Pass rate
91.4%
Above average — 0.7 pts ahead of the 90.7% that cars this age and mileage manage.
Across 34,769 recorded tests.
Typical repair bill £40–£94
2020 Audi A1 MOT pass rate
- 2020
- 3 trims combined
- typical 26,410 mi
Check your postcode
Most common fault
Tyres
45.3% of faults · 19.8% nationally
mostly tread below the limit, cuts and sidewall bulges.
Part only £55–£85 for Tread depth below 1.6 mm. What fitting it takes →
2.4 pts down across model years — 6.6% in 2010, 4.2% in 2022.
Which year to buy
- Best 2023 95.3% pass
- Avoid 2010 76.0% pass
Across the 14 years on record, a spread of 19.3 points. See every year →
- First-attempt pass
- 90.7%
- Typical mileage
- 26k mi
The 2020 Audi A1 MOT pass rate is 91.4% of its MOT tests — about what its age and mileage predict. Tyres is the biggest single reason it fails, at 45.3% of what testers record.
Expert verdict
Tyres: 2.3× the national share
Tyres make up 45.3% of everything recorded on the 2020 Audi A1, against 19.8% nationally — 25.5 points above. Check all four tyres yourself, including the inner shoulders, and look at the date stamp — a tyre can pass on tread and still be six years old.
- When it fails, it costs. Only 15% of this model’s typical repairs come in under £30 in parts — the failures here tend to be the kind that need a garage rather than a bulb.
Written from this page's own figures: fault shares against the national composition, the like-for-like pass rate, and the priced repair list. How these are worked out
Watching a Audi A1? Get an email when these numbers change .
Every Audi A1 first registered in 2020 is combined here — 3 trim and body variants in total — so the sample is as large as the DVSA data allows.
How does the 2020 Audi A1 compare?
Cars of this age and mileage average 90.7%, so this figure is 0.7 points ahead of what its age and mileage predict. On a first attempt, before any retests, the figure drops to 90.7%. The median 2020 Audi A1 in this dataset had covered 26,410 mi.
Pass rates also shift with the test month: tests recorded October–March passed 91.4% of the time, April–September 91.5%.
The single most recorded failure item is "Windscreen damaged but not adversely affecting driver's view", noted on 2.04% of tests.
- 34,769 recorded tests behind this page.
- 91.4% overall pass rate, 90.7% on a first attempt.
- Across every year of the Audi A1, the average is 83.2% — best year 2023 (95.3%), worst 2010 (76.0%).
Figures count every completed test on this vehicle-year in the dataset, including retests. See methodology for the exact definition.
This page's data
- Tests analysed
- 34,769
- Typical mileage (median)
- 26,410 mi
- Make and model
- Audi A1
- Updated
- 2026-11-07
Source: DVSA anonymised MOT test data (2023–2025), OGL v3.0.
Top part to budget for
Windscreen
Typically a garage job — get quotes before committing.
Does mileage affect the A1 MOT pass rate?
Pass rate by odometer reading. Bar lengths start at 72% so small gaps stay visible.
Where the Audi A1 is most common
Across all A1 model years on record (2010–2023): 335,584 Audi A1 cars tested in a recordable postcode area, across 757,296 tests. Birmingham (B) has the most, with 11,237 cars tested there. Cars are counted by the postcode area of the MOT station, so this is where they were tested, not necessarily where their owners live.
| # | Postcode area | Cars | Pass rate |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Birmingham (B) | 11,237 | 86.2% |
| 2 | Sheffield (S) | 7,239 | 84.4% |
| 3 | Cardiff (CF) | 6,898 | 80.4% |
| 4 | Newcastle upon Tyne (NE) | 6,512 | 82.0% |
| 5 | Manchester (M) | 5,933 | 83.9% |
| 6 | Nottingham (NG) | 5,879 | 80.6% |
| 7 | Peterborough (PE) | 5,822 | 84.6% |
| 8 | Glasgow (G) | 5,814 | 79.9% |
| 9 | Leicester (LE) | 5,690 | 83.6% |
| 10 | Bristol (BS) | 5,676 | 80.7% |
| 11 | Chelmsford (CM) | 5,268 | 85.4% |
| 12 | Reading (RG) | 4,753 | 84.9% |
| 13 | Derby (DE) | 4,632 | 83.8% |
| 14 | Coventry (CV) | 4,515 | 83.7% |
| 15 | Doncaster (DN) | 4,309 | 82.9% |
| 16 | Leeds (LS) | 4,290 | 79.7% |
| 17 | Guildford (GU) | 4,270 | 84.0% |
| 18 | Swansea (SA) | 4,196 | 80.3% |
| 19 | Wakefield (WF) | 4,152 | 83.7% |
| 20 | Northampton (NN) | 4,134 | 79.9% |
The twenty areas with the most Audi A1 cars in the record, sorted by car count — sort the columns for a different question. Cars tested at a station whose postcode area could not be resolved are counted in the model's total but in no area, so the shares add up to slightly under 100% even across every area, and an area's cars are a subset of the model's. Pass rate is blank below 30 tests in an area, where a percentage is noise rather than a finding. How this model's pass rate varies by postcode →
Regional pass rates for the A1
| Region | Tests | Pass rate |
|---|---|---|
| South East | 6,804 | 90.9% |
| North West | 4,385 | 92.1% |
| Scotland | 3,779 | 89.9% |
| East of England | 3,623 | 92.5% |
| West Midlands | 3,113 | 91.9% |
| Yorkshire | 2,986 | 91.8% |
| South West | 2,704 | 91.3% |
| East Midlands | 2,149 | 90.2% |
| North East | 1,786 | 93.3% |
| Wales | 1,746 | 89.6% |
| London | 1,694 | 92.9% |
Regions come from the postcode area recorded at the test station. Areas on region borders are assigned to the region with the majority of their population.
