Pass rate
77.2%
Around average — 14.0 pts behind the 91.2% that cars this age and mileage manage.
Across 167 recorded tests.
Typical repair bill £14–£46
2021 Mazda Bongo MOT pass rate
- 2021
- typical 88,949 mi
Check your postcode
Most common fault
Lamps & electrics
23.0% of faults · 12.2% nationally
Part only £6–£18 for Registration plate lamp inoperative (multiple lamps). What fitting it takes →
Which year to buy
- Best 2021 77.2% pass · this year
- Avoid 2011 64.8% pass
Across the 22 years on record, a spread of 12.4 points. See every year →
- First-attempt pass
- 72.2%
- Typical mileage
- 89k mi
The 2021 Mazda Bongo MOT pass rate is 77.2% of its MOT tests — 14.0 points behind what its age and mileage predict. Lamps & electrics is the biggest single reason it fails, at 23.0% of what testers record.
Expert verdict
Lamps & electrics: 1.9× the national share
Lamps & electrics make up 23.0% of everything recorded on the 2021 Mazda Bongo, against 12.2% nationally — 10.8 points above. Walk round the car with the lights on before the test: bulbs, indicators and number-plate lamps are the cheapest failures to prevent and among the most common.
- Falls short of its own age and mileage. Like-for-like, cars this age and mileage expect about 91.2%; this one manages 77.2% — 14.0 points below. Age is a fair excuse; this is not age.
- Failures here tend to be cheap ones. 71% of the repairs this model fails on cost under £30 in parts. The pass rate matters less than what a bad afternoon at the test centre actually costs you.
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 Mazda Bongo? Get an email when these numbers change .
How does the 2021 Mazda Bongo compare?
Cars of this age and mileage average 91.2%, so this figure is 14.0 points behind what its age and mileage predict. On a first attempt, before any retests, the figure drops to 72.2%. The median 2021 Mazda Bongo in this dataset had covered 88,949 mi.
86% of the tests on this vehicle ran on Petrol, which passed 78.3% of the time. Pass rates also shift with the test month: tests recorded October–March passed 81.6% of the time, April–September 73.6%.
The single most recorded failure item is "Registration plate lamp(s) inoperative in the case of multiple lamps or light sources", noted on 6.59% of tests.
- 167 recorded tests behind this page.
- 77.2% overall pass rate, 72.2% on a first attempt.
- Across every year of the Mazda Bongo, the average is 69.0% — best year 2021 (77.2%), worst 2011 (64.8%).
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
- 167
- Typical mileage (median)
- 88,949 mi
- Make and model
- Mazda Bongo
- Updated
- 2026-11-07
Source: DVSA anonymised MOT test data (2023–2025), OGL v3.0.
Top part to budget for
Number Plate Lamp
Usually a DIY or independent-garage job.
Does mileage affect the Bongo MOT pass rate?
Pass rate by odometer reading. Bar lengths start at 57% so small gaps stay visible.
Fuel type and reliability
Pass rate by fuel type. Petrol is the most common here (86% of tests).
Where the Mazda Bongo is most common
Across all Bongo model years on record (2000–2021): 11,922 Mazda Bongo cars tested in a recordable postcode area, across 30,855 tests. Bristol (BS) has the most, with 565 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 | Bristol (BS) | 565 | 60.9% |
| 2 | Exeter (EX) | 414 | 64.7% |
| 3 | Brighton (BN) | 390 | 61.4% |
| 4 | Portsmouth (PO) | 371 | 65.7% |
| 5 | Plymouth (PL) | 371 | 63.5% |
| 6 | Poole (BH) | 309 | 64.6% |
| 7 | Southampton (SO) | 298 | 72.0% |
| 8 | Cardiff (CF) | 231 | 64.3% |
| 9 | Leicester (LE) | 219 | 71.6% |
| 10 | Stoke On Trent (ST) | 214 | 63.1% |
| 11 | Crawley (RH) | 213 | 74.1% |
| 12 | Birmingham (B) | 212 | 76.7% |
| 13 | Reading (RG) | 206 | 78.3% |
| 14 | Swansea (SA) | 205 | 73.1% |
| 15 | Gloucester (GL) | 201 | 67.1% |
| 16 | Halifax (HX) | 200 | 90.4% |
| 17 | Newport (NP) | 198 | 69.0% |
| 18 | Newton Abbot (TQ) | 190 | 68.8% |
| 19 | Norwich (NR) | 185 | 67.5% |
| 20 | Chester (CH) | 184 | 78.5% |
The twenty areas with the most Mazda Bongo 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 →
Regional pass rates for the Bongo
| Region | Tests | Pass rate |
|---|---|---|
| South West | 59 | 78.0% |
| Wales | 33 | 81.8% |
| South East | 26 | 73.1% |
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 Bongo
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 Bongo
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 6.6% 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 3.6% 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 wipers and washers 3.0% of tests
“wipers does not clear the windscreen effectively”
Run the wipers with the screen wet: they should clear it in one sweep without smearing or juddering. Top the washer bottle up and check both jets hit the screen.
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 Bongo through its MOT
Across the 10 items that are recorded most often on this model, the average repair comes to £14–£46 — and 71% of those repairs are parts that cost under £30.
- Average repair across the 10 common items
- £14–£46
- Cheapest common item: rear fog lamp does not emit a steady red light
- £3–£15
- Dearest common item: catalyst emissions carbon monoxide content…
- £60–£250
- Common items a careful owner can do at home
- 80%
- Repairs that still cost under £30
- 71%
Estimates from typical UK parts prices, weighted by how often each item appears in 167 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 Bongo, side by side
22 model years on record, from 2000 to 2021. Across them the pass rate runs from 64.8% to 77.2% — a spread of 12.4 points. The bar under each year is the item that failed it most often.
