Pass rate
Around average — 9.9 pts ahead of the 72.2% that cars this age and mileage manage.
Across 1,867 recorded tests.
Typical repair bill £45–£121
Pass rate
Around average — 9.9 pts ahead of the 72.2% that cars this age and mileage manage.
Across 1,867 recorded tests.
Typical repair bill £45–£121
Most common fault
Suspension
34.7% of faults · 21.0% nationally
mostly worn arm bushes, split ball-joint boots and broken coil springs.
Part only £35–£75 for Suspension pin or bush excessively worn. What fitting it takes →
Which year to buy
Across the 9 years on record, a spread of 5.1 points. See every year →
The 2004 Jaguar XK8 MOT pass rate is 82.1% of its MOT tests — 9.9 points ahead of what its age and mileage predict. Suspension is the biggest single reason it fails, at 34.7% of what testers record.
Expert verdict
Suspension accounts for 34.7% of everything recorded on the 2004 Jaguar Xk8, against 21.0% nationally — 13.7 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 Jaguar XK8? Get an email when these numbers change .
Cars of this age and mileage average 72.2%, so this figure is 9.9 points ahead of what its age and mileage predict. On a first attempt, before any retests, the figure drops to 79.4%. The median 2004 Jaguar XK8 in this dataset had covered 80,180 mi.
Pass rates also shift with the test month: tests recorded October–March passed 81.3% of the time, April–September 82.6%.
The single most recorded failure item is "Malfunction indicator lamp inoperative or indicates a malfunction", noted on 2.46% 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.
Indicator Bulb
Usually a DIY or independent-garage job.
Pass rate by odometer reading. Bar lengths start at 69% so small gaps stay visible.
Across all XK8 model years on record (2000–2008): 5,347 Jaguar XK8 cars tested in a recordable postcode area, across 12,646 tests. Birmingham (B) has the most, with 146 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) | 146 | 80.8% |
| 2 | Coventry (CV) | 139 | 82.6% |
| 3 | Crawley (RH) | 129 | 81.2% |
| 4 | Ashford (TN) | 124 | 77.2% |
| 5 | Peterborough (PE) | 110 | 80.0% |
| 6 | Reading (RG) | 109 | 81.8% |
| 7 | Chelmsford (CM) | 105 | 86.5% |
| 8 | Bristol (BS) | 104 | 73.6% |
| 9 | High Wycombe (HP) | 104 | 85.5% |
| 10 | Poole (BH) | 94 | 73.7% |
| 11 | Norwich (NR) | 92 | 83.6% |
| 12 | Guildford (GU) | 91 | 82.7% |
| 13 | Sheffield (S) | 91 | 85.7% |
| 14 | Leicester (LE) | 89 | 82.4% |
| 15 | Portsmouth (PO) | 82 | 73.7% |
| 16 | Ipswich (IP) | 79 | 77.8% |
| 17 | Nottingham (NG) | 76 | 79.2% |
| 18 | Southampton (SO) | 75 | 76.9% |
| 19 | Swindon (SN) | 75 | 80.6% |
| 20 | Oxford (OX) | 75 | 86.9% |
The twenty areas with the most Jaguar XK8 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 →
| Region | Tests | Pass rate |
|---|---|---|
| South East | 454 | 82.8% |
| East of England | 286 | 84.6% |
| South West | 233 | 79.8% |
| North West | 196 | 79.6% |
| West Midlands | 170 | 84.7% |
| Yorkshire | 147 | 83.7% |
| East Midlands | 125 | 79.2% |
| Scotland | 98 | 79.6% |
| London | 62 | 80.6% |
| Wales | 57 | 75.4% |
| North East | 38 | 89.5% |
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 2.5% of tests
“malfunction indicator lamp inoperative or indicates a malfunction”
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 2.4% of tests
“pins and bushes pin or bush excessively worn”
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 corrosion 2.1% of tests
“component mounting prescribed areas prescribed area excessively corroded significantly reducing structural strength”
Look under the sills, around the jacking points and where the suspension mounts meet the body. Flaking, holed or crumbly metal fails; a brown stain on sound metal does not.
