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RecallScanner Severity Profile

Audi A3

Watch5 recall campaigns, verify by VIN.
0
RecallScore
Critical
2
Fire risk
0
Crash risk
5
Injuries
0
Deaths
0
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All Recalls

5 campaigns
5 recalls 2 critical💥 5 crash risk
Model year
Airbag
Aug 29, 2022
1346 days ago

Your front passenger airbag can tear and fail to deploy in a crash.

Affected: AIR BAGS:FRONTAL · 2022
CRASH RISK
NHTSA
Summary

Volkswagen Group of America, Inc. (Volkswagen) is recalling certain 2022 Audi S3, A3, and RS3 vehicles. The front passenger air bag may have been folded incorrectly.

Consequence

An incorrectly folded air bag can tear, prohibiting it from deploying properly during a crash, increasing the risk of an injury.

Remedy

Dealers will replace the front passenger air bag module, free of charge. Owner notification letters were mailed December 13, 2022. Owners may contact Audi's customer service at 1-800-253-2834. Audi's number for this recall is 69DZ.

Airbag
Mar 22, 2021
1871 days ago

Your passenger airbag can turn off even when someone is sitting there, leaving them unprotected in a crash.

Affected: AIR BAGS:SENSOR:OCCUPANT CLASSIFICATION:FRONT PASSENGER · 2020
CRASH RISK
NHTSA
Summary

Volkswagen Group of America, Inc. (Audi) is recalling certain 2015-2020 Audi S3 Sedan, A3 Sedan, 2016-2018 A3 Etron, 2017-2020 RS3 Sedan, and 2015-2019 A3 Cabriolet vehicles. The passenger occupant detection system (PODS) may malfunction and switch off the passenger air bag even when the seat is occupied.

Consequence

A deactivated passenger air bag increases the risk of injury during a crash.

Remedy

Dealers will replace the PODS sensor mat and update the PODS control module, free of charge. Owners letters were mailed December 23, 2021. Owners may contact Audi customer service at 1-800-253-2834. Audi's number for this recall is 69BY.

Seat Belts
Jul 20, 2022
1386 days ago

Your seat belt tensioner may not lock during a crash, leaving you unrestrained and at risk of serious injury.

Affected: SEAT BELTS:PRETENSIONER · 2022
CRASH RISK
NHTSA
Summary

Volkswagen Group of America, Inc. (Volkswagen) is recalling certain 2022 Audi S3 and A3 sedans. The retention force of the seat belt tensioner on the driver and front passenger seats may be inadequate to properly restrain the occupants during a crash.

Consequence

Improperly restrained occupants have an increased risk of injury during a crash.

Remedy

Dealers will replace the driver and front passenger seat belt assemblies, free of charge. Owner notification letters were mailed November 15, 2022. Owners may contact Audi's customer service at 1-800-253-2834. Audi's number for this recall is 68i2.

Other
Jun 4, 2022
1432 days ago

Your child seat anchors are marked wrong, so the car seat won't lock in properly during a crash.

Affected: CHILD SEAT:VEHICLE LATCH ANCHOR · 2022
CRASH RISK
NHTSA
Summary

Volkswagen Group of America, Inc. (Audi) is recalling certain 2022 A3 Sedan and S3 Sedan vehicles. The child seat anchorage fitting sleeves are incorrectly marked with a different symbol than the one described in the owner's manual. As such, these vehicles fail to comply with the requirements of Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard number 225, "Child Restraint Anchorage Systems."

Consequence

An incorrectly marked child restraint anchorage may cause confusion during child seat installation, resulting in a child seat being improperly secured and increasing the risk of injury during a crash.

Remedy

Dealers will replace all four fitting sleeves, free of charge. Owner notification letters were mailed May24, 2022. Owners may contact Audi customer service at 1-800-253-2834. Audi's number for this recall is 72M7.

