Complaint volume
317 consumer-submitted complaints are matched to this model year. Treat the count as a research signal, then read the actual summaries for repeated symptoms.
Complaint records
2021 Volkswagen ID.4 Complaints
317 consumer-submitted complaints on record for the 2021 Volkswagen ID.4, grouped by component category.
317 Total complaints
26 Crash reports
1 Fire reports
14 Injury reports
Complaint data reflects consumer-submitted reports. A complaint is not proof
of a defect, recall, or manufacturer fault. Enriched severity fields come
from official bulk records when the complaint can be matched by ODI number.
Buyer interpretation
How to use these complaints before buying
Complaint records are most useful when they turn into inspection points, seller questions, and comparison checks against nearby model years.
Pattern to inspect
The most common categories are electrical system, unknown or other, structure. Use those categories as a test-drive checklist instead of judging the vehicle from the total count alone.
Severity flags
Enriched records include 26 crash reports, 1 fire report, 14 injury reports, and 0 fatality reports. These fields come from complaint records and should be read in context.
Mileage clue
Mileage is available on 34 complaints, with an average reported failure mileage of 33,202 miles. Compare that with the mileage on the listing.
Questions to ask the seller
- Have you had any problems related to electrical system, unknown or other, structure?
- Can I see recent maintenance and repair records?
- Has the vehicle ever been towed, involved in a crash, or repaired for the same issue twice?
- Can we also check the recall record for this 2021 Volkswagen ID.4?
Used-car checklist
Use these complaints before the test drive.
Build a buyer checklist to turn these issues into questions and inspection points.
2021 Volkswagen ID.4
Build buyer checklist Compare with other years Sends year, make, and model to pre-fill your checklist.
How severe are the 2021 Volkswagen ID.4 complaints?
26 Crash
1 Fire
14 Injury
0 Fatality
22 Towed
9 Medical attention
What are the most common 2021 Volkswagen ID.4 complaint categories?
ELECTRICAL SYSTEM 72
UNKNOWN OR OTHER 31
STRUCTURE 16
ELECTRICAL SYSTEM,UNKNOWN OR OTHER 11
SERVICE BRAKES 9
FUEL/PROPULSION SYSTEM 7
TIRES 7
ELECTRICAL SYSTEM,EQUIPMENT,BACK OVER PREVENTION 6
ELECTRICAL SYSTEM,STRUCTURE 6
POWER TRAIN 6
317 total complaints on record
Latest complaints
| Date | Component | Summary | Severity | Mileage |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mar 2023 | ELECTRICAL SYSTEM,UNKNOWN OR OTHER | Driver's door keeps unlocking while driving. Swung open several times while driving. Also, sometimes difficult to unlock driver's door from the outside. All this seems to be be related to error messages concerning Auto Hold (which this vehicle does not have) and Travel Assist not being available. All this began after my first one year scheduled service on 2/17/23. Taking in vehicle on 3/10 concerning these problems. I had made an appointment for an earlier date, but cancelled it because everything went back to normal. The dealer said if the messages were not active, I would be wasting my time. I called the VW Customer Service Number and reported my concern on 2/24. I am not driving my vehicle as it is not safe if the driver's door opens while driving. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Mar 2023 | ELECTRICAL SYSTEM | I was driving around 45 mph when several warning lights lit up on my dashboard at the same time, indicating an issue with the battery. The car slowly rolled to a stop, and I had no control of the vehicle. This was in the middle of traffic and very dangerous. There were no warnings or indications beforehand that would suggest there was an issue. This was completely out of the blue. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Feb 2023 | LANE DEPARTURE | The blind spot warning on the right side has not worked since I purchased the vehicle in April 2021. I have taken it to two different VW dealers three times and they have failed to repair it. I consider this safety issue! | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Feb 2023 | ELECTRICAL SYSTEM | The contact owns a 2021 Volkswagen ID.4. The contact received notification of NHTSA Campaign Number: 23V040000 (Electrical System) however, the part to do the recall repair was not yet available. The contact stated while driving 30 MPH, the vehicle stalled with several unknown warning lights illuminated. The contact stated the front driver’s side door latch opened independently. The contact took the vehicle to the local dealer, but the mechanic was unable to duplicate the failure. The contact stated that the manufacturer had exceeded a reasonable amount of time for the recall repair. The manufacturer was made aware of the issue. The failure mileage was approximately 24,000. VIN tool confirms parts not available. | Crash: No Fire: No | 24,000 |
