Pass rate
86.5%
Above average — 4.7 pts behind the 91.2% that cars this age and mileage manage.
Across 52 recorded tests.
Typical repair bill £43–£99
2021 BMW 225XE Luxury MOT pass rate
- 2021
- typical 30,120 mi
Only 52 tests of this exact model and year are in the DVSA data, below the 100 we ask for before a page goes in the index. The figures are still shown, because they are the only ones there are.
Most common fault
Tyres
56.4% of faults · 19.8% nationally
mostly tread below the limit, cuts and sidewall bulges.
Which year to buy
- Best 2019 92.9% pass
- Avoid 2021 86.5% pass · this year
Across the 4 years on record, a spread of 6.4 points. See every year →
- First-attempt pass
- 84.8%
- Typical mileage
- 30k mi
The 2021 BMW 225XE Luxury MOT pass rate is 86.5% of its MOT tests — 4.7 points behind what its age and mileage predict. Tyres is the biggest single reason it fails, at 56.4% of what testers record.
Check your postcode
MOT pass rates are national — type your postcode to see how BMW 225XE Luxury does in your corner of the country.
Expert verdict
Tyres: 2.9× the national share
Tyres make up 56.4% of everything recorded on the 2021 BMW 225xe Luxury, against 19.8% nationally — 36.6 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.
- Falls short of its own age and mileage. Like-for-like, cars this age and mileage expect about 91.2%; this one manages 86.5% — 4.7 points below. Age is a fair excuse; this is not age.
- When it fails, it costs. Only 17% 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 BMW 225XE Luxury? Get an email when these numbers change .
How does the 2021 BMW 225XE Luxury compare?
Cars of this age and mileage average 91.2%, so this figure is 4.7 points behind what its age and mileage predict. On a first attempt, before any retests, the figure drops to 84.8%. The median 2021 BMW 225XE Luxury in this dataset had covered 30,120 mi.
The single most recorded failure item is "Has a cut in excess of the requirements deep enough to reach the ply or cords", noted on 3.85% of tests.
- 52 recorded tests behind this page.
- 86.5% overall pass rate, 84.8% on a first attempt.
- Across every year of the BMW 225XE Luxury, the average is 90.4% — best year 2019 (92.9%), worst 2021 (86.5%).
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
- 52
- Typical mileage (median)
- 30,120 mi
- Make and model
- BMW 225XE Luxury
- Updated
- 2026-11-05
Source: DVSA anonymised MOT test data (2023–2025), OGL v3.0.
Top part to budget for
Tyres
Usually a DIY or independent-garage job.
Does mileage affect the 225XE Luxury MOT pass rate?
Pass rate by odometer reading. Bar lengths start at 73% so small gaps stay visible.
Regional pass rates for the 225XE Luxury
| Region | Tests | Pass rate |
|---|---|---|
| South West | 15 | 80.0% |
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 2021 225XE Luxury
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 2021 225XE Luxury
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 3.9% 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 1.9% of tests
“brake discs significantly and obviously worn”
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 shock absorbers 1.9% of tests
“shock absorbers has a serious fluid leak”
Press down hard on each corner of the car and let go. It should settle in one bounce; if it keeps rocking, or you can see oil weeping down a shock absorber, that is the fault a tester will find.
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 2021 225XE Luxury through its MOT
Across the 10 items that are recorded most often on this model, the average repair comes to £43–£99 — and 17% of those repairs are parts that cost under £30.
- Average repair across the 10 common items
- £43–£99
- Cheapest common item: side repeaters lens defective such that the…
- £3–£15
- Dearest common item: windscreen damaged
- £80–£200
- Common items a careful owner can do at home
- 90%
- Repairs that still cost under £30
- 17%
Estimates from typical UK parts prices, weighted by how often each item appears in 52 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 225XE Luxury, side by side
4 model years on record, from 2018 to 2021. Across them the pass rate runs from 86.5% to 92.9% — a spread of 6.4 points. The bar under each year is the item that failed it most often.
