Pass rate
78.1%
Around average — 0.9 pts ahead of the 77.2% that cars this age and mileage manage.
Across 4,505 recorded tests.
Typical repair bill £34–£91
2012 Volkswagen Amarok MOT pass rate
- 2012
- typical 123,325 mi
Most common fault
Suspension
23.0% 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 →
3.5 pts down across model years — 4.7% in 2011, 1.2% in 2020.
Which year to buy
- Best 2020 89.4% pass
- Avoid 2011 76.5% pass
Across the 10 years on record, a spread of 12.9 points. See every year →
- First-attempt pass
- 73.1%
- Typical mileage
- 123k mi
The 2012 Volkswagen Amarok MOT pass rate is 78.1% of its MOT tests — about what its age and mileage predict. Suspension is the biggest single reason it fails, at 23.0% of what testers record.
Check your postcode
MOT pass rates are national — type your postcode to see how Volkswagen Amarok does in your corner of the country.
Expert verdict
Lamps & electrics: 1.6× the national share
Lamps & electrics make up 19.9% of everything recorded on the 2012 Volkswagen Amarok, against 12.2% nationally — 7.7 points above. Suspension is still the single largest share at 23.0%, but at 21.0% 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.
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 Volkswagen Amarok? Get an email when these numbers change .
How does the 2012 Volkswagen Amarok compare?
Cars of this age and mileage average 77.2%, so this figure is 0.9 points ahead of what its age and mileage predict. On a first attempt, before any retests, the figure drops to 73.1%. The median 2012 Volkswagen Amarok in this dataset had covered 123,325 mi.
Pass rates also shift with the test month: tests recorded October–March passed 78.5% of the time, April–September 77.6%.
The single most recorded failure item is "Registration plate lamp(s) inoperative in the case of multiple lamps or light sources", noted on 7.30% of tests.
- 4,505 recorded tests behind this page.
- 78.1% overall pass rate, 73.1% on a first attempt.
- Across every year of the Volkswagen Amarok, the average is 83.6% — best year 2020 (89.4%), worst 2011 (76.5%).
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
- 4,505
- Typical mileage (median)
- 123,325 mi
- Make and model
- Volkswagen Amarok
- 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 Amarok MOT pass rate?
Pass rate by odometer reading. Bar lengths start at 63% so small gaps stay visible.
Regional pass rates for the Amarok
| Region | Tests | Pass rate |
|---|---|---|
| South East | 754 | 82.5% |
| South West | 699 | 73.1% |
| East of England | 630 | 81.0% |
| West Midlands | 456 | 80.0% |
| Scotland | 450 | 70.2% |
| North West | 347 | 79.0% |
| Yorkshire | 344 | 78.5% |
| East Midlands | 300 | 75.7% |
| Wales | 249 | 77.1% |
| North East | 237 | 83.1% |
| London | 39 | 92.3% |
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 2012 Amarok
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 2012 Amarok
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
“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 windscreen 5.4% 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 coil springs 2.4% of tests
“coil spring fractured or broken”
Look up inside each wheel arch with a torch, all the way round the spring. A snapped spring usually breaks at the very bottom coil, where a quick glance will not reach.
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 2012 Amarok through its MOT
Across the 10 items that are recorded most often on this model, the average repair comes to £34–£91 — and 40% of those repairs are parts that cost under £30.
- Average repair across the 10 common items
- £34–£91
- Cheapest common item: rear fog lamp not working
- £3–£15
- Dearest common item: windscreen damaged
- £80–£200
- Common items a careful owner can do at home
- 60%
- Repairs that still cost under £30
- 40%
Estimates from typical UK parts prices, weighted by how often each item appears in 4,505 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 Amarok, side by side
10 model years on record, from 2011 to 2020. Across them the pass rate runs from 76.5% to 89.4% — a spread of 12.9 points. The bar under each year is the item that failed it most often.
