Pass rate
95.2%
Above average — 7.3 pts ahead of the 87.9% that cars this age and mileage manage.
Across 105 recorded tests.
Typical repair bill £14–£44
2018 Toyota Sienta MOT pass rate
- 2018
- typical 36,331 mi
Most common fault
Tyres
31.4% of faults · 19.8% nationally
mostly tread below the limit, cuts and sidewall bulges.
Which year to buy
- Best 2018 95.2% pass · this year
- Avoid 2020 84.8% pass
Across the 6 years on record, a spread of 10.4 points. See every year →
- First-attempt pass
- 95.0%
- Typical mileage
- 36k mi
The 2018 Toyota Sienta MOT pass rate is 95.2% of its MOT tests — 7.3 points ahead of what its age and mileage predict. Tyres is the biggest single reason it fails, at 31.4% of what testers record.
Check your postcode
MOT pass rates are national — type your postcode to see how Toyota Sienta does in your corner of the country.
Expert verdict
Lamps & electrics: 2.1× the national share
Lamps & electrics make up 25.7% of everything recorded on the 2018 Toyota Sienta, against 12.2% nationally — 13.5 points above. Tyres are still the single largest share at 31.4%, but at 19.8% nationally that one is ordinary. 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.
- Beats its own age and mileage. Once you allow for how old and how far these cars have been driven, the expected pass rate is 87.9% and this one manages 95.2% — 7.3 points ahead of what its age and mileage predict.
- Failures here tend to be cheap ones. 67% 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 Toyota Sienta? Get an email when these numbers change .
How does the 2018 Toyota Sienta compare?
Cars of this age and mileage average 87.9%, so this figure is 7.3 points ahead of what its age and mileage predict. On a first attempt, before any retests, the figure drops to 95.0%. The median 2018 Toyota Sienta in this dataset had covered 36,331 mi.
79% of the tests on this vehicle ran on Hybrid, which passed 95.2% of the time. Pass rates also shift with the test month: tests recorded October–March passed 94.1% of the time, April–September 96.3%.
The single most recorded failure item is "Registration plate lamp(s) inoperative in the case of a single lamp or all lamps", noted on 2.86% of tests.
- 105 recorded tests behind this page.
- 95.2% overall pass rate, 95.0% on a first attempt.
- Across every year of the Toyota Sienta, the average is 89.6% — best year 2018 (95.2%), worst 2020 (84.8%).
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
- 105
- Typical mileage (median)
- 36,331 mi
- Make and model
- Toyota Sienta
- Updated
- 2026-11-05
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 Sienta MOT pass rate?
Pass rate by odometer reading. Bar lengths start at 84% so small gaps stay visible.
Fuel type and reliability
Pass rate by fuel type. Hybrid is the most common here (79% of tests).
Regional pass rates for the Sienta
| Region | Tests | Pass rate |
|---|---|---|
| West Midlands | 44 | 95.5% |
| London | 18 | 88.9% |
| North West | 17 | 100.0% |
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 2018 Sienta
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 2018 Sienta
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 2.9% of tests
“registration plate lamp(s) inoperative in the case of a single lamp or all lamps”
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 1.9% 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 brakes 0.9% of tests
“brake pads less than 1.5 mm thick”
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.
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 2018 Sienta through its MOT
Across the 10 items that are recorded most often on this model, the average repair comes to £14–£44 — and 67% of those repairs are parts that cost under £30.
- Average repair across the 10 common items
- £14–£44
- Cheapest common item: rear fog lamp not working
- £3–£15
- Dearest common item: bumpers insecure
- £80–£250
- Common items a careful owner can do at home
- 90%
- Repairs that still cost under £30
- 67%
Estimates from typical UK parts prices, weighted by how often each item appears in 105 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 Sienta, side by side
6 model years on record, from 2015 to 2020. Across them the pass rate runs from 84.8% to 95.2% — a spread of 10.4 points. The bar under each year is the item that failed it most often.
