This Is the World's Least Reliable Supercar

Special Report

Published: December 16, 2021 8:00 am

One would think a car that costs hundreds of thousands of dollars or more would be flawless mechanically. Some of them are literally built by hand. However, expensive cars can have complex engines and other remarkably detailed features, which require meticulous efforts by the manufacturer — which don’t always succeed.

In its study of the most unreliable supercars, USwitch — an online and telephone comparison and switching service covering a wide range of products and services — determined that the least reliable of all was the Mercedes-AMG GT.

For its study, USwitch did not rely on regularly used sources like Consumer Reports, J.D. Power, Edmunds, and reports by the automotive media, most of which survey tens of thousands of car owners and consider features like how often a car needs repair. Instead, their evaluation was based on three yardsticks.

The first is the MOT test (named for the United Kingdom’s now-defunct Ministry of Transport), required for most vehicles in the U.K. more than three years old. It considers “roadworthiness,” exhaust emissions, and vehicle safety. The other two measures were the number of recalls and reviews of supercars on the British automotive review website Parkers. (These are the safest new cars for 2021.)

USwitch rated vehicles on a scale of 1 to 10. The Mercedes-AMG GT posted the lowest score of all, 3.22, mostly because of its huge number of recalls. AMG is the Mercedes ultra-performance division. The base price for the vehicle is $118,600, but with accessories, the figure goes higher. (These are the most expensive non-vintage cars in the world.)

The report’s authors noted “The Mercedes-AMG GT is an impressive car, but it came at the bottom of our rankings, largely due to the number of times it has been recalled in the last 20 years, with 18 instances (2.6 for each of the seven years it has been in production). However, the GT also performed relatively poorly on its industry review score, with 4.1 (with most supercars scoring 4.5 or over).”

The car with the second worst score was the Porsche 911, the iconic flagship of the German sports car company. Once again, the culprit was a high number of recalls. Other big names in the luxury car category are on the list too, including Lamborghini, Maserati, and Ferrari.

Click here to see the 25 least reliable supercars in the world