ABS module or sensor failure on the 2003 Toyota Camry
10 crashes 2 injuries 12 of the 30 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 abs module or sensor failure gets reported
Owners of the 2003 Toyota Camry report ABS module or sensor failure at a median of 10,000 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 200 miles and a quarter after 25,000 miles, from 24 reports that carried an odometer reading.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 95,000 miles. It is the 6th most-reported problem on this model year.
The mileage distribution
The reported range runs from 100 miles at the tenth percentile to 35,000 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 35,737 miles across the middle 80% of reports.
A window that narrow is the signature of a part that fails on its own schedule rather than on how the car is driven — which is usually a design or supplier problem rather than wear and tear.
88% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 51 miles | 229 miles | 7,800 miles | 25,750 miles | 35,788 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, 10 a crash and 2 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 $500–$2,400 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 17 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2010, at a median of 5,000 miles, and latest on the 2007 at 112,500 miles.
By volume the 2007 carries the most reports, with 105; the 2003 has 30. 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.
2003 toyota camry v6 (midyear 210 hp motor). The brakes on this car fade all the way to the floor when depressing the pedal. This is very disconcerting as there isn't any "pedal" to the brake and has to just keep pressing, pressing, pressing the pedal until the car stops. The toyota representative says this is how the camry brakes are designed and it is normal. The toyota representative insists that since he can not reengineer the car he cannot do anything to help with the problem. He acknowledges that the pedal goes to the floor. The dealer service manager was "obviously" concerned with the problem, but the toyota representative dismissed his concern. It appears that toyota "thinks" it's smarter than the rest of us. But perhaps they should take a step back and look at where that attitude has gotten a few of the other automobile manufacturers. The camry's brakes do not give the driver a feeling that the brakes will stop the car. In fact, the car does not stop. These brakes are dangerous. *ak *scc
While making left turns and without any warning steering wheel and brake pedal locked up. As result, consumer was involved in a head on collision, and air bags did not deploy.*ak
Our 2003 leased toyota camry has been great for the first year. We currently have approx 5600 miles on the car. During january and february of this year we experienced two separate ABS (antiskid brake system) activations. In both incidents the car was on dry, clean, hard surfaced roads. There was no gravel, dirt, ice, etc or any foreign matter on the roads. The roads were also dry. No rain was falling. In both incidents the car was gong less than 30 MPH and in both cases the car was descending a slight hill. When the operator applied brakes the ABS system activated and no amount of brake peddle pressure changed the stopping ability of the car. Kickback thru the brake peddle was felt by me. The stopping distance was increased dramatically. In the first incident my wife was alone in the car and coming down a hill to a stop light. She could not stop the car before the light and had to make a hard right hand turn to prevent hitting cars or being hit by cars that were going 45+ MPH on their road thru the light. At the intersection. Fortunately there had been a break in traffic so when she turned right at the red light there was a break…
Also reported on the 2003 Toyota Camry
Other speed control problem
Other engine problem
Other brake problem
Other body or interior problem
Head gasket failure
Other steering problem
How far this goes
Complaints are voluntary, so 30 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 abs module or sensor failure happen on the 2003 Toyota Camry?
Across 24 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 10,000 miles. A quarter were filed before 200 miles and a quarter after 25,000 miles. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is abs module or sensor failure on the 2003 Toyota Camry?
30 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 0.7 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