Other
Jul 12, 2022
1394 days ago

You might overload your car without knowing it, raising the crash risk.

Affected: EQUIPMENT:OTHER:LABELS · 2023
CRASH RISK
NHTSA
Summary

Volkswagen Group of America, Inc. (Volkswagen) is recalling certain 2023 Audi S3, RS3, and A3 vehicles. The Safety Certification label on the B-pillar is missing weight capacity information. As such, these vehicles fail to comply with the requirements of 49 CFR Part 567, "Certification."

Consequence

Missing weight information may result in unintentional overloading of the vehicle, increasing the risk of a crash.

Remedy

Audi dealers will install an overlay label, free of charge. Owner notification letters were mailed February 27, 2023. Owners may contact Audi's customer service at 1-800-253-2834. Audi's number for this recall is 50ZZ.

›Owner complaints (3)
09/10/20252025 A3Crash
ELECTRICAL SYSTEM,VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL,UNKNOWN OR OTHER

1) Electronic emergency brake goes on repeatedly when attempting to put vehicle in gear. 2) Speed control has coasted to a very low speed while on the highway several times, on its own with no vehicles in front of me. 3) Numerous other “glitchy” electrical issues exist. Dealer says they are collaborating with engineers in Germany. There is currently no fix. It is as if the vehicle is always cycling through various “glitches”.

02/16/20252024 A3
ELECTRICAL SYSTEM

If the car is not driven for 20 minutes per day and the car sits for any length of time the check engine light comes on. The dealership advises it is the 12v battery is run down. According the Audi USA and the service order that the car is operating as designed.

01/26/20262025 A3
UNKNOWN OR OTHER

The honk stopped functioning on January 21 2026. I noticed this when a car was moving into my lane on a major highway and I need to honk to alert them. Not being able to alert another drive that they are about to hit me puts me, the other driver, and potentially others at risk. I had to break hard, which is also a safety hazard. The honk has not functioned since, so it was not an isolated issue. No warning lights went on. I have scheduled an appointment with the Bridgewater dealership for Friday January 30.

Complaints are self-reported to NHTSA by owners and are not verified by the agency.

›
Full analysis: how to read the Audi A3 recall history
Year range, common components, complaint patterns, and how to use this page.

Understanding the Audi A3 recall history

The Audi A3 currently has 5 recall campaigns and 3 owner complaints indexed from the NHTSA public database. Each recall represents a formal campaign to fix a defect at no cost to the current owner. Owner complaints are self-reported incidents that haven't (yet) resulted in a recall but can indicate emerging patterns worth watching.

The most frequent recall categories for the A3 in our dataset are air bag (2), and seat belt (1). These clusters matter when you're shopping for a used A3: recalls in these systems tend to be the ones most likely to have been skipped by previous owners, because they aren't always visible during a routine test drive or pre-purchase inspection.

The tracked recalls span model years 2020–2023, with campaigns reported to NHTSA between 2021 and 2022. Not every model year carries every recall. Each campaign is scoped to a specific year range and often a specific build window, which is why a VIN lookup is the only way to know whether a particular A3 is actually affected by any of these campaigns.

NHTSA's complaint database for the A3 records 1 crash report. Complaint data is unverified and shouldn't be read as a blanket condemnation of the model (large production volumes naturally produce more reports), but it is useful for spotting whether a specific defect has a serious real-world pattern behind it.

How to use this page

The safest path for an owner is to run your VIN through the checker above. A VIN query hits NHTSA's live API and tells you whether your specific A3 has an open, unresolved recall. If you're researching a used A3before buying, use the recall list below to understand the model's full history, then check the seller's VIN to see whether prior owners actually completed the free repairs. Many don't, and unresolved recalls can linger for years.

Figures are generated live from the RecallScanner dataset, which is sourced from NHTSA's public recall and complaint APIs and refreshed daily. RecallScanner is independent and not affiliated with Audi or any U.S. government agency.

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