Other visibility problem on the 2016 Subaru Legacy
When other visibility problem gets reported
Owners of the 2016 Subaru Legacy report other visibility problem at a median of 25,000 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 15,000 miles and a quarter after 55,000 miles, from 8 reports that carried an odometer reading.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 75,000 miles. It is the 3rd most-reported problem on this model year.
The mileage distribution
The reported range runs from 5,000 miles at the tenth percentile to 70,000 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 63,845 miles across the middle 80% of reports.
When the reports scatter this far, the mileage is telling you about how these cars were driven more than about the part itself.
63% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 3,755 miles | 16,550 miles | 24,350 miles | 57,250 miles | 67,600 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–$1,400 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 12 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2021, at a median of 1,100 miles, and latest on the 2000 at 225,000 miles.
By volume the 2020 carries the most reports, with 48; the 2016 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.
High gloss navigation screen and high gloss finish on vents reflect sun at certain angles and result in sun being reflected into drivers eyes causing a blinding condition. This happens when driving during daylight when sun is out. This is a severe and significant safety issue. I have driven subarus for years and just got the 2016 legacy. Have never had this problem with any other vehicle. Have to put a towel over area when sun is out to drive without being blinded.
I bought the car as a dealer car (they told me it was registered to a manager as a test car). It had 4,810 miles when I bought it. I have driven the car just over 300 miles. When I test drive it, it made a sound like a stone hit the windshield. Then almost every time I have driven it since, including three times today, it made the same exact sound. I was driving both in city traffic (red light to red light) and on a toll road with limited traffic. When I got out and looked at the windshield, I noticed literally 50 or more small "chips" in the windshield.
One morning after being parked all night, we noticed a six inch crack appeared one day in the front windshield half way up at the passenger side edge and extending toward the driver side. There is no impact or chip site in the windshield.
Also reported on the 2016 Subaru Legacy
Other electrical problem
Other steering problem
Other body or interior problem
Parasitic battery drain
Cruise control failure
No-start or intermittent start failure
How far this goes
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 other visibility problem happen on the 2016 Subaru Legacy?
Across 8 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 25,000 miles. A quarter were filed before 15,000 miles and a quarter after 55,000 miles. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is other visibility problem on the 2016 Subaru Legacy?
12 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 1.2 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