AtWhatMileage
Engine · 28 owner reports

Other engine problem on the 2017 Toyota Rav4

1 crash 11 fires 1 injury 13 of the 28 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.

Reports of this failure 28
With an odometer reading 16
Reports per 1,000 built 0.1 per 1,000
Filed below 36,000 miles 31%
Mention a crash, fire or injury 13
Typical repair $300–$4,000
What it means when it happens High
Rank among this year's problems 2nd

When other engine problem gets reported

Owners of the 2017 Toyota Rav4 report other engine problem at a median of 60,000 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 30,000 miles and a quarter after 80,000 miles, from 16 reports that carried an odometer reading.

A part like this is normally expected to survive 95,000 miles. It is the 2nd most-reported problem on this model year.

The mileage distribution

The reported range runs from 20,000 miles at the tenth percentile to 95,000 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 77,025 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.

31% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.

The whole distribution

Percentiles of the 16 odometer readings owners gave.
10th25thMedian 75th90th
18,975 miles 29,880 miles 60,000 miles 78,000 miles 96,000 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

Of these reports, 1 a crash, 11 a fire and 1 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 $300–$4,000 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 26 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2013, at a median of 10,000 miles, and latest on the 2001 at 115,000 miles.

By volume the 2019 carries the most reports, with 147; the 2017 has 28. 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.

Median
  1. 1996 Toyota Rav4 other engine problem 100k
  2. 1997 Toyota Rav4 other engine problem
    no odometer readings given
    —
  3. 1998 Toyota Rav4 other engine problem 88k
  4. 1999 Toyota Rav4 other engine problem 70k
  5. 2000 Toyota Rav4 other engine problem
    no odometer readings given
    —
  6. 2001 Toyota Rav4 other engine problem 113k
  7. 2002 Toyota Rav4 other engine problem 95k
  8. 2003 Toyota Rav4 other engine problem 91k
  9. 2004 Toyota Rav4 other engine problem 34k
  10. 2005 Toyota Rav4 other engine problem 98k
  11. 2006 Toyota Rav4 other engine problem 70k
  12. 2007 Toyota Rav4 other engine problem 80k
  13. 2008 Toyota Rav4 other engine problem 79k
  14. 2009 Toyota Rav4 other engine problem 35k
  15. 2010 Toyota Rav4 other engine problem 40k
  16. 2011 Toyota Rav4 other engine problem 51k
  17. 2012 Toyota Rav4 other engine problem 33k
  18. 2013 Toyota Rav4 other engine problem 10k
  19. 2014 Toyota Rav4 other engine problem 50k
  20. 2015 Toyota Rav4 other engine problem 54k
  21. 2016 Toyota Rav4 other engine problem 20k
  22. 2017 (this one) 60k
  23. 2018 Toyota Rav4 other engine problem 48k
  24. 2019 Toyota Rav4 other engine problem 10k
  25. 2020 Toyota Rav4 other engine problem 27k
  26. 2021 Toyota Rav4 other engine problem 28k
  27. 2022 Toyota Rav4 other engine problem 27k
  28. 2023 Toyota Rav4 other engine problem
    no odometer readings given
    —
  29. 2024 Toyota Rav4 other engine problem 13k
  30. 2025 Toyota Rav4 other engine problem
    no odometer readings given
    —

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.

Tl* the contact owns a 2017 toyota rav4. While the vehicle was stationary and while driving various speeds, toxic fumes emitted from the heater on the passenger side of the vehicle. Koons arlington toyota in arlington, virginia was made aware of the failure and acknowledged the presence of the fumes. The vehicle was not repaired. The manufacturer was made aware of the failure. The failure mileage was approximately 3,000. The VIN was not available.

3,000 miles NHTSA complaint 1434310 filed 2017-12-20

About 1 year after I purchased my car brand new off of the lot I started to notice my brakes starting to rub and squeak. If I was going down hill the front of my car would shake. It was terrifying. I took it to the maita toyota delarship in sacramento. They told me nothing is wrong my pads are still good. I begged them to fix them they replaced my front rotors and break pads. This dealership also performed a engine cleaning and multiple other things they said my car needed at that time running me 795$ this being on july 11th 2018. Then today sept 6th 2018. My starter is out my car no longer starts. When you turn the key all of the inside lights come on and all you hear is a clicking sound. Mind you I also had a chip in my windshield when I took my car in for inspection in july and they placed green check mark's on everything including my windshield being free from chips. I now question the integrity of this dealerships service department. Do they truly inspect and do the work on your car? Because from where I am seeing this at sitting here with a year old car in my parking lot currently not driveable I begin to wonder if they do…

31,673 miles NHTSA complaint 1497267 filed 2018-09-06

Also reported on the 2017 Toyota Rav4

Other electrical problem

78 reports median 51k

Other brake problem

26 reports median 10k

Headlight failure or clouding

16 reports median 6k

Other body or interior problem

14 reports median 23k

Cruise control failure

12 reports median 9k

Other powertrain problem

12 reports median 25k

How far this goes

Complaints are voluntary, so 28 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 engine problem happen on the 2017 Toyota Rav4?

Across 16 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 60,000 miles. A quarter were filed before 30,000 miles and a quarter after 80,000 miles. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.

How common is other engine problem on the 2017 Toyota Rav4?

28 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