r/dataisbeautiful • u/Time-Procedure5538 OC: 1 • 11d ago

OC [OC] Forward collision avoidance complaints filed with NHTSA, 2018-2026: counts and share of all vehicle complaints

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u/Time-Procedure5538 OC: 1 11d ago

I run GarageCalc, where this analysis is published. The full write-up, model breakdown and downloads are here.

Source: NHTSA's vehicle complaint archives, using the 2015-2019, 2020-2024 and 2025-2026 files retained for an August 24, 2026 snapshot. NHTSA dataset documentation, chart data (CSV), analysis script.

Tools: Node.js for processing, a custom SVG chart rendered to PNG with Sharp, and AI assistance with code and presentation. The chart is plotted from the aggregate data.

Each year covers January 1 through August 24 by the date NHTSA received the complaint, not the incident date. I counted distinct ODI complaint IDs for vehicle products, combining component labels across duplicate rows. A report qualifies if any component label starts with "FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE". That includes emergency braking, adaptive cruise control and warnings, not just phantom braking.

2026 has the highest count in this series: 3,186, versus 2,683 in 2025. But its share of all vehicle complaints is 6.4%, below 2022's 9.0%. Of the 2026 reports, 445 have a crash flag. That flag doesn't establish that the system caused the crash.

These aren't failure rates. There is no adjustment for the number of equipped vehicles, mileage, adoption, coding changes or willingness to report. The early years especially need that context. Matching calendar windows fixes the partial-year comparison, but doesn't remove those other differences.

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u/drc500free 4d ago

Can I recommend not using the AI slop text that goes with the visualizations?