Pass rate
93.0%
Above average — 1.8 pts ahead of the 91.2% that cars this age and mileage manage.
Across 115 recorded tests.
Typical repair bill £46–£110
2021 Mercedes-Benz A-Class MOT pass rate
- 2021
- typical 24,270 mi
Most common fault
Tyres
51.5% of faults · 19.8% nationally
mostly tread below the limit, cuts and sidewall bulges.
Which year to buy
- Best 2021 93.0% pass · this year
- Avoid 2000 70.6% pass
Across the 22 years on record, a spread of 22.4 points. See every year →
- First-attempt pass
- 92.6%
- Typical mileage
- 24k mi
The 2021 Mercedes-Benz A-Class MOT pass rate is 93.0% of its MOT tests — 1.8 points ahead of what its age and mileage predict. Tyres is the biggest single reason it fails, at 51.5% of what testers record.
Check your postcode
MOT pass rates are national — type your postcode to see how Mercedes-Benz A-Class does in your corner of the country.
Expert verdict
Tyres: 2.6× the national share
Tyres make up 51.5% of everything recorded on the 2021 Mercedes-Benz A-Class, against 19.8% nationally — 31.7 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 17% 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. 115 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 Mercedes-Benz A-Class? Get an email when these numbers change .
How does the 2021 Mercedes-Benz A-Class compare?
Cars of this age and mileage average 91.2%, so this figure is 1.8 points ahead of what its age and mileage predict. On a first attempt, before any retests, the figure drops to 92.6%. The median 2021 Mercedes-Benz A-Class in this dataset had covered 24,270 mi.
65% of the tests on this vehicle ran on Petrol, which passed 96.0% of the time. Pass rates also shift with the test month: tests recorded October–March passed 95.4% of the time, April–September 90.0%.
The single most recorded failure item is "Windscreen damaged but not adversely affecting driver's view", noted on 2.61% of tests.
- 115 recorded tests behind this page.
- 93.0% overall pass rate, 92.6% on a first attempt.
- Across every year of the Mercedes-Benz A-Class, the average is 82.5% — best year 2021 (93.0%), worst 2000 (70.6%).
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
- 115
- Typical mileage (median)
- 24,270 mi
- Make and model
- Mercedes-Benz A-Class
- Updated
- 2026-11-05
Source: DVSA anonymised MOT test data (2023–2025), OGL v3.0.
Top part to budget for
Windscreen
Typically a garage job — get quotes before committing.
Does mileage affect the A-Class MOT pass rate?
Pass rate by odometer reading. Bar lengths start at 72% so small gaps stay visible.
Fuel type and reliability
Pass rate by fuel type. Petrol is the most common here (65% of tests).
Regional pass rates for the A-Class
| Region | Tests | Pass rate |
|---|---|---|
| South East | 28 | 92.9% |
| Scotland | 15 | 93.3% |
| London | 15 | 93.3% |
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 A-Class
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 A-Class
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 windscreen 2.6% of tests
“windscreen damaged”
Check the driver’s side of the screen within the swept area for chips and cracks; anything larger than 10mm in the driver’s central view is a fail. Most chips can be resin-repaired for far less than a new screen.
-
Check the brakes 0.9% of tests
“brake pads worn down to wear indicator”
Look through the spokes of each wheel at the pad — less than 3mm of friction material, or a lip on the disc edge, is the usual failure. Check the handbrake holds on a slope with a few clicks, not at the top of its travel.
-
Check tyre pressures and valves 0.9% of tests
“tyre pressure monitoring system malfunctioning or obviously inoperative”
Set the pressures to the figures on the door pillar, not the tyre wall, and check the valves do not hiss. A leaking valve is a two-minute fix that fails a test.
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 A-Class through its MOT
Across the 10 items that are recorded most often on this model, the average repair comes to £46–£110 — and 17% of those repairs are parts that cost under £30.
- Average repair across the 10 common items
- £46–£110
- Cheapest common item: washers not working
- £5–£15
- Dearest common item: windscreen damaged
- £80–£200
- Common items a careful owner can do at home
- 80%
- Repairs that still cost under £30
- 17%
Estimates from typical UK parts prices, weighted by how often each item appears in 115 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 A-Class, side by side
22 model years on record, from 2000 to 2021. Across them the pass rate runs from 70.6% to 93.0% — a spread of 22.4 points. The bar under each year is the item that failed it most often.
