2018 Subaru Forester vs 2019 Subaru Forester
Two adjacent model years of the Subaru Forester, side by side. Every figure is a raw NHTSA/EPA count — not normalized by how many were sold.
Side by side: identical recall campaigns (3 each), and 2018 Forester has fewer recorded owner complaints (489 vs 831). 2018 Forester carries more NHTSA investigations (1 vs 0). Both carry NHTSA crash ratings, and neither has EPA fuel-economy data in our dataset.
| Metric | 2018 Subaru Forester | 2019 Subaru Forester |
|---|---|---|
| Recall campaigns | 3 | 3 |
| Owner complaints | 489 | 831 |
| NHTSA investigations | 1 | 0 |
| NHTSA crash rating | Rated by NHTSA | Rated by NHTSA |
| EPA fuel economy | — | — |
Where these two actually differ
Both carry 3 recall campaigns, so recall history does not separate them. A campaign can still cover very different defects on each vehicle — read both records before treating the tie as equivalence.
2019 Subaru Forester has drawn 342 more owner complaints (831 against 489). Complaints are self-reported to NHTSA and scale with how many were sold, so treat the pattern of what owners report as more informative than the total.
Both have been crash-tested by NHTSA, so their star ratings are directly comparable — they were assessed under the same program in the same year.
Counts are raw NHTSA and EPA totals for each model year. They are not adjusted for how many of each vehicle were sold, so a high-volume model will tend to show more of everything — a larger complaint count is not by itself evidence of a worse car. Use the per-vehicle reports for the underlying records.
How to read this
- A green check marks the lower raw count — fewer recorded issues, not a declared winner.
- Complaint totals are not normalized by vehicle population; a big-seller shows more of everything.
- Where a rating or EPA record is absent, that is missing data — not evidence of safety.