- 2011 76.5% registration plate lamp(s)…
- 2012 78.1%registration plate lamp(s)…
- 2013 80.3% windscreen damaged but not…
- 2014 80.6% windscreen damaged but not…
- 2015 81.7% windscreen damaged but not…
- 2016 83.7% registration plate lamp(s)…
- 2017 84.4% windscreen damaged but not…
- 2018 86.5% windscreen damaged but not…
- 2019 88.5% windscreen damaged but not…
- 2020 89.4% 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 2012 Volkswagen Amarok 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 2012 cars with a similar record
- Hyundai I10 78.1%
- Audi A3 78.0%
- Nissan Micra 78.0%
- Volvo V60 78.2%
- Vauxhall Meriva 77.9%
- Suzuki Splash 77.9%
Closest pass rates among 2012 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 2012 Volkswagen Amarok 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 7,799 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 | 1,812 | 23.00% | 20.98% | +2.02 |
| Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | 1,573 | 19.90% | 12.21% | +7.69 |
| Brakes | 1,495 | 18.90% | 20.89% | −1.99 |
| Tyres | 989 | 12.50% | 19.76% | −7.26 |
| Visibility | 563 | 7.10% | 4.97% | +2.13 |
| Body, chassis, structure | 396 | 5.00% | 5.57% | −0.57 |
| Noise, emissions and leaks | 369 | 4.70% | 5.52% | −0.82 |
| Non-component advisories | 250 | 3.20% | 4.18% | −0.98 |
| Steering | 236 | 3.00% | 2.57% | +0.43 |
| Seat belts and supplementary restraint systems | 116 | 1.50% | 0.82% | +0.68 |
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 | 7.3% | £5–20 |
| Windscreen damaged but not adversely affecting driver's view Visibility | Minor | 5.4% | £80–200 |
| Rear fog lamp not working Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | Major | 3.8% | £3–15 |
| Rbt (sp) efficiency below requirements Brakes | Major | 3.0% | £45–110 |
| Coil spring fractured or broken Suspension | Major | 2.4% | £25–65 |
| Pins and bushes pin or bush excessively worn Suspension | Major | 2.3% | £40–150 |
| Service brake performance excessively binding Brakes | Major | 2.2% | £60–150 |
| Shock absorbers has a serious fluid leak Suspension | Major | 1.8% | £30–75 |
| Headlamp not working on dipped beam Lamps, reflectors and electrical equipment | Major | 1.5% | £5–25 |
| Parking brake performance inoperative on one side Brakes | Major | 1.5% | £60–150 |
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 | 14.4% | £45–95 |
| Coil spring corroded so that its cross sectional area is reduced and seriously weakened Suspension | Advisory | 7.7% | £25–65 |
| Pins and bushes pin or bush excessively worn Suspension | Advisory | 7.1% | £40–150 |
| Shock absorbers has a serious fluid leak Suspension | Advisory | 6.3% | £30–75 |
| Engine oil leaks leaking excessively from engine Noise, emissions and leaks | Advisory | 4.4% | £200–700 |
| Shock absorbers damaged to the extent that it does not function Suspension | Advisory | 3.6% | £30–75 |
Pass rate by mileage
| Mileage | Tests | Pass rate | Median odometer |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0-30k | 7 | 71.4% | 21,662 mi |
| 30-60k | 122 | 84.4% | 49,293 mi |
| 60-90k | 628 | 81.1% | 77,581 mi |
| 90-120k | 1,338 | 78.4% | 105,952 mi |
| 120k+ | 2,407 | 76.9% | 156,814 mi |
Source: 4,505 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.
2012 Amarok MOT questions
What is the MOT pass rate for a 2012 Volkswagen Amarok?
78.1% of the 4,505 2012 Volkswagen Amarok tests in this dataset passed, against a national average of 77.2% for cars first used in 2012. First-attempt pass rate: 73.1%.
What are the most common MOT failures on a 2012 Volkswagen Amarok?
The three most recorded items are registration plate lamp(s) inoperative in the case of multiple lamps or light sources (7.30%), windscreen damaged but not adversely affecting driver's view (5.44%), rear fog lamp not working (3.84%). Percentages are the share of tests on this vehicle that recorded the item.
Does mileage affect the 2012 Volkswagen Amarok MOT pass rate?
Yes. Cars under 30,000 miles passed 71.4% of the time, falling to 76.9% for those over 120,000 miles. The median 2012 Volkswagen Amarok in this dataset had covered 123,325 mi.
Does the season affect the 2012 Volkswagen Amarok MOT pass rate?
Tests recorded in the winter months (October–March) passed 78.5% of the time; summer months (April–September) passed 77.6%. Brakes, tyres and lights are tested harder in bad weather, but the difference is small on most models.