Is Honda Really as Reliable as Its Japanese Reputation?

Few brands carry a mechanical reliability reputation as firmly established as Honda’s — engines said to be practically indestructible, a durable image inherited from Japanese car culture. But what does France’s official roadworthiness test data actually show?

Honda against the other brands

Out of the 38 brands tracked on this site, Honda ranks 36th, with a weighted average retest rate of 26.28% across the 8 models tracked (58,598 roadworthiness tests represented). That’s well above the national reference rate (18.94% across all models, see the 2025 barometer), and Honda ends up surrounded by mainstream generalist brands rather than alongside premium Japanese marques: just ahead of Opel (26.42%, 37th) and Seat (26.67%, 38th), and just behind Peugeot (25.55%, 35th) and Mini (25.46%, 34th). Honda sits in one of the bottom three places of the overall ranking.

With 8 families tracked, Honda’s range is narrower than the mainstream generalist brands (Renault: 40, Peugeot: 36, Volkswagen: 32) — a similar order of magnitude to Porsche, Land Rover or Mini (8 families each). The site doesn’t flag this sample as statistically limited, unlike brands with only 1 or 2 models (Alpine, Cupra, Tesla…). The volume of tests represented (58,598), however, remains lower than for the high-volume generalist brands.

Model by model

Here are the 8 Honda families tracked, ranked from most to least reliable by retest rate:

Model	Retest rate	National rank (/530)
Civic IX	21.42%	273
CR-V IV	21.74%	279
HR-V II	23.81%	307
Civic X	24.21%	313
Jazz II	24.94%	325
CR-V III	28.12%	385
Civic VIII	29.66%	406
Jazz I	35.12%	501

The finding is unambiguous: even Honda’s best-performing model, the Civic IX (21.42%), sits above the national reference rate (18.94%). None of the 8 families tracked falls below that average, and all of them sit in the bottom half of the overall ranking out of 530 models. That’s a different profile from other brands with a strong reputation, such as Volvo, where at least one model climbed into the upper tier of the national ranking: here, the gap between the best (Civic IX, 273rd) and the worst (Jazz I, 501st) stays entirely within the bottom half of the table.

Manufacturer recalls

RappelConso lists 4 distinct notices concerning the Honda families tracked on this site: an insufficient wheel-nut torque defect on the Civic VIII/IX/X (2026, risk of wheel loss), a risk of negative battery-terminal corrosion on the same Civic generations (2025, fire risk), a fuel-pump impeller moulding defect shared with the CR-V, HR-V, Jazz and NSX (2024, risk of engine stall), and a driver-seat frame that can crack on the Civic VIII/IX/X (2023, risk of injury in a crash).

Counted using the same method as our recalls-per-brand ranking (a recall counts once per family it affects), that comes to 14 recalls cumulated across the 8 Honda families tracked — almost all of it concentrated on the Civic line (generations VIII, IX and X are systematically affected together on every notice). The CR-V and HR-V each appear only once, on the 2024 notice shared across the group’s entire petrol/hybrid range. As with other brands, a recall doesn’t mean a widespread defect across every unit of the model concerned.

What this means for a purchase

The retest rate measures compliance with the safety points checked (braking, suspension, emissions, lighting), not the internal mechanical reliability (engine, gearbox) that Honda’s reputation is built on — these two angles are complementary, not contradictory. An engine can easily run 300,000 km without ever breaking down while still generating, over the years, more defects on the points checked during the roadworthiness test (braking, suspension, lighting). On this specific measure, the data doesn’t confirm the exceptional reliability image associated with the brand: Honda ranks among the weakest performers on the site, across every model tracked. The full model-by-model detail is available on the Honda brand page (in French), and the full methodology page (in French) explains what the retest rate does — and doesn’t — measure.

Source data: UTAC-OTC (French roadworthiness test, 2025), RappelConso (data.gouv.fr). Full methodology on the methodology page (in French).