Pass rate
Below average — 0.3 pts behind the 72.5% that cars this age and mileage manage.
Across 55,712 recorded tests.
Typical repair bill £14–£39
Pass rate
Below average — 0.3 pts behind the 72.5% that cars this age and mileage manage.
Across 55,712 recorded tests.
Typical repair bill £14–£39
Most common fault
Suspension
28.4% of faults · 21.0% nationally
mostly worn arm bushes, split ball-joint boots and broken coil springs.
Part only £40–£65 for Shock absorber leaking. What fitting it takes →
3.9 pts down across model years — 5.6% in 2000, 1.7% in 2021.
Which year to buy
Across the 24 years on record, a spread of 23.9 points. See every year →
The 2006 Honda Civic MOT pass rate is 72.2% of its MOT tests — about what its age and mileage predict. Suspension is the biggest single reason it fails, at 28.4% of what testers record.
MOT pass rates are national — type your postcode to see how Honda Civic does in your corner of the country.
Expert verdict
Suspension accounts for 28.4% of everything recorded on the 2006 Honda Civic, against 21.0% nationally — 7.4 points above. Ask for the front and rear suspension to be checked on a ramp before you buy — worn bushes and broken springs are cheap to look at and expensive to discover at test time.
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 Honda Civic? Get an email when these numbers change .
Cars of this age and mileage average 72.5%, 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 63.7%. The median 2006 Honda Civic in this dataset had covered 122,510 mi.
The most common fuel recorded here is Petrol — 78% of tests, with a 72.7% pass rate. Pass rates also shift with the test month: tests recorded October–March passed 72.2% of the time, April–September 72.1%.
The single most recorded failure item is "Registration plate lamp(s) inoperative in the case of multiple lamps or light sources", noted on 8.67% 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.
Number Plate Lamp
Usually a DIY or independent-garage job.
Pass rate by odometer reading. Bar lengths start at 62% so small gaps stay visible.
Pass rate by fuel type. Petrol is the most common here (78% of tests).
| Region | Tests | Pass rate |
|---|---|---|
| South East | 12,297 | 74.8% |
| South West | 7,839 | 67.3% |
| West Midlands | 6,246 | 75.7% |
| North West | 5,962 | 71.6% |
| East of England | 5,653 | 74.1% |
| Yorkshire | 4,250 | 70.4% |
| East Midlands | 4,064 | 72.1% |
| London | 3,335 | 80.8% |
| Scotland | 2,625 | 61.8% |
| Wales | 2,040 | 66.4% |
| North East | 1,398 | 67.2% |
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.
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 8.7% of tests
“registration plate lamp(s) inoperative in the case of multiple lamps or light sources”
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 6.4% 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 shock absorbers 2.8% 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.
Across the 10 items that are recorded most often on this model, the average repair comes to £14–£39 — and 48% of those repairs are parts that cost under £30.
Estimates from typical UK parts prices, weighted by how often each item appears in 55,712 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 71.7% to 95.6% — a spread of 23.9 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 2006 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 175,666 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 | 50,413 | 28.40% | 20.98% | +7.42 |
| Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | 34,732 | 19.60% | 12.21% | +7.39 |
| Brakes | 29,181 | 16.50% | 20.89% | −4.39 |
| Tyres | 22,463 | 12.70% | 19.76% | −7.06 |
| Body, chassis, structure | 9,363 | 5.30% | 5.57% | −0.27 |
| Non-component advisories | 6,995 | 3.90% | 4.18% | −0.28 |
| Visibility | 6,020 | 3.40% | 4.97% | −1.57 |
| Steering | 5,909 | 3.30% | 2.57% | +0.73 |
| Identification of the vehicle | 5,363 | 3.00% | 1.76% | +1.24 |
| Noise, emissions and leaks | 5,227 | 2.90% | 5.52% | −2.62 |
| Recorded item | Severity | Tests | Est. cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Registration plate lamp(s) inoperative in the case of multiple lamps or light sources Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | Minor | 8.7% | £5–20 |
| Headlamp lens slightly defective Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | Minor | 6.7% | £5–25 |
| Ball joint dust cover severely deteriorated Suspension | Minor | 6.4% | £18–45 |
| Track rod end ball joint dust cover damaged or deteriorated, but preventing the ingress of dirt Steering | Minor | 5.2% | £18–45 |
| Headlamp aim projected beam image is obviously incorrect Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | Major | 5.0% | £30–80 |
| Position lamp not working Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | Major | 4.6% | £5–25 |
| Shock absorbers has a serious fluid leak Suspension | Major | 2.8% | £30–75 |
| Linkage ball joints ball joint excessively worn Suspension | Major | 2.5% | £18–45 |
| Linkage ball joint dust cover ball joint dust cover no longer prevents the ingress of dirt Suspension | Major | 2.4% | £18–45 |
| Stop lamp not working Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | Major | 2.4% | £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.
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 | 18.7% | £45–95 |
| Coil spring corroded so that its cross sectional area is reduced and seriously weakened Suspension | Advisory | 16.0% | £25–65 |
| Brake discs in such a condition that it is seriously weakened Brakes | Advisory | 13.6% | £45–110 |
| Has a tear, caused by separation or partial failure of its structure Tyres | Advisory | 11.7% | £45–95 |
| Pins and bushes pin or bush excessively worn Suspension | Advisory | 10.1% | £40–150 |
| Brake pads less than 1.5 mm thick Brakes | Advisory | 9.7% | £18–45 |
| Mileage | Tests | Pass rate | Median odometer |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0-30k | 223 | 87.0% | 22,833 mi |
| 30-60k | 2,070 | 80.9% | 49,228 mi |
| 60-90k | 7,994 | 76.0% | 77,410 mi |
| 90-120k | 15,999 | 72.5% | 105,934 mi |
| 120k+ | 29,217 | 70.3% | 152,587 mi |
Source: 55,712 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.
72.2% of the 55,712 2006 Honda Civic tests in this dataset passed, against a national average of 72.5% for cars first used in 2006. First-attempt pass rate: 63.7%.
The three most recorded items are registration plate lamp(s) inoperative in the case of multiple lamps or light sources (8.67%), headlamp lens slightly defective (6.67%), ball joint dust cover severely deteriorated (6.42%). Percentages are the share of tests on this vehicle that recorded the item.
Yes. Cars under 30,000 miles passed 87.0% of the time, falling to 70.3% for those over 120,000 miles. The median 2006 Honda Civic in this dataset had covered 122,510 mi.
Petrol: 72.7% pass rate across 43,284 tests. Diesel: 69.8% pass rate across 11,857 tests. Hybrid: 77.5% pass rate across 298 tests. Electric: 80.1% pass rate across 141 tests. Other: 83.5% pass rate across 121 tests. LPG: 72.7% pass rate across 11 tests. Shares are of the tests on this vehicle that recorded each fuel type.
Tests recorded in the winter months (October–March) passed 72.2% of the time; summer months (April–September) passed 72.1%. Brakes, tyres and lights are tested harder in bad weather, but the difference is small on most models.