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 £45–£121 — and 34% of those repairs are parts that cost under £30.
Estimates from typical UK parts prices, weighted by how often each item appears in 1,867 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 →
9 model years on record, from 2000 to 2008. Across them the pass rate runs from 77.0% to 82.1% — a spread of 5.1 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 2004 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 3,146 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 | 1,110 | 34.70% | 20.98% | +13.72 |
| Brakes | 529 | 16.50% | 20.89% | −4.39 |
| Tyres | 426 | 13.30% | 19.76% | −6.46 |
| Body, chassis, structure | 248 | 7.80% | 5.57% | +2.23 |
| Noise, emissions and leaks | 219 | 6.80% | 5.52% | +1.28 |
| Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | 218 | 6.80% | 12.21% | −5.41 |
| Non-component advisories | 131 | 4.10% | 4.18% | −0.08 |
| Visibility | 105 | 3.30% | 4.97% | −1.67 |
| Steering | 105 | 3.30% | 2.57% | +0.73 |
| Seat belts and supplementary restraint systems | 55 | 1.70% | 0.82% | +0.88 |
| Recorded item | Severity | Tests | Est. cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Malfunction indicator lamp inoperative or indicates a malfunction Noise, emissions and leaks | Major | 2.5% | £3–12 |
| Pins and bushes pin or bush excessively worn Suspension | Major | 2.4% | £40–150 |
| Component mounting prescribed areas prescribed area excessively corroded significantly reducing structural strength Suspension | Major | 2.1% | £180–450 |
| Anti-lock braking system warning lamp indicates an ABS fault Brakes | Major | 2.0% | £3–15 |
| Ball joint dust cover severely deteriorated Suspension | Minor | 1.8% | £18–45 |
| Windscreen damaged but not adversely affecting driver's view Visibility | Minor | 1.4% | £80–200 |
| Coil spring fractured or broken Suspension | Major | 1.2% | £25–65 |
| Wipers does not clear the windscreen effectively Visibility | Major | 1.1% | £8–22 |
| Rbt (sp) efficiency below requirements Brakes | Major | 1.1% | £45–110 |
| Shock absorbers has an excessively worn bush Suspension | Major | 1.1% | £30–75 |
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 | 10.2% | £45–95 |
| Pins and bushes pin or bush excessively worn Suspension | Advisory | 9.0% | £40–150 |
| Component mounting prescribed areas prescribed area excessively corroded significantly reducing structural strength Suspension | Advisory | 6.2% | £180–450 |
| Has a tear, caused by separation or partial failure of its structure Tyres | Advisory | 6.1% | £45–95 |
| Wheel bearings has excessive play Suspension | Advisory | 5.8% | £20–55 |
| Rigid brake pipes excessively corroded Brakes | Advisory | 5.7% | £80–180 |
| Mileage | Tests | Pass rate | Median odometer |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0-30k | 68 | 91.2% | 18,655 mi |
| 30-60k | 358 | 88.0% | 47,791 mi |
| 60-90k | 780 | 82.3% | 75,469 mi |
| 90-120k | 439 | 78.1% | 102,609 mi |
| 120k+ | 219 | 77.2% | 138,681 mi |
Source: 1,867 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.
82.1% of the 1,867 2004 Jaguar XK8 tests in this dataset passed, against a national average of 72.2% for cars first used in 2004. First-attempt pass rate: 79.4%.
The three most recorded items are malfunction indicator lamp inoperative or indicates a malfunction (2.46%), pins and bushes pin or bush excessively worn (2.36%), component mounting prescribed areas prescribed area excessively corroded significantly reducing structural strength (2.09%). Percentages are the share of tests on this vehicle that recorded the item.
Yes. Cars under 30,000 miles passed 91.2% of the time, falling to 77.2% for those over 120,000 miles. The median 2004 Jaguar XK8 in this dataset had covered 80,180 mi.
Tests recorded in the winter months (October–March) passed 81.3% of the time; summer months (April–September) passed 82.6%. Brakes, tyres and lights are tested harder in bad weather, but the difference is small on most models.