Pass rate
Below average — 0.3 pts behind the 73.0% that cars this age and mileage manage.
Across 200,254 recorded tests.
Typical repair bill £24–£62
Pass rate
Below average — 0.3 pts behind the 73.0% that cars this age and mileage manage.
Across 200,254 recorded tests.
Typical repair bill £24–£62
Most common fault
Suspension
20.9% of faults · 21.0% nationally
mostly worn arm bushes, split ball-joint boots and broken coil springs.
Which year to buy
Across the 24 years on record, a spread of 26.3 points. See every year →
The 2007 Ford Fiesta MOT pass rate is 72.7% of its MOT tests — about what its age and mileage predict. Suspension is the biggest single reason it fails, at 20.9% of what testers record.
MOT pass rates are national — type your postcode to see how Ford Fiesta does in your corner of the country.
Expert verdict
Tyres are 12.1% of this car’s recorded faults, against 19.8% nationally — the mirror image of the usual story on a car of this age.
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 Ford Fiesta? Get an email when these numbers change .
Every Ford Fiesta first registered in 2007 is combined here — 2 trim and body variants in total — so the sample is as large as the DVSA data allows.
Cars of this age and mileage average 73.0%, so this figure is 0.3 points behind what its age and mileage predict. On a first attempt, before any retests, the figure drops to 64.3%. The median 2007 Ford Fiesta in this dataset had covered 92,905 mi.
The most common fuel recorded here is Petrol — 89% of tests, with a 72.9% pass rate. Pass rates also shift with the test month: tests recorded October–March passed 72.7% of the time, April–September 72.7%.
The single most recorded failure item is "Headlamp lens slightly defective", noted on 6.89% of tests.
Figures count every completed test on this vehicle-year in the dataset, including retests. See methodology for the exact definition.
Source: DVSA anonymised MOT test data (2023–2025), OGL v3.0.
Headlight Bulb
Usually a DIY or independent-garage job.
Pass rate by odometer reading. Bar lengths start at 60% so small gaps stay visible.
Pass rate by fuel type. Petrol is the most common here (89% of tests).
| Region | Tests | Pass rate |
|---|---|---|
| South East | 39,122 | 75.5% |
| South West | 27,577 | 68.6% |
| East of England | 27,489 | 74.9% |
| North West | 22,167 | 72.5% |
| West Midlands | 19,568 | 74.6% |
| Yorkshire | 16,456 | 70.9% |
| East Midlands | 15,381 | 72.5% |
| Wales | 12,182 | 68.7% |
| Scotland | 7,778 | 65.2% |
| London | 6,734 | 82.3% |
| North East | 5,789 | 69.7% |
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.
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
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 lights 6.9% of tests
“headlamp lens slightly defective”
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 suspension joints 5.2% of tests
“ball joint dust cover severely deteriorated”
With the car parked on level ground, rock the top of each front wheel in and out while someone watches the suspension arm. Clunks, or rubber boots split and greasy, are what testers record here.
Check the brake pipes 4.2% of tests
“rigid brake pipes excessively corroded”
Brake pipes run under the car, usually in front of the rear wheels. Flaking or crusty metal is what fails; a light dusting of surface rust does not. Worth asking a garage to look while it is on a ramp.
Shares are the proportion of tests on this vehicle that recorded the item, so they overlap: one test can record several.
Across the 10 items that are recorded most often on this model, the average repair comes to £24–£62 — and 53% of those repairs are parts that cost under £30.
Estimates from typical UK parts prices, weighted by how often each item appears in 200,254 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 →
24 model years on record, from 2000 to 2023. Across them the pass rate runs from 68.3% to 94.6% — a spread of 26.3 points. The bar under each year is the item that failed it most often.
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.
The raw pass rate mostly measures age. The year comparison adds the like-for-like figure, the mileage bands and the repair bill.
Closest pass rates among 2007 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.
