Citroen Saxo MOT reliability

Citroen Saxos passed their MOT first time 56% of the time across 2,906 tests in 2025. 2,144 are still licensed in Great Britain.

Example photo of a Citroen Saxo — Photo: Vauxford · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons

First-time pass rate

56%

MOTs analysed

2,906

Still licensed (GB)

2,144

Body type

–

Pass rate by year of first registration

Older cars fail more often, so compare a car with others of the same age. Years with very few MOTs can show extreme pass rates, even 0% or 100%, so give more weight to years with more tests.

In detail:

First registered

2001 petrol

742 MOTs

Passed first time 59%. Typical mileage 70,510 (most between 52,906 and 93,664).

2005: 74% → 2006: 68% → 2007: 60% → 2008: 54% → 2009: 49% → 2010: 46% → 2011: 43% → 2012: 42% → 2013: 39% → 2014: 39% → 2015: 42% → 2016: 41% → 2017: 44% → 2018: 45% → 2019: 47% → 2020: 48% → 2021: 53% → 2022: 51% → 2023: 53% → 2024: 56% → 2025: 59%

Most common failures

Position lamp: not working (6.2%)
Service brake imbalance: across an axle (6.2%)
Stop lamp: not working (5.3%)
Component mounting prescribed areas: prescribed area excessively corroded significantly reducing structural strength (5.1%)
Service brake performance: efficiency below requirements (4.9%)

2001 diesel

20 MOTs

These figures come from 20 MOT tests. That's a fairly small number of cars, so they may not be typical of these cars as a whole.

Passed first time 55%. Typical mileage 95,028 (most between 54,070 and 108,958).

2005: 74% → 2006: 67% → 2007: 60% → 2008: 53% → 2009: 50% → 2010: 50% → 2011: 44% → 2012: 42% → 2013: 41% → 2014: 43% → 2015: 42% → 2016: 46% → 2017: 46% → 2018: 47% → 2019: 44% → 2020: 56% → 2021: 55% → 2022: 46% → 2023: 65% → 2024: 40% → 2025: 55%

Most common failures

Service brake imbalance: across an axle (25.0%)
Stop lamp: not working (15.0%)
Service brake performance: efficiency below requirements (10.0%)
Position lamp: not working (10.0%)
Wipers: does not clear the windscreen effectively (10.0%)

Where 2001 Saxos fail

Lights & electrics

19.5%

Brakes

14.7%

Body, structure & corrosion

13.2%

Suspension & axles

11.1%

Exhaust, emissions & leaks

10.1%

Visibility & wipers

8.0%

Wheels & tyres

5.3%

Steering

4.9%

Looking at a particular car?

See its own MOT history, mileage and red flags, compared with these figures. Free.

Based on 2025 initial MOT tests in DVSA's anonymised MOT dataset (cars and light vans). Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Model details: Vehicle data by VehiclesDB.