What fails a 2020 A1
Everything a tester recorded on this vehicle, grouped into the inspection sections that produced it. The notch on each bar is the national share, so you can see at a glance whether this car is unusual or just ordinary.
A test can record several items, so these percentages do not add up to 100%. The exact strings, with prices, are in the full DVSA record at the bottom of this page.
Before your test
Three checks worth doing on a 2020 A1
These are not generic tips — they are the faults recorded most often on this exact model, rewritten as things you can check yourself. All three take about ten minutes and cost nothing.
-
Check the windscreen 2.0% of tests
“windscreen damaged”
Check the driver’s side of the screen within the swept area for chips and cracks; anything larger than 10mm in the driver’s central view is a fail. Most chips can be resin-repaired for far less than a new screen.
-
Check the brakes 1.4% of tests
“brake pads less than 1.5 mm thick”
Look through the spokes of each wheel at the pad — less than 3mm of friction material, or a lip on the disc edge, is the usual failure. Check the handbrake holds on a slope with a few clicks, not at the top of its travel.
-
Check the tyre tread 1.1% of tests
“tread depth below requirements of 1.6mm”
Check all four tyres cold, including the inner shoulder where wear hides — 1.6mm across the central three-quarters is the legal limit, and most testers fail at 1.6mm without argument.
Shares are the proportion of tests on this vehicle that recorded the item, so they overlap: one test can record several.
What it costs to get a 2020 A1 through its MOT
Across the 10 items that are recorded most often on this model, the average repair comes to £40–£94 — and 15% of those repairs are parts that cost under £30.
- Average repair across the 10 common items
- £40–£94
- Cheapest common item: malfunction indicator lamp inoperative or…
- £3–£12
- Dearest common item: windscreen damaged
- £80–£200
- Common items a careful owner can do at home
- 90%
- Repairs that still cost under £30
- 15%
Estimates from typical UK parts prices, weighted by how often each item appears in 34,769 MOT tests on this vehicle. They exclude diagnostics, retest fees and garage labour where the part is a DIY fit, and they are not figures from the DVSA dataset. Older and higher-mileage examples cost more than the average. How these estimates are built → · All MOT repair costs → · Cheapest cars to put through a test →
Every year of the A1, side by side
14 model years on record, from 2010 to 2023. Across them the pass rate runs from 76.0% to 95.3% — a spread of 19.3 points. The bar under each year is the item that failed it most often.
- 2010 76.0% joints constant velocity boot…
- 2011 76.6% coil spring fractured or broken
- 2012 78.3% coil spring fractured or broken
- 2013 78.9% coil spring fractured or broken
- 2014 81.0% pins and bushes pin or bush…
- 2015 82.8% pins and bushes pin or bush…
- 2016 82.9% pins and bushes pin or bush…
- 2017 84.4% pins and bushes pin or bush…
- 2018 86.7% pins and bushes pin or bush…
- 2019 89.9% windscreen damaged but not…
- 2020 91.4%windscreen damaged but not…
- 2021 92.2% windscreen damaged but not…
- 2022 93.0% windscreen damaged but not…
- 2023 95.3% windscreen damaged but not…
Colour is the pass rate on a fixed scale, so a block means the same thing on any model. Each year links to its own page with the full fault breakdown.
Compare the 2020 Audi A1 with another year
The raw pass rate mostly measures age. The year comparison adds the like-for-like figure, the mileage bands and the repair bill.
Other 2020 cars with a similar record
- Skoda Kodiaq 91.4%
- Volkswagen T-Cross 91.4%
- BMW X3 91.4%
- Fiat 500 Lounge 91.4%
- Fiat 500X 91.4%
- Mitsubishi Outlander Dynamic 91.4%
Closest pass rates among 2020 cars with at least 2,000 tests, so a small sample cannot flatter itself into the list. See the full rankings: best and worst MOT pass rates.