| Feb 2023 | ELECTRICAL SYSTEM | The driver side door no longer automatically unlocks from the outside of the car when pressed with fingers near door handle. Door can only be unlocked or locked with the key fob. While seated in the driver's seat with the door shut the door will make random clicking noises as if the door is confused if it should be locking or unlocking. This happens even while driving the car. The driver's side door has unlatched and flown open into traffic while at a stop sign. The driver instrument panel also reports several errors related to the driver assistance systems while operating the vehicle including one which 'dings' at every complete stop. I suspect the electronics are designed to throw these errors when it thinks the door is open while driving. The dealer was able to reproduce the problem and reported that the door handle needs to be replaced but is unable to get the part from VW and has no estimate as to when it will be available. The car is undrivable due to being unsafe and has been parked for over a month. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Feb 2023 | ELECTRICAL SYSTEM,VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL,SERVICE BRAKES | We’ve been leasing a Volkswagen EV car ID4. And after a recent software update, we got problems as in the following. Intermittently when coming to stop, The vehicle is difficult to stop and Pedal pressure seems low. When we experience concern, the accelerator does not seem to react in the same way. As a result, the car failed to stop at short of stop line. Volkswagen sent us a recall notice of High voltage sudden reset error what promote acceleration failure. But our car has not only acceleration but brake issues more than dozen times in 3weeks. We believe we are in very delicate and dangerous situation. But VW doesn’t provide a substitute vehicle, as Volkswagen view problems as vehicle to be still drivable. I strongly disagree with their view, since we will be in serious danger without secure brake and acceleration. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Feb 2023 | WHEELS | Sudden and complete tire blowout at 65 mph on rear driver side. Tires were verified to have correct pressure. Less than 11K miles on the vehicle which is perfectly maintained and garaged. Technician at the tire store indicated likely manufacturer's defect. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Feb 2023 | SERVICE BRAKES,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | When driving using adaptive cruise control and my car decelerating using the regenerative braking, applying the brakes turns off the regenerative braking leaving only the friction brakes to slow/stop the car. I have demonstrated this situation to a VW dealer technician, who has confirmed that another 2021 VW ID4 that was in the shop duplicated this behavior. I have experienced this behavior multiple times over the last year. Because one of the systems for decelerating the vehicle is not available during a potentially emergency situation, I believe this is a safety risk. No warning lights or messages are displayed when this occurs. This has not been reported to my insurance company or the police. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Feb 2023 | ELECTRICAL SYSTEM | The contact owns a 2021 Volkswagen ID.4. The contact stated that while driving at an undisclosed speed, the 12V battery fault message was displayed. Additionally, the passenger's side rear door was inoperable. The vehicle was taken to the dealer; however, no failure was found. The vehicle was then taken to Emich Volkswagen of Boulder (2470 49th St, Boulder, CO 80301) where the 12V battery was replaced. The dealer determined that the passenger's side rear door needed to be replaced. The vehicle was not repaired. The manufacturer was made aware of the failure and provided no assistance. The failure mileage was approximately 38,000. | Crash: No Fire: No | 38,000 |
| Feb 2023 | POWER TRAIN | My vehicle did exactly what the recall is about, the electrical system went into a dumb mode and the care could not be used for a while. It eventually reset and is working. Took to dealer and they said that is was good to go, but want to make sure my VIN is on the recall fix when ready | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Feb 2023 | ELECTRICAL SYSTEM | The contact owns a 2021 Volkswagen ID.4. The contact received notification of NHTSA Campaign Number: 23V040000 (Electrical System) however, the part to do the recall repair was unavailable. The contact stated that the manufacturer had exceeded a reasonable amount of time for the recall repair. The manufacturer was made aware of the issue. The contact had not experienced a failure. VIN tool confirms parts not available. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Feb 2023 | SERVICE BRAKES | Electronic Stability Control (ESC) activated over a dozen time un-necessarily on a recent road trip. The activation caused the brake pedal to collapse and caused braking action to be un-even and nearly un-controlled on a windy mountain road. There was no slippage to cause stability control to intervene. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Jan 2023 | ELECTRICAL SYSTEM,ENGINE | The contact owns a 2021 Volkswagen ID.4. The contact stated that while driving at an undisclosed speed, there was smoke coming into the cabin of the vehicle through the air vents. No medical attention was received for smoke inhalation. The dealer was made aware of the failure; however, the vehicle was not diagnosed or repaired. The manufacturer was made aware of the failure. The failure mileage was approximately 35,000. | Crash: No Fire: No | 35,000 |
