive oil consumption on the 2015 Kia Sorento
1 fire 1 of the 17 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 excessive oil consumption gets reported
Owners of the 2015 Kia Sorento report excessive oil consumption at a median of 95,000 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 75,000 miles and a quarter after 95,000 miles, from 9 reports that carried an odometer reading.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 85,000 miles. It is the 13th most-reported problem on this model year.
The mileage distribution
The reported range runs from 25 miles at the tenth percentile to 115,000 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 116,175 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.
22% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 25 miles | 75,000 miles | 96,000 miles | 96,000 miles | 116,200 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, 1 a fire is 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 $900–$6,500 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 10 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2017, at a median of 65,000 miles, and latest on the 2011 at 125,000 miles.
By volume the 2016 carries the most reports, with 106; the 2015 has 17. 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.
The SUV has been having white smoke coming from tailpipe and the car has been pulling. It makes ugly noise when we try to accelerate on the freeway and pulls. The oil light isn't coming on to tell us when the oil is low even if it's not time for a pil change. We seem to notice that the car is burning oil more frequently than a normal vehicle. Also notice sludge when we check the oil even if we had just had a oil change it seems to come back. The dealer keeps telling me there is nothing wrong with it. They tell me they can't find anything wrong.
The SUV has been having white smoke coming from tailpipe and the car has been pulling. It makes ugly noise when we try to accelerate on the freeway and pulls. The oil light isn't coming on to tell us when the oil is low even if it's not time for a pil change. We seem to notice that the car is burning oil more frequently than a normal vehicle. Also notice sludge when we check the oil even if we had just had a oil change it seems to come back. The dealer keeps telling me there is nothing wrong with it. They tell me they can't find anything wrong.
Driving on a 4 lane highway my 2015 kia sorento died without warning and made a clicking noise when I tried to start it. I had the car towed to a local kia dealership who advised metal shavings were found in the oil, which clogged the oil filter, restricting oil flow thus causing the connecting rod bearings to break. They confirmed there was no sludge found in the engine. The car needs the engine replaced and my extended warranty is refusing to pay citing there was not sufficient oil lubrication due to low oil which caused the connecting rod bearings to break. However, the dealership advised both myself, warranty, and adjuster the car was burning oil as no external engine leaks were found. All oil changes were completed by the kia dealership whom I purchased the car from and records were provided. At no point did any warning lights illuminate on the dashboard to indicate low oil or to check engine. My 2015 kia sorento has the gdi (or theta ii) engine which is named in multiple class action lawsuits for the same thing. I still owe on this car as I have only had for 1.5 years and am now looking at $5,000-$7,000 in repairs.
Also reported on the 2015 Kia Sorento
Other engine problem
Other body or interior problem
Headlight failure or clouding
Other lighting problem
Complete engine failure or seizure
Other powertrain problem
How far this goes
Complaints are voluntary, so 17 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 excessive oil consumption happen on the 2015 Kia Sorento?
Across 9 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 95,000 miles. A quarter were filed before 75,000 miles and a quarter after 95,000 miles. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is excessive oil consumption on the 2015 Kia Sorento?
17 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 0.2 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