The full DVSA record for the 2020 Audi A1 10 failure items · 6 advisories · 10 inspection categories · mileage brackets · all of it in the page, none of it above the fold
Every inspection category
Shares of the 24,075 individual items recorded on this vehicle, and the same share across all cars nationally. A single test can record several items, so a row is not a percentage of tests.
| Category | Items | This car | Nationally | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Tyres | 11,003 | 45.30% | 19.76% | +25.54 |
| Brakes | 7,590 | 31.30% | 20.89% | +10.41 |
| Non-component advisories | 1,679 | 6.90% | 4.18% | +2.72 |
| Visibility | 1,372 | 5.70% | 4.97% | +0.73 |
| Suspension | 633 | 2.60% | 20.98% | −18.38 |
| Identification of the vehicle | 500 | 2.10% | 1.76% | +0.34 |
| Steering | 410 | 1.70% | 2.57% | −0.87 |
| Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | 380 | 1.60% | 12.21% | −10.61 |
| Noise, emissions and leaks | 257 | 1.10% | 5.52% | −4.42 |
| Seat belts and supplementary restraint systems | 251 | 1.00% | 0.82% | +0.18 |
The exact failure items, in the tester's words
| Recorded item | Severity | Tests | Est. cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Windscreen damaged but not adversely affecting driver's view Visibility | Minor | 2.0% | £80–200 |
| Has a cut in excess of the requirements deep enough to reach the ply or cords Tyres | Major | 1.6% | £45–95 |
| Brake pads less than 1.5 mm thick Brakes | Major | 1.4% | £18–45 |
| Tread depth below requirements of 1.6mm Tyres | Major | 1.1% | £45–95 |
| Track rod end ball joint dust cover damaged or deteriorated, but preventing the ingress of dirt Steering | Minor | 0.83% | £18–45 |
| Wipers blade defective Visibility | Minor | 0.50% | £8–22 |
| Malfunction indicator lamp inoperative or indicates a malfunction Noise, emissions and leaks | Major | 0.50% | £3–12 |
| Has ply or cords exposed Tyres | Major | 0.49% | £45–95 |
| Washers provides insufficient washer liquid Visibility | Rectified | 0.39% | £5–15 |
| Has a bulge, caused by separation or partial failure of its structure Tyres | Major | 0.30% | £45–95 |
Severity is as recorded: Major and Dangerous fail the test outright; Minor and Advisory do not. Costs are estimates from typical UK parts prices — see how they are built.
What testers noted without failing the car
Advisories are the early warnings — the same parts a year or two before they fail. Reading them is how you tell a car that has been maintained from one that has been patched.
| Recorded item | Severity | Tests | Est. cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Tread depth below requirements of 1.6mm Tyres | Advisory | 12.9% | £45–95 |
| Has a tear, caused by separation or partial failure of its structure Tyres | Advisory | 9.5% | £45–95 |
| Brake pads less than 1.5 mm thick Brakes | Advisory | 9.4% | £18–45 |
| Brake discs in such a condition that it is seriously weakened Brakes | Advisory | 6.9% | £45–110 |
| Non-component advisories Nail in tyre Non-component advisories | Advisory | 2.5% | £45–95 |
| Brake discs significantly and obviously worn Brakes | Advisory | 2.3% | £45–110 |
Pass rate by mileage
| Mileage | Tests | Pass rate | Median odometer |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0-30k | 20,875 | 93.4% | 19,229 mi |
| 30-60k | 12,675 | 88.7% | 40,097 mi |
| 60-90k | 1,117 | 86.8% | 68,835 mi |
| 90-120k | 90 | 80.0% | 97,872 mi |
| 120k+ | 11 | 81.8% | 145,786 mi |
Source: 34,769 recorded tests on this vehicle-year. Every row above is recomputed from the same DVSA extract as the rest of the page — see the methodology.
2020 A1 MOT questions
What is the MOT pass rate for a 2020 Audi A1?
91.4% of the 34,769 2020 Audi A1 tests in this dataset passed, against a national average of 90.7% for cars first used in 2020. First-attempt pass rate: 90.7%.
What are the most common MOT failures on a 2020 Audi A1?
The three most recorded items are windscreen damaged but not adversely affecting driver's view (2.04%), has a cut in excess of the requirements deep enough to reach the ply or cords (1.65%), brake pads less than 1.5 mm thick (1.38%). Percentages are the share of tests on this vehicle that recorded the item.
Does mileage affect the 2020 Audi A1 MOT pass rate?
Yes. Cars under 30,000 miles passed 93.4% of the time, falling to 81.8% for those over 120,000 miles. The median 2020 Audi A1 in this dataset had covered 26,410 mi.
Does the season affect the 2020 Audi A1 MOT pass rate?
Tests recorded in the winter months (October–March) passed 91.4% of the time; summer months (April–September) passed 91.5%. Brakes, tyres and lights are tested harder in bad weather, but the difference is small on most models.