| Jan 2023 | STRUCTURE | The driver door unlocks and occasionally opens on its own. Took the car to the dealer at a faulty door handle was diagnosed. A replacement handle was installed and the problem was corrected. This problem happened for about a week before taking it to the dealer (at their next available time). On almost all occasions, the door unlocked and became ajar, but did not fully open. Only once when I was turning to get into my driveway, at low speed, the door fully opened and I had to hold it before it swung open. I discussed this on an owner forum, and other owners seem to have had similar experiences. A suggestion was made there to submit to NHTSA, so that prompted me to write this report. https://www.vwidtalk.com/threads/error-auto-hold-anyone-else.7485/ | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Jan 2023 | UNKNOWN OR OTHER | Driver door cannot be opened from the outside or inside. It appears the latch, the central locking system, or the electronic switch to the latch, etc. failed. The is a major safety concern in an emergency to access the driver or to escape the vehicle. The current ingress and egress routes for the driver are through the front passenger door. The driver door has always operates in a "strange" fashion and reported to the dealer when it was new. Prior to the failure and oftentimes the driver door handle has to be pulled twice (from the inside even the door is unlocked) to open the driver door. The failure to open the door from the inside or outside has been documented in various internet discussion forums and can easily be searched. The vehicle is currently in the shop for diagnosis. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Jan 2023 | ELECTRICAL SYSTEM | I took my car in for recall service repair which I was told would only be about two days. The dealership has now had my car for just about three weeks and they cannot give me an eta as to when the car will be finished. I am concerned about the length of time and quality of the repair since they have admitted to me that they are uncertain with how to proceed with the repairs. I took my car in to make sure it’s safe because it is our family car and I have been stuck with the loaner gas guzzler and still uncertain when I will get my car back and if it will even be safe. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Jan 2023 | WHEELS | Tires are different sizes, severe wear after 10,000 miles. Tires are peeling apart | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Jan 2023 | WHEELS | The tires ripped up and fell apart at 17,000 miles, no indicator alerted the driver to a problem prior to the tire falling apart, even driving it completely flat. I didn't alert anyone but a tow truck driver and my local tire repair center. I have replaced all four tires to prevent further damage to my car and safety to myself and my family. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Jan 2023 | POWER TRAIN,ELECTRICAL SYSTEM,ENGINE | Car displayed error while driving and immediately began to lose speed. Stopped in the middle of a 6 lane road with a posted speed limit of 35mph. Car would not go into drive. Turned car off and attempted to restart and put it back into drive, but did not work. Turned car off and waited 1 minute and tried again, turned car off a second time and waited 3 minutes. Car restarted with errors but was able to be put into drive and driven. The car was blocking a driving lane in the road for approximately five minutes with hazard lights on. If this has happened on a highway it would have been extremely dangerous. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Dec 2022 | POWER TRAIN,ELECTRICAL SYSTEM | On Monday, December 19, 2022, at approximately 1:30 p.m., driving at 70 miles per hour, my Volkswagen W ID.4 car suddenly lost electric power and I was unable to accelerate. I was driving on Highway 680 South, near the Livorna exit, on the Livorna Zone Express Lanes when this occurred in Contra Costa County, California. The car's user interface panel flashed the message, "Electrical system not working correctly. Please service vehicle." From the second lane on a four-lane highway, with the remaining speed, as the car dramatically slowed, I coasted to the right shoulder and came to a complete stop. During this entire time, there was no power. This was extremely dangerous and stressful as I was concerned of highway speed traffic approaching from behind and being unable to reach the shoulder safely without any power. There, at the right shoulder, I turned