Pass rate
91.2%
Above average — 0.5 pts ahead of the 90.7% that cars this age and mileage manage.
Across 889 recorded tests.
Typical repair bill £24–£57
2020 Smart Eq Forfour Prime MOT pass rate
- 2020
- typical 12,545 mi
Most common fault
Tyres
42.3% of faults · 19.8% nationally
mostly tread below the limit, cuts and sidewall bulges.
Which year to buy
- Best 2020 91.2% pass · this year
- Avoid 2021 87.5% pass
Across the 2 years on record, a spread of 3.7 points. See every year →
- First-attempt pass
- 90.5%
- Typical mileage
- 13k mi
The 2020 Smart Eq Forfour Prime MOT pass rate is 91.2% of its MOT tests — about what its age and mileage predict. Tyres is the biggest single reason it fails, at 42.3% of what testers record.
Check your postcode
MOT pass rates are national — type your postcode to see how Smart Eq Forfour Prime does in your corner of the country.
Expert verdict
Tyres: 2.1× the national share
Tyres make up 42.3% of everything recorded on the 2020 Smart Eq Forfour Prime, against 19.8% nationally — 22.5 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.
- Failures here tend to be cheap ones. 56% 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 Smart Eq Forfour Prime? Get an email when these numbers change .
How does the 2020 Smart Eq Forfour Prime compare?
Cars of this age and mileage average 90.7%, so this figure is 0.5 points ahead of what its age and mileage predict. On a first attempt, before any retests, the figure drops to 90.5%. The median 2020 Smart Eq Forfour Prime in this dataset had covered 12,545 mi.
Pass rates also shift with the test month: tests recorded October–March passed 89.8% of the time, April–September 92.3%.
The single most recorded failure item is "Wipers does not clear the windscreen effectively", noted on 3.04% of tests.
- 889 recorded tests behind this page.
- 91.2% overall pass rate, 90.5% on a first attempt.
- Across every year of the Smart Eq Forfour Prime, the average is 90.8% — best year 2020 (91.2%), worst 2021 (87.5%).
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
- 889
- Typical mileage (median)
- 12,545 mi
- Make and model
- Smart Eq Forfour Prime
- Updated
- 2026-11-05
Source: DVSA anonymised MOT test data (2023–2025), OGL v3.0.
Top part to budget for
Wiper Blade
Usually a DIY or independent-garage job.
Does mileage affect the Eq Forfour Prime MOT pass rate?
Pass rate by odometer reading. Bar lengths start at 71% so small gaps stay visible.
Regional pass rates for the Eq Forfour Prime
| Region | Tests | Pass rate |
|---|---|---|
| South East | 281 | 91.1% |
| London | 170 | 91.8% |
| North West | 85 | 91.8% |
| East of England | 81 | 87.7% |
| South West | 79 | 91.1% |
| East Midlands | 52 | 92.3% |
| Yorkshire | 47 | 93.6% |
| Scotland | 31 | 90.3% |
| West Midlands | 29 | 100.0% |
| Wales | 21 | 85.7% |
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.
What fails a 2020 Eq Forfour Prime
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 2020 Eq Forfour Prime
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 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.
-
Check the lights 1.1% of tests
“headlamp aim too high”
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 windscreen 0.6% 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.
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 2020 Eq Forfour Prime through its MOT
Across the 10 items that are recorded most often on this model, the average repair comes to £24–£57 — and 56% of those repairs are parts that cost under £30.
- Average repair across the 10 common items
- £24–£57
- Cheapest common item: washers provides insufficient washer liquid
- £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
- 56%
Estimates from typical UK parts prices, weighted by how often each item appears in 889 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 Eq Forfour Prime, side by side
2 model years on record, from 2020 to 2021. Across them the pass rate runs from 87.5% to 91.2% — a spread of 3.7 points. The bar under each year is the item that failed it most often.