Shares of the 607,222 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Suspension | 131,242 | 20.90% | 20.98% | −0.08 |
| Brakes | 125,561 | 20.00% | 20.89% | −0.89 |
| Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | 103,894 | 16.60% | 12.21% | +4.39 |
| Tyres | 76,259 | 12.10% | 19.76% | −7.66 |
| Noise, emissions and leaks | 38,798 | 6.20% | 5.52% | +0.68 |
| Body, chassis, structure | 37,967 | 6.00% | 5.57% | +0.43 |
| Visibility | 26,559 | 4.20% | 4.97% | −0.77 |
| Non-component advisories | 24,612 | 3.90% | 4.18% | −0.28 |
| Steering | 21,677 | 3.50% | 2.57% | +0.93 |
| Road Wheels | 20,653 | 3.30% | 0.75% | +2.55 |
| Recorded item | Severity | Tests | Est. cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Headlamp lens slightly defective Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | Minor | 6.9% | £5–25 |
| Ball joint dust cover severely deteriorated Suspension | Minor | 5.2% | £18–45 |
| Rigid brake pipes excessively corroded Brakes | Major | 4.2% | £80–180 |
| Stop lamp not working Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | Major | 4.0% | £3–12 |
| Registration plate lamp(s) inoperative in the case of multiple lamps or light sources Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | Minor | 3.8% | £5–20 |
| Position lamp not working Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | Major | 3.3% | £5–25 |
| Windscreen damaged but not adversely affecting driver's view Visibility | Minor | 3.0% | £80–200 |
| Headlamp aim projected beam image is obviously incorrect Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | Major | 2.9% | £30–80 |
| Ball joint dust cover no longer prevents the ingress of dirt Suspension | Major | 2.7% | £18–45 |
| Wipers does not clear the windscreen effectively Visibility | Major | 2.5% | £8–22 |
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.
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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Rigid brake pipes excessively corroded Brakes | Advisory | 26.6% | £80–180 |
| Tread depth below requirements of 1.6mm Tyres | Advisory | 16.1% | £45–95 |
| Has a tear, caused by separation or partial failure of its structure Tyres | Advisory | 12.7% | £45–95 |
| Coil spring corroded so that its cross sectional area is reduced and seriously weakened Suspension | Advisory | 12.3% | £25–65 |
| Badly distorted Road Wheels | Advisory | 9.8% | £20–55 |
| Brake discs in such a condition that it is seriously weakened Brakes | Advisory | 9.2% | £45–110 |
| Mileage | Tests | Pass rate | Median odometer |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0-30k | 3,699 | 87.8% | 22,837 mi |
| 30-60k | 28,012 | 80.2% | 48,068 mi |
| 60-90k | 61,114 | 74.1% | 76,104 mi |
| 90-120k | 63,932 | 70.2% | 104,062 mi |
| 120k+ | 42,775 | 68.2% | 141,897 mi |
Source: 200,254 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.
72.7% of the 200,254 2007 Ford Fiesta tests in this dataset passed, against a national average of 73.0% for cars first used in 2007. First-attempt pass rate: 64.3%.
The three most recorded items are headlamp lens slightly defective (6.89%), ball joint dust cover severely deteriorated (5.17%), rigid brake pipes excessively corroded (4.19%). Percentages are the share of tests on this vehicle that recorded the item.
Yes. Cars under 30,000 miles passed 87.8% of the time, falling to 68.2% for those over 120,000 miles. The median 2007 Ford Fiesta in this dataset had covered 92,905 mi.
Petrol: 72.9% pass rate across 178,547 tests. Diesel: 71.3% pass rate across 21,704 tests. Shares are of the tests on this vehicle that recorded each fuel type.
Tests recorded in the winter months (October–March) passed 72.7% of the time; summer months (April–September) passed 72.7%. Brakes, tyres and lights are tested harder in bad weather, but the difference is small on most models.