on the hazard lights and called my husband. He told me to exit and reenter the car, as safely as possible, to try to restart the system. I exited the car from the passenger side. When I reentered the car, the system restarted and the electric power returned. The vehicle had power again and I was able to safely re-enter the freeway lanes. This same error "Electrical system not working correctly. Please service vehicle" occurred previously two times when the vehicle was not moving (i.e. when trying to start driving from a stop) in the last year and a half. For these 2 previous incidents, my husband had opened service requests for repairs under warranty to the VW dealer in Walnut Creek, CA and they confirmed the faults and serviced the vehicle by bleeding the coolant system each time. Both times they assured me this would resolve the problem. This is the first time the same problem recurred while the vehicle was in motion resulting in total loss of power and put me in a dangerous situation. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Dec 2022 | STEERING | While driving with cruise control on (60 to 70 MPH) after almost an hour the steering suddenly becomes very loose. There is essentially no response in the center of the steering wheel location but can still steer when turning the wheel a few degrees left or right. After turning off the cruise control the steering response becomes normal again. This has happened in August this year and haven't noticed it again until this last weekend (12/17/2022). The previous incident happened several time in a row when I would turn the cruise control off and then back on. I was on the highway going 70 MPH. One incident in the summer and one in colder weather. After the first incident the dealership could not determine a cause when test driving it but it's not something that can be duplicated. It appears randomly and is quite scary. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Dec 2022 | WHEELS | The new 2021 ID4 purchased in August 2021 only had 17783 miles on the four original OEM tires when the problem occurred. While driving at a low rate of speed around 15 MPH from a stop light the left rear tire exploded. The driver safely got the vehicle to the side of the road. The car was towed to the VW dealership in Delray Beach, Florida. The dealer says that all four tires needed replacement at only 17783 miles. None of the tires were safe to drive on despite the low mileage. There were no warnings regarding the tires and no reason to believe there was an issue with the tires with only 17783 miles on the car having all season tires. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Dec 2022 | ELECTRICAL SYSTEM | The contact owns a 2021 Volkswagen ID.4. The contact stated while starting the vehicle and exiting his driveway, the "All Wheel Drive Function Disabled", "Electrical System Failure", "Rear Assist Failure" and other unknown messages were displayed. The contact stated that the vehicle hesitated to respond while depressing the accelerator pedal. The contact also stated that the vehicle was slow to get up to speed while driving on a flat road surface. Additionally, the contact stated while driving at night, the exterior lights failed to illuminate as needed. The contact veered to the side of the road, turned off, and restarted the vehicle several times; however, the exterior lights failed to operate. The contact activated the hazard light and was able to drive to his destination. The vehicle was taken to the dealer where it was diagnosed but no cause for the failure was found. The vehicle was then taken to a second dealer, Volkswagen of Smithtown (530 Jericho Turnpike, St James, NY 11780) where it was diagnosed that the Body Control Module (BCM) had failed and needed to be reprogrammed along with the vehicle key fob. The dealer completed the repair; however, the failure persisted. The contact stated while attempting to drive from a complete stop uphill, the vehicle failed to respond and started rolling backwards. The same warning messages were displayed. The contact parked and turned off the vehicle. The contact restarted the vehicle after an hour and 25 minutes and was able to continue driving. The vehicle was not repaired. The dealer was notified of the failure and informed the contact that they could not assist. The manufacturer was not notified of the failure. The failure mileage was approximately 12,500. | Crash: No Fire: No | 12,500 |
| Nov 2022 | FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | When backing up, if you turn to look over shoulder, the change in weight on the seat triggers the car to abruptly stop. Though the rear camera is good for cross traffic, still need to turn to look for pedestrians when pulling out of driveway across sidewalk. Safety issue for pedestrians | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Nov 2022 | AIR BAGS | The airbags warning light is on and Volkswagen dealer can’t fix the issue. It’s a safety issue and I need a remedy please. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |