Electric vehicle companies have a serious quality problem

Photo by Andrew Hawkins / The Verge

Quality is being affected by the chip shortage and supply chain crisis.

The steepest drop in new vehicle quality has ever been recorded by the group, according to the initial quality study published this week.

Polestar is the last electric vehicle manufacturer to show a drop in quality. The trend of shoddy manufacturing continues forTesla, which is ranked 7th from the bottom.

There were over 200 problems per 100 cars in the survey. As more EV models hit the road, the number of problems reported per 100 EV decreased.

A total of 84,165 verified owners and lessees of personal use vehicles were surveyed. Data was provided for 33 different makes and 189 different model vehicles.

Six of the top 10 issues are related to software. One of the main features people are looking for in a new car is Apple CarPlay. Half of all consumers who took the survey use CarPlay, and they report less problems than the 17 percent of users who use the operating system.

Users are having difficulty making the connection work because it is hard to understand. There has been an increase in the number of connected cars, which has resulted in a higher penetration of wireless CarPlay.

According to the survey, built-in voice recognition features are the only category to improve among all other features.

Features that manufacturers have cut to get a grip on the chip shortage include delivering fewer vehicles with advanced driver-assist features, heated seats, parking assistant modules, only including a single keyfob, and more. Ford removed A/C controls from the rear seats of its Explorer SUV, and Chevrolet axed wireless phone charging and the gas-saving auto start-stop features in some SUV models.

GM won the most awards ranging from the Chevy Malibu to the Cadillac Escalade for initial quality. Second and third place went to BMW andHyundai.

David Amodeo was surprised that the initial quality study wasn't worse than before. In an era in which there have been many shortages of critical components to support them, the automotive industry continues to launch vehicles that are more and more technologically complex.