Pass rate
92.3%
Above average — 1.6 pts ahead of the 90.7% that cars this age and mileage manage.
Across 222 recorded tests.
Typical repair bill £34–£84
2020 BMW I8 MOT pass rate
- 2020
- typical 11,399 mi
Most common fault
Tyres
67.9% 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 →
Which year to buy
- Best 2019 93.4% pass
- Avoid 2014 91.0% pass
Across the 7 years on record, a spread of 2.4 points. See every year →
- First-attempt pass
- 91.7%
- Typical mileage
- 11k mi
The 2020 BMW I8 MOT pass rate is 92.3% of its MOT tests — 1.6 points ahead of what its age and mileage predict. Tyres is the biggest single reason it fails, at 67.9% of what testers record.
Check your postcode
MOT pass rates are national — type your postcode to see how BMW I8 does in your corner of the country.
Expert verdict
Tyres: 3.4× the national share
Tyres make up 67.9% of everything recorded on the 2020 BMW I8, against 19.8% nationally — 48.1 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.
- Based on a small sample. 222 tests back this page. That is enough to publish and to index, not enough to treat the decimal places as precise — read the pattern, not the second digit.
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 I8? Get an email when these numbers change .
How does the 2020 BMW I8 compare?
Cars of this age and mileage average 90.7%, so this figure is 1.6 points ahead of what its age and mileage predict. On a first attempt, before any retests, the figure drops to 91.7%. The median 2020 BMW I8 in this dataset had covered 11,399 mi.
Pass rates also shift with the test month: tests recorded October–March passed 95.9% of the time, April–September 90.6%.
The single most recorded failure item is "Tread depth below requirements of 1.6mm", noted on 3.15% of tests.
- 222 recorded tests behind this page.
- 92.3% overall pass rate, 91.7% on a first attempt.
- Across every year of the BMW I8, the average is 91.7% — best year 2019 (93.4%), worst 2014 (91.0%).
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
- 222
- Typical mileage (median)
- 11,399 mi
- Make and model
- BMW I8
- 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 I8 MOT pass rate?
Pass rate by odometer reading. Bar lengths start at 72% so small gaps stay visible.
Regional pass rates for the I8
| Region | Tests | Pass rate |
|---|---|---|
| South East | 74 | 93.2% |
| South West | 29 | 82.8% |
| East of England | 25 | 100.0% |
| West Midlands | 19 | 100.0% |
| North West | 17 | 88.2% |
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 I8
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 I8
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 tyre tread 3.1% 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.
-
Check the lights 1.8% of tests
“headlamp aim too high”
Switch everything on and walk round the car: both headlamps on dip and main, every indicator, both brake lights, reverse, fog and the two number-plate lamps. A bulb is a few pounds and a five-minute job.
-
Check the number plates 1.4% of tests
“registration plates does not conform to the specified requirements”
Check both plates are present, legible and correctly spaced, with the postcode of the supplier and the BS AU 145e mark. A private plate in the wrong style is a fail before the car is even looked at.
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 I8 through its MOT
Across the 10 items that are recorded most often on this model, the average repair comes to £34–£84 — and 15% of those repairs are parts that cost under £30.
- Average repair across the 10 common items
- £34–£84
- Cheapest common item: individual direction indicators lens…
- £3–£12
- Dearest common item: windscreen damaged
- £80–£200
- Common items a careful owner can do at home
- 70%
- Repairs that still cost under £30
- 15%
Estimates from typical UK parts prices, weighted by how often each item appears in 222 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 I8, side by side
7 model years on record, from 2014 to 2020. Across them the pass rate runs from 91.0% to 93.4% — a spread of 2.4 points. The bar under each year is the item that failed it most often.
