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What 158 owners told NHTSA about the 2018 Kia Sportage Phev Phev

These are the actual owner complaints behind this car’s reliability verdict, filed with the federal government, unedited. They’re unverified reports, not confirmed defects: read them as leads for your pre-purchase inspection, not a diagnosis.

All (158)Crash / fire / injury (17)Engine (85)Electrical system (28)Transmission & drivetrain (17)Brakes (11)Fuel system (10)Steering (9)Speed control (8)Body & structure (6)Lights (6)Engine & cooling (5)

4 of 158 complaints match · Electrical system · crash/fire/injury only · clear filters

Mar 26, 2026Electrical systemEngineFuel systemFire

On 1/26/2024 approximately 9am, my husband had been driving on the highway for about 2 hours and pulled over to shut his eyes for a few minutes. He shut off the engine, closed his eyes and immediately smelled smoke. Black smoke began coming from under the hood and quickly got worse. He quickly got out of the car and walked away. He heard a loud pop sound and the engine area was engulfed in flames. He called 911. It took about 10 min for the fire dept to arrive and by then, the fire was being fed by the gas in the tank. They tried to put out the fire but the car burnt completely due to the gasoline. No one was hurt, thank goodness. There were no active lawsuits that I could find to get some compensation for this loss. We had to pay our high deductible and lost personal belongings in the car. This car did have an ongoing oil consumption issue. We had to replace the oil more frequently than normally required and it used much more oil than normal. We were told we had to wait for engine failure to get any kind of resolution.

NHTSA ODI 11727238

Oct 17, 2022SteeringElectrical systemCrash

My car was stolen from the Kia challenge

NHTSA ODI 11489673

Dec 13, 2019Electrical systemCrashFire

THE ENTIRE CAR CAUGHT FIRE. ALL ELECTRIC WIRES CAUGHT FIRE AND THE CAR IT WAS PARK IN MY HOUSE .

NHTSA ODI 11288823

Sep 12, 2019SteeringElectrical systemBrakesCrash1 injury

ALL ELECTRICAL MALFUNCTION AND LOSS OF STEERING AND BRAKES RESULTING IN HEADING CRASH

NHTSA ODI 11255041

Working with the data? Download all 158 complaints as CSV · fetched from NHTSA July 19, 2026

How to use these: a complaint is one owner’s report, filed voluntarily and published unverified. Patterns matter more than any single story. If several owners describe the same failure at similar mileage, put that system at the top of your pre-purchase inspection list. Back to the full 2018 Kia Sportage Phev Phev verdict →