- 2000 70.6% registration plate lamp(s)…
- 2001 72.6% registration plate lamp(s)…
- 2002 72.1% registration plate lamp(s)…
- 2003 72.2% registration plate lamp(s)…
- 2004 73.1% registration plate lamp(s)…
- 2005 74.2% joints constant velocity boot…
- 2006 73.6% joints constant velocity boot…
- 2007 74.5% joints constant velocity boot…
- 2008 74.2% joints constant velocity boot…
- 2009 75.1% joints constant velocity boot…
- 2010 76.5% side repeaters not working
- 2011 78.4% side repeaters not working
- 2012 78.8% coil spring fractured or broken
- 2013 79.7% coil spring fractured or broken
- 2014 80.5% linkage ball joint dust cover…
- 2015 82.4% coil spring fractured or broken
- 2016 84.1% coil spring fractured or broken
- 2017 85.8% windscreen damaged but not…
- 2018 88.1% windscreen damaged but not…
- 2019 88.9% srs malfunction indicator lamp…
- 2020 87.3% has a cut in excess of the…
- 2021 93.0%windscreen damaged but not…
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 Mercedes-Benz A-Class 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
- Nissan Leaf 93.0%
- Hyundai Tucson Ultimate T-Gdi 93.0%
- Mazda Cx-5 93.0%
- Fiat 500 Dolcevita 93.0%
- Audi Q3 93.1%
- BMW X1 93.1%
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 Mercedes-Benz A-Class 10 failure items · 6 advisories · 6 inspection categories · mileage brackets · all of it in the page, none of it above the fold
Every inspection category
Shares of the 33 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 | 17 | 51.50% | 19.76% | +31.74 |
| Visibility | 6 | 18.20% | 4.97% | +13.23 |
| Suspension | 4 | 12.10% | 20.98% | −8.88 |
| Brakes | 3 | 9.10% | 20.89% | −11.79 |
| Road Wheels | 2 | 6.10% | 0.75% | +5.35 |
| Noise, emissions and leaks | 1 | 3.00% | 5.52% | −2.52 |
The exact failure items, in the tester's words
| Recorded item | Severity | Tests | Est. cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Windscreen damaged but not adversely affecting driver's view Visibility | Minor | 2.6% | £80–200 |
| Brake pads worn down to wear indicator Brakes | Major | 0.87% | £18–45 |
| Electronic braking system warning device indicates a fault Brakes | Major | 0.87% | £45–110 |
| Has a cut in excess of the requirements deep enough to reach the ply or cords Tyres | Major | 0.87% | £45–95 |
| Has ply or cords damaged Tyres | Major | 0.87% | £45–95 |
| Service brake performance excessively fluctuating Brakes | Major | 0.87% | £60–150 |
| Size/type of different sizes are fitted on the same axle. Tyres | Major | 0.87% | £45–95 |
| Tyre pressure monitoring system malfunctioning or obviously inoperative Tyres | Rectified | 0.87% | £45–95 |
| Washers not working Visibility | Major | 0.87% | £5–15 |
| Wipers blade defective Visibility | Minor | 0.87% | £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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Has a tear, caused by separation or partial failure of its structure Tyres | Advisory | 2.6% | £45–95 |
| Tread depth below requirements of 1.6mm Tyres | Advisory | 2.6% | £45–95 |
| Tread depth tread pattern not visible over the whole tread area when minimum depth required is 1.0mm Tyres | Advisory | 2.6% | £45–95 |
| Badly distorted Road Wheels | Advisory | 1.7% | £20–55 |
| Has a bulge, caused by separation or partial failure of its structure Tyres | Advisory | 1.7% | £45–95 |
| Has a cut in excess of the requirements deep enough to reach the ply or cords Tyres | Advisory | 1.7% | £45–95 |
Pass rate by mileage
| Mileage | Tests | Pass rate | Median odometer |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0-30k | 71 | 91.5% | 16,622 mi |
| 30-60k | 38 | 97.4% | 38,221 mi |
| 60-90k | 5 | 80.0% | 71,419 mi |
| 90-120k | 1 | 100.0% | 119,547 mi |
Source: 115 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 A-Class MOT questions
What is the MOT pass rate for a 2021 Mercedes-Benz A-Class?
93.0% of the 115 2021 Mercedes-Benz A-Class tests in this dataset passed, against a national average of 91.2% for cars first used in 2021. First-attempt pass rate: 92.6%.
What are the most common MOT failures on a 2021 Mercedes-Benz A-Class?
The three most recorded items are windscreen damaged but not adversely affecting driver's view (2.61%), brake pads worn down to wear indicator (0.87%), electronic braking system warning device indicates a fault (0.87%). Percentages are the share of tests on this vehicle that recorded the item.
Does mileage affect the 2021 Mercedes-Benz A-Class MOT pass rate?
Yes. Cars under 30,000 miles passed 91.5% of the time, falling to 100.0% for those over 120,000 miles. The median 2021 Mercedes-Benz A-Class in this dataset had covered 24,270 mi.
Which fuel type is most reliable for a 2021 Mercedes-Benz A-Class?
Petrol: 96.0% pass rate across 75 tests. Hybrid: 89.3% pass rate across 28 tests. Diesel: 83.3% pass rate across 12 tests. Shares are of the tests on this vehicle that recorded each fuel type.
Does the season affect the 2021 Mercedes-Benz A-Class MOT pass rate?
Tests recorded in the winter months (October–March) passed 95.4% of the time; summer months (April–September) passed 90.0%. Brakes, tyres and lights are tested harder in bad weather, but the difference is small on most models.