- 2014 91.0% joints constant velocity boot…
- 2015 91.2% joints constant velocity boot…
- 2016 91.2% joints constant velocity boot…
- 2017 92.1% tread depth below requirements of…
- 2018 92.0% tread depth below requirements of…
- 2019 93.4% tread depth below requirements of…
- 2020 92.3%tread depth below requirements of…
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 BMW I8 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
- MINI COOPER 92.3%
- Fiat Panda 92.3%
- Jeep Renegade 92.2%
- Renault Captur 92.4%
- MINI Countryman 92.4%
- Citroen C1 92.4%
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 BMW I8 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 78 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 | 53 | 67.90% | 19.76% | +48.14 |
| Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | 6 | 7.70% | 12.21% | −4.51 |
| Visibility | 6 | 7.70% | 4.97% | +2.73 |
| Brakes | 4 | 5.10% | 20.89% | −15.79 |
| Identification of the vehicle | 4 | 5.10% | 1.76% | +3.34 |
| Road Wheels | 3 | 3.80% | 0.75% | +3.05 |
| Non-component advisories | 2 | 2.60% | 4.18% | −1.58 |
The exact failure items, in the tester's words
| Recorded item | Severity | Tests | Est. cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Tread depth below requirements of 1.6mm Tyres | Major | 3.1% | £45–95 |
| Headlamp aim too high Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | Rectified | 1.8% | £30–80 |
| Has a cut in excess of the requirements deep enough to reach the ply or cords Tyres | Major | 1.4% | £45–95 |
| Registration plates does not conform to the specified requirements Identification of the vehicle | Major | 1.4% | £20–80 |
| Wipers blade defective Visibility | Minor | 1.4% | £8–22 |
| Windscreen damaged but not adversely affecting driver's view Visibility | Minor | 0.90% | £80–200 |
| Fixing missing Road Wheels | Rectified | 0.45% | £20–55 |
| Fixing missing Road Wheels | Major | 0.45% | £20–55 |
| Headlamp aim projected beam image is obviously incorrect Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | Major | 0.45% | £30–80 |
| Individual direction indicators lens defective such that the emitted light is adversely affected Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | Major | 0.45% | £3–12 |
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 | 10.8% | £45–95 |
| Has a tear, caused by separation or partial failure of its structure Tyres | Advisory | 3.1% | £45–95 |
| Tread depth tread pattern not visible over the whole tread area when minimum depth required is 1.0mm Tyres | Advisory | 3.1% | £45–95 |
| Has a cut in excess of the requirements deep enough to reach the ply or cords Tyres | Advisory | 1.4% | £45–95 |
| Brake pads less than 1.5 mm thick Brakes | Advisory | 0.90% | £18–45 |
| Has a bulge, caused by separation or partial failure of its structure Tyres | Advisory | 0.90% | £45–95 |
Pass rate by mileage
| Mileage | Tests | Pass rate | Median odometer |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0-30k | 179 | 94.4% | 11,001 mi |
| 30-60k | 37 | 83.8% | 41,045 mi |
| 60-90k | 5 | 80.0% | 72,737 mi |
Source: 222 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 I8 MOT questions
What is the MOT pass rate for a 2020 BMW I8?
92.3% of the 222 2020 BMW I8 tests in this dataset passed, against a national average of 90.7% for cars first used in 2020. First-attempt pass rate: 91.7%.
What are the most common MOT failures on a 2020 BMW I8?
The three most recorded items are tread depth below requirements of 1.6mm (3.15%), headlamp aim too high (1.80%), has a cut in excess of the requirements deep enough to reach the ply or cords (1.35%). Percentages are the share of tests on this vehicle that recorded the item.
Does mileage affect the 2020 BMW I8 MOT pass rate?
Yes. Cars under 30,000 miles passed 94.4% of the time, falling to 80.0% for those over 120,000 miles. The median 2020 BMW I8 in this dataset had covered 11,399 mi.
Does the season affect the 2020 BMW I8 MOT pass rate?
Tests recorded in the winter months (October–March) passed 95.9% of the time; summer months (April–September) passed 90.6%. Brakes, tyres and lights are tested harder in bad weather, but the difference is small on most models.