- 2015 88.1% position lamp incorrect colour
- 2016 87.7% rear fog lamp not working
- 2017 89.7% registration plate lamp(s)…
- 2018 95.2%registration plate lamp(s)…
- 2019 92.7% joints constant velocity boot…
- 2020 84.8% rear fog lamp does not emit a…
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 2018 Toyota Sienta 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 2018 cars with a similar record
- Porsche 911 95.2%
- Porsche Boxster 95.0%
- Levc Tx Vista Comfort 95.5%
- Porsche Cayman 94.7%
- Lexus Rx 95.9%
- Porsche Macan 94.1%
Closest pass rates among 2018 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 2018 Toyota Sienta 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 35 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 | 11 | 31.40% | 19.76% | +11.64 |
| Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | 9 | 25.70% | 12.21% | +13.49 |
| Brakes | 8 | 22.90% | 20.89% | +2.01 |
| Suspension | 4 | 11.40% | 20.98% | −9.58 |
| Visibility | 2 | 5.70% | 4.97% | +0.73 |
| Body, chassis, structure | 1 | 2.90% | 5.57% | −2.67 |
The exact failure items, in the tester's words
| Recorded item | Severity | Tests | Est. cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Registration plate lamp(s) inoperative in the case of a single lamp or all lamps Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | Rectified | 2.9% | £5–20 |
| Ball joint dust cover severely deteriorated Suspension | Minor | 1.9% | £18–45 |
| Position lamp not working Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | Rectified | 1.9% | £5–25 |
| Registration plate lamp(s) inoperative in the case of multiple lamps or light sources Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | Minor | 1.9% | £5–20 |
| Brake pads less than 1.5 mm thick Brakes | Major | 0.95% | £18–45 |
| Bumpers insecure Body, chassis, structure | Major | 0.95% | £80–250 |
| Flexible brake hoses slightly twisted Brakes | Minor | 0.95% | £25–70 |
| Position lamp not working Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | Major | 0.95% | £5–25 |
| Rear fog lamp not working Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | Major | 0.95% | £3–15 |
| Wipers blade defective Visibility | Minor | 0.95% | £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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Tread depth below requirements of 1.6mm Tyres | Advisory | 6.7% | £45–95 |
| Brake discs in such a condition that it is seriously weakened Brakes | Advisory | 3.8% | £45–110 |
| Brake pads less than 1.5 mm thick Brakes | Advisory | 1.9% | £18–45 |
| Has a cut in excess of the requirements deep enough to reach the ply or cords Tyres | Advisory | 1.9% | £45–95 |
| Has a tear, caused by separation or partial failure of its structure Tyres | Advisory | 1.9% | £45–95 |
| Suspension arm damaged and seriously weakened Suspension | Advisory | 1.9% | £35–85 |
Pass rate by mileage
| Mileage | Tests | Pass rate | Median odometer |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0-30k | 36 | 97.2% | 21,177 mi |
| 30-60k | 54 | 94.4% | 41,851 mi |
| 60-90k | 14 | 92.9% | 71,542 mi |
| 90-120k | 1 | 100.0% | 94,893 mi |
Source: 105 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.
2018 Sienta MOT questions
What is the MOT pass rate for a 2018 Toyota Sienta?
95.2% of the 105 2018 Toyota Sienta tests in this dataset passed, against a national average of 87.9% for cars first used in 2018. First-attempt pass rate: 95.0%.
What are the most common MOT failures on a 2018 Toyota Sienta?
The three most recorded items are registration plate lamp(s) inoperative in the case of a single lamp or all lamps (2.86%), ball joint dust cover severely deteriorated (1.90%), position lamp not working (1.90%). Percentages are the share of tests on this vehicle that recorded the item.
Does mileage affect the 2018 Toyota Sienta MOT pass rate?
Yes. Cars under 30,000 miles passed 97.2% of the time, falling to 100.0% for those over 120,000 miles. The median 2018 Toyota Sienta in this dataset had covered 36,331 mi.
Which fuel type is most reliable for a 2018 Toyota Sienta?
Hybrid: 95.2% pass rate across 83 tests. Petrol: 95.5% pass rate across 22 tests. Shares are of the tests on this vehicle that recorded each fuel type.
Does the season affect the 2018 Toyota Sienta MOT pass rate?
Tests recorded in the winter months (October–March) passed 94.1% of the time; summer months (April–September) passed 96.3%. Brakes, tyres and lights are tested harder in bad weather, but the difference is small on most models.