Pass rate
67.6%
Below average — 5.0 pts behind the 72.6% that cars this age and mileage manage.
Across 559 recorded tests.
Typical repair bill £49–£143
2003 Suzuki Liana MOT pass rate
- 2003
- typical 80,278 mi
Most common fault
Suspension
29.6% 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
- Best 2001 75.6% pass
- Avoid 2008 66.0% pass
Across the 8 years on record, a spread of 9.6 points. See every year →
- First-attempt pass
- 55.9%
- Typical mileage
- 80k mi
The 2003 Suzuki Liana MOT pass rate is 67.6% of its MOT tests — 5.0 points behind what its age and mileage predict. Suspension is the biggest single reason it fails, at 29.6% of what testers record.
Check your postcode
MOT pass rates are national — type your postcode to see how Suzuki Liana does in your corner of the country.
Expert verdict
Suspension: 1.4× the national share
Suspension accounts for 29.6% of everything recorded on the 2003 Suzuki Liana, against 21.0% nationally — 8.6 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.
- Falls short of its own age and mileage. Like-for-like, cars this age and mileage expect about 72.6%; this one manages 67.6% — 5.0 points below. Age is a fair excuse; this is not age.
- When it fails, it costs. Only 28% 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.
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 Suzuki Liana? Get an email when these numbers change .
How does the 2003 Suzuki Liana compare?
Cars of this age and mileage average 72.6%, so this figure is 5.0 points behind what its age and mileage predict. On a first attempt, before any retests, the figure drops to 55.9%. The median 2003 Suzuki Liana in this dataset had covered 80,278 mi.
Pass rates also shift with the test month: tests recorded October–March passed 68.8% of the time, April–September 65.5%.
The single most recorded failure item is "Joints constant velocity boot split or insecure, no longer prevents the ingress of dirt", noted on 8.41% of tests.
- 559 recorded tests behind this page.
- 67.6% overall pass rate, 55.9% on a first attempt.
- Across every year of the Suzuki Liana, the average is 69.5% — best year 2001 (75.6%), worst 2008 (66.0%).
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
- 559
- Typical mileage (median)
- 80,278 mi
- Make and model
- Suzuki Liana
- Updated
- 2026-11-05
Source: DVSA anonymised MOT test data (2023–2025), OGL v3.0.
Top part to budget for
Body Panel Repair
Typically a garage job — get quotes before committing.
Does mileage affect the Liana MOT pass rate?
Pass rate by odometer reading. Bar lengths start at 49% so small gaps stay visible.
Regional pass rates for the Liana
| Region | Tests | Pass rate |
|---|---|---|
| South East | 131 | 70.2% |
| West Midlands | 80 | 70.0% |
| South West | 70 | 55.7% |
| East of England | 57 | 63.2% |
| North West | 54 | 72.2% |
| Yorkshire | 48 | 62.5% |
| East Midlands | 41 | 70.7% |
| London | 26 | 84.6% |
| Wales | 21 | 76.2% |
| Scotland | 20 | 65.0% |
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 2003 Liana
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 2003 Liana
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 7.3% of tests
“headlamp lens slightly defective”
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 5.0% of tests
“ball joint 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 2.9% 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.
What it costs to get a 2003 Liana through its MOT
Across the 10 items that are recorded most often on this model, the average repair comes to £49–£143 — and 28% of those repairs are parts that cost under £30.
- Average repair across the 10 common items
- £49–£143
- Cheapest common item: registration plate lamp(s) inoperative in the…
- £5–£20
- Dearest common item: component mounting prescribed areas…
- £180–£450
- Common items a careful owner can do at home
- 50%
- Repairs that still cost under £30
- 28%
Estimates from typical UK parts prices, weighted by how often each item appears in 559 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 Liana, side by side
8 model years on record, from 2001 to 2008. Across them the pass rate runs from 66.0% to 75.6% — a spread of 9.6 points. The bar under each year is the item that failed it most often.