- 2018 88.9% has a cut in excess of the…
- 2019 92.9% has a cut in excess of the…
- 2020 88.5% has a cut in excess of the…
- 2021 86.5%has a cut in excess of the…
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 2021 BMW 225XE Luxury 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 2021 cars with a similar record
- Fiat 500E La Prima 86.5%
- Vauxhall Corsa E 86.3%
- Land Rover Discovry 86.7%
- Ford Ranger 86.9%
- Citroen C4 86.9%
- Peugeot 508 86.9%
Closest pass rates among 2021 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 2021 BMW 225XE Luxury 10 failure items · 6 advisories · 7 inspection categories · mileage brackets · all of it in the page, none of it above the fold
Every inspection category
Shares of the 39 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 | 22 | 56.40% | 19.76% | +36.64 |
| Brakes | 8 | 20.50% | 20.89% | −0.39 |
| Visibility | 3 | 7.70% | 4.97% | +2.73 |
| Suspension | 2 | 5.10% | 20.98% | −15.88 |
| Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | 2 | 5.10% | 12.21% | −7.11 |
| Non-component advisories | 1 | 2.60% | 4.18% | −1.58 |
| Identification of the vehicle | 1 | 2.60% | 1.76% | +0.84 |
The exact failure items, in the tester's words
| Recorded item | Severity | Tests | Est. cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Has a cut in excess of the requirements deep enough to reach the ply or cords Tyres | Major | 3.9% | £45–95 |
| Windscreen damaged but not adversely affecting driver's view Visibility | Minor | 3.9% | £80–200 |
| Brake discs significantly and obviously worn Brakes | Major | 1.9% | £45–110 |
| Has a bulge, caused by separation or partial failure of its structure Tyres | Major | 1.9% | £45–95 |
| Has ply or cords damaged Tyres | Major | 1.9% | £45–95 |
| Has ply or cords exposed Tyres | Major | 1.9% | £45–95 |
| Shock absorbers has a serious fluid leak Suspension | Major | 1.9% | £30–75 |
| Side repeaters lens defective such that the emitted light is adversely affected Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | Major | 1.9% | £3–15 |
| Side repeaters with a multiple light source more than 1/2 not functioning Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | Major | 1.9% | £3–15 |
| Tyre pressure monitoring system malfunctioning or obviously inoperative Tyres | Rectified | 1.9% | £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 | 19.2% | £45–95 |
| Brake discs in such a condition that it is seriously weakened Brakes | Advisory | 7.7% | £45–110 |
| Brake pads less than 1.5 mm thick Brakes | Advisory | 5.8% | £18–45 |
| Has a cut in excess of the requirements deep enough to reach the ply or cords Tyres | Advisory | 3.9% | £45–95 |
| Has a tear, caused by separation or partial failure of its structure Tyres | Advisory | 3.9% | £45–95 |
| Has a bulge, caused by separation or partial failure of its structure Tyres | Advisory | 1.9% | £45–95 |
Pass rate by mileage
| Mileage | Tests | Pass rate | Median odometer |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0-30k | 26 | 84.6% | 18,187 mi |
| 30-60k | 15 | 93.3% | 43,178 mi |
| 60-90k | 11 | 81.8% | 75,257 mi |
Source: 52 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.
2021 225XE Luxury MOT questions
What is the MOT pass rate for a 2021 BMW 225XE Luxury?
86.5% of the 52 2021 BMW 225XE Luxury tests in this dataset passed, against a national average of 91.2% for cars first used in 2021. First-attempt pass rate: 84.8%.
What are the most common MOT failures on a 2021 BMW 225XE Luxury?
The three most recorded items are has a cut in excess of the requirements deep enough to reach the ply or cords (3.85%), windscreen damaged but not adversely affecting driver's view (3.85%), brake discs significantly and obviously worn (1.92%). Percentages are the share of tests on this vehicle that recorded the item.
Does mileage affect the 2021 BMW 225XE Luxury MOT pass rate?
Yes. Cars under 30,000 miles passed 84.6% of the time, falling to 81.8% for those over 120,000 miles. The median 2021 BMW 225XE Luxury in this dataset had covered 30,120 mi.