- 2020 91.2%wipers does not clear the…
- 2021 87.5% wipers does not clear the…
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 2020 Smart Eq Forfour Prime 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 2020 cars with a similar record
- Volkswagen Tiguan 91.2%
- Citroen C3 Aircross 91.2%
- Audi A3 Technik 91.2%
- BMW X4 91.2%
- Land Rover Range Rover 91.3%
- Mercedes-Benz Gle 91.3%
Closest pass rates among 2020 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 2020 Smart Eq Forfour Prime 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 489 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 | 207 | 42.30% | 19.76% | +22.54 |
| Brakes | 109 | 22.30% | 20.89% | +1.41 |
| Visibility | 75 | 15.30% | 4.97% | +10.33 |
| Non-component advisories | 50 | 10.20% | 4.18% | +6.02 |
| Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | 20 | 4.10% | 12.21% | −8.11 |
| Suspension | 12 | 2.50% | 20.98% | −18.48 |
| Body, chassis, structure | 5 | 1.00% | 5.57% | −4.57 |
| Identification of the vehicle | 4 | 0.80% | 1.76% | −0.96 |
| Road Wheels | 4 | 0.80% | 0.75% | +0.05 |
| Seat belts and supplementary restraint systems | 3 | 0.60% | 0.82% | −0.22 |
The exact failure items, in the tester's words
| Recorded item | Severity | Tests | Est. cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Wipers does not clear the windscreen effectively Visibility | Major | 3.0% | £8–22 |
| Wipers blade defective Visibility | Minor | 2.5% | £8–22 |
| Has a cut in excess of the requirements deep enough to reach the ply or cords Tyres | Major | 1.7% | £45–95 |
| Wipers does not clear the windscreen effectively Visibility | Rectified | 1.2% | £8–22 |
| Headlamp aim too high Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | Rectified | 1.1% | £30–80 |
| Has ply or cords exposed Tyres | Major | 1.0% | £45–95 |
| Has a bulge, caused by separation or partial failure of its structure Tyres | Major | 0.90% | £45–95 |
| Washers provides insufficient washer liquid Visibility | Rectified | 0.56% | £5–15 |
| Windscreen damaged but not adversely affecting driver's view Visibility | Minor | 0.56% | £80–200 |
| Obviously under inflated Tyres | Minor | 0.45% | £45–95 |
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 | 8.8% | £45–110 |
| Has a tear, caused by separation or partial failure of its structure Tyres | Advisory | 6.9% | £45–95 |
| Tread depth below requirements of 1.6mm Tyres | Advisory | 6.2% | £45–95 |
| Has a cut in excess of the requirements deep enough to reach the ply or cords Tyres | Advisory | 2.9% | £45–95 |
| Non-component advisories Nail in tyre Non-component advisories | Advisory | 2.6% | £45–95 |
| Non-component advisories Child Seat fitted not allowing full inspection of adult belt Non-component advisories | Advisory | 1.9% | £20–80 |
Pass rate by mileage
| Mileage | Tests | Pass rate | Median odometer |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0-30k | 843 | 91.8% | 13,017 mi |
| 30-60k | 44 | 79.5% | 36,687 mi |
Source: 889 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.
2020 Eq Forfour Prime MOT questions
What is the MOT pass rate for a 2020 Smart Eq Forfour Prime?
91.2% of the 889 2020 Smart Eq Forfour Prime tests in this dataset passed, against a national average of 90.7% for cars first used in 2020. First-attempt pass rate: 90.5%.
What are the most common MOT failures on a 2020 Smart Eq Forfour Prime?
The three most recorded items are wipers does not clear the windscreen effectively (3.04%), wipers blade defective (2.47%), has a cut in excess of the requirements deep enough to reach the ply or cords (1.69%). Percentages are the share of tests on this vehicle that recorded the item.
Does mileage affect the 2020 Smart Eq Forfour Prime MOT pass rate?
Yes. Cars under 30,000 miles passed 91.8% of the time, falling to 79.5% for those over 120,000 miles. The median 2020 Smart Eq Forfour Prime in this dataset had covered 12,545 mi.
Does the season affect the 2020 Smart Eq Forfour Prime MOT pass rate?
Tests recorded in the winter months (October–March) passed 89.8% of the time; summer months (April–September) passed 92.3%. Brakes, tyres and lights are tested harder in bad weather, but the difference is small on most models.