- 2001 75.6% headlamp lens slightly defective
- 2002 69.3% headlamp lens slightly defective
- 2003 67.6%joints constant velocity boot…
- 2004 70.6% joints constant velocity boot…
- 2005 67.7% joints constant velocity boot…
- 2006 70.5% joints constant velocity boot…
- 2007 71.1% headlamp lens slightly defective
- 2008 66.0% pins and bushes pin or bush…
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 2003 Suzuki Liana 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 2003 cars with a similar record
- Volvo V40 67.3%
- Ford Ka 68.0%
- Ford Galaxy 68.0%
- Volkswagen Beetle 67.1%
- Citroen C3 68.2%
- Volkswagen Polo 68.3%
Closest pass rates among 2003 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 2003 Suzuki Liana 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 1,880 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 | 560 | 29.60% | 20.98% | +8.62 |
| Brakes | 333 | 17.60% | 20.89% | −3.29 |
| Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | 237 | 12.50% | 12.21% | +0.29 |
| Tyres | 226 | 12.00% | 19.76% | −7.76 |
| Body, chassis, structure | 198 | 10.50% | 5.57% | +4.93 |
| Noise, emissions and leaks | 136 | 7.20% | 5.52% | +1.68 |
| Non-component advisories | 58 | 3.10% | 4.18% | −1.08 |
| Visibility | 56 | 3.00% | 4.97% | −1.97 |
| Identification of the vehicle | 51 | 2.70% | 1.76% | +0.94 |
| Steering | 25 | 1.30% | 2.57% | −1.27 |
The exact failure items, in the tester's words
| Recorded item | Severity | Tests | Est. cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Joints constant velocity boot split or insecure, no longer prevents the ingress of dirt Body, chassis, structure | Major | 8.4% | £80–250 |
| Joints constant velocity boot severely deteriorated Body, chassis, structure | Minor | 7.5% | £80–250 |
| Headlamp lens slightly defective Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | Minor | 7.3% | £5–25 |
| Registration plate lamp(s) inoperative in the case of multiple lamps or light sources Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | Minor | 6.8% | £5–20 |
| Ball joint excessively worn Suspension | Major | 5.0% | £18–45 |
| Service brake imbalance across an axle Brakes | Major | 3.9% | £45–110 |
| Service brake performance excessively binding Brakes | Major | 3.6% | £60–150 |
| Ball joint dust cover severely deteriorated Suspension | Minor | 3.2% | £18–45 |
| Component mounting prescribed areas prescribed area excessively corroded significantly reducing structural strength Suspension | Major | 2.9% | £180–450 |
| Pins and bushes pin or bush excessively worn Suspension | Major | 2.5% | £40–150 |
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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Tread depth below requirements of 1.6mm Tyres | Advisory | 20.2% | £45–95 |
| Sub-frame corroded and seriously weakened Suspension | Advisory | 17.2% | £180–450 |
| Rigid brake pipes excessively corroded Brakes | Advisory | 16.6% | £80–180 |
| Has a tear, caused by separation or partial failure of its structure Tyres | Advisory | 14.3% | £45–95 |
| Component mounting prescribed areas prescribed area excessively corroded significantly reducing structural strength Suspension | Advisory | 12.7% | £180–450 |
| Engine oil leaks leaking excessively from engine Noise, emissions and leaks | Advisory | 9.7% | £200–700 |
Pass rate by mileage
| Mileage | Tests | Pass rate | Median odometer |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0-30k | 14 | 57.1% | 25,327 mi |
| 30-60k | 133 | 71.4% | 48,492 mi |
| 60-90k | 196 | 70.4% | 74,712 mi |
| 90-120k | 148 | 62.8% | 105,533 mi |
| 120k+ | 66 | 65.2% | 138,943 mi |
Source: 559 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.
2003 Liana MOT questions
What is the MOT pass rate for a 2003 Suzuki Liana?
67.6% of the 559 2003 Suzuki Liana tests in this dataset passed, against a national average of 72.6% for cars first used in 2003. First-attempt pass rate: 55.9%.
What are the most common MOT failures on a 2003 Suzuki Liana?
The three most recorded items are joints constant velocity boot split or insecure, no longer prevents the ingress of dirt (8.41%), joints constant velocity boot severely deteriorated (7.51%), headlamp lens slightly defective (7.33%). Percentages are the share of tests on this vehicle that recorded the item.
Does mileage affect the 2003 Suzuki Liana MOT pass rate?
Yes. Cars under 30,000 miles passed 57.1% of the time, falling to 65.2% for those over 120,000 miles. The median 2003 Suzuki Liana in this dataset had covered 80,278 mi.
Does the season affect the 2003 Suzuki Liana MOT pass rate?
Tests recorded in the winter months (October–March) passed 68.8% of the time; summer months (April–September) passed 65.5%. Brakes, tyres and lights are tested harder in bad weather, but the difference is small on most models.