- 2000 72.9% ball joint dust cover severely…
- 2001 72.1% registration plate lamp(s)…
- 2002 74.3% headlamp lens slightly defective
- 2003 71.3% component mounting prescribed…
- 2004 70.0% component mounting prescribed…
- 2005 68.2% component mounting prescribed…
- 2006 66.3% component mounting prescribed…
- 2007 65.2% component mounting prescribed…
- 2008 64.9% component mounting prescribed…
- 2009 65.8% component mounting prescribed…
- 2010 65.5% component mounting prescribed…
- 2011 64.8% component mounting prescribed…
- 2012 68.4% component mounting prescribed…
- 2013 69.6% component mounting prescribed…
- 2014 68.8% headlamp lens slightly defective
- 2015 71.1% headlamp lens slightly defective
- 2016 70.9% registration plate lamp(s)…
- 2017 73.9% headlamp lens slightly defective
- 2018 76.1% registration plate lamp(s)…
- 2019 75.5% rear fog lamp not working
- 2020 75.9% headlamp lens slightly defective
- 2021 77.2%registration plate lamp(s)…
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 Mazda Bongo 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
- Mercedes-Benz Citan 82.9%
- Vauxhall Combo 84.0%
- Ford Galaxy 84.1%
- Citroen C4 Sense + 84.8%
- Mercedes-Benz Vito 85.2%
- Tesla Model 3 Performance 85.3%
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 Mazda Bongo 10 failure items · 6 advisories · 10 inspection categories · mileage brackets · all of it in the page, none of it above the fold
Every inspection category
Shares of the 301 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | 70 | 23.00% | 12.21% | +10.79 |
| Brakes | 55 | 18.10% | 20.89% | −2.79 |
| Suspension | 51 | 16.80% | 20.98% | −4.18 |
| Noise, emissions and leaks | 30 | 9.90% | 5.52% | +4.38 |
| Tyres | 24 | 7.90% | 19.76% | −11.86 |
| Non-component advisories | 23 | 7.60% | 4.18% | +3.42 |
| Visibility | 16 | 5.30% | 4.97% | +0.33 |
| Body, chassis, structure | 14 | 4.60% | 5.57% | −0.97 |
| Steering | 11 | 3.60% | 2.57% | +1.03 |
| Identification of the vehicle | 7 | 2.30% | 1.76% | +0.54 |
The exact failure items, in the tester's words
| 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 | 6.6% | £5–20 |
| Headlamp lens slightly defective Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | Minor | 6.0% | £5–25 |
| Rear fog lamp does not emit a steady red light Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | Major | 4.2% | £3–15 |
| Ball joint dust cover severely deteriorated Suspension | Minor | 3.6% | £18–45 |
| Wipers does not clear the windscreen effectively Visibility | Major | 3.0% | £8–22 |
| Rear fog lamp not working Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | Major | 2.4% | £3–15 |
| Service brake performance efficiency below requirements Brakes | Major | 2.4% | £60–150 |
| Ball joint dust cover no longer prevents the ingress of dirt Suspension | Major | 1.8% | £18–45 |
| Catalyst emissions carbon monoxide content after 2nd fast idle exceeds default limits Noise, emissions and leaks | Major | 1.8% | £60–250 |
| Driver's view to the front outside the swept area of the windscreen wipers restricted by an obstruction Visibility | Minor | 1.8% | £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.
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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Brake discs in such a condition that it is seriously weakened Brakes | Advisory | 12.0% | £45–110 |
| Engine oil leaks leaking excessively from engine Noise, emissions and leaks | Advisory | 10.8% | £200–700 |
| Has a tear, caused by separation or partial failure of its structure Tyres | Advisory | 9.0% | £45–95 |
| Pins and bushes pin or bush excessively worn Suspension | Advisory | 7.8% | £40–150 |
| Brake pads less than 1.5 mm thick Brakes | Advisory | 7.2% | £18–45 |
| Linkage ball joints ball joint excessively worn Suspension | Advisory | 4.8% | £18–45 |
Pass rate by mileage
| Mileage | Tests | Pass rate | Median odometer |
|---|---|---|---|
| 30-60k | 20 | 85.0% | 53,987 mi |
| 60-90k | 65 | 76.9% | 76,770 mi |
| 90-120k | 41 | 85.4% | 102,025 mi |
| 120k+ | 41 | 65.9% | 156,050 mi |
Source: 167 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 Bongo MOT questions
What is the MOT pass rate for a 2021 Mazda Bongo?
77.2% of the 167 2021 Mazda Bongo tests in this dataset passed, against a national average of 91.2% for cars first used in 2021. First-attempt pass rate: 72.2%.
What are the most common MOT failures on a 2021 Mazda Bongo?
The three most recorded items are registration plate lamp(s) inoperative in the case of multiple lamps or light sources (6.59%), headlamp lens slightly defective (5.99%), rear fog lamp does not emit a steady red light (4.19%). Percentages are the share of tests on this vehicle that recorded the item.
Does mileage affect the 2021 Mazda Bongo MOT pass rate?
Yes. Cars under 30,000 miles passed 85.0% of the time, falling to 65.9% for those over 120,000 miles. The median 2021 Mazda Bongo in this dataset had covered 88,949 mi.
Which fuel type is most reliable for a 2021 Mazda Bongo?
Petrol: 78.3% pass rate across 143 tests. Diesel: 70.8% pass rate across 24 tests. Shares are of the tests on this vehicle that recorded each fuel type.
Does the season affect the 2021 Mazda Bongo MOT pass rate?
Tests recorded in the winter months (October–March) passed 81.6% of the time; summer months (April–September) passed 73.6%. Brakes, tyres and lights are tested harder in bad weather, but the difference is small on most models.