2020 Subaru Outback Problems

2020 Subaru Outback problems owners report most

2020 Subaru Outback problems are documented in public: owners have filed 904 complaints with NHTSA, the earliest in 2019 and the most recent in 2026. Sorting those by the component the filer named puts the visibility/wiper clearly first, at 313 of the 904 complaints, close to a third of everything filed.

A complaint is not a repair bill and not a defect finding. It is one owner telling the regulator something went wrong. What makes the count useful is the concentration: when one component takes 35 per cent of everything filed on a car, the pattern is doing more than chance.

Against the 2019 car, this model year has drawn 13 per cent fewer complaints (904 against 1,036). The 2019 car was led by its electrical system instead, so the pattern shifted between the two years.

Of those complaints, 19 describe a crash and 7 describe a fire. Filers reported 4 injuries.

Recalls on the 2020 Subaru Outback

A recall means the manufacturer or the regulator found a safety defect, and the repair is free at a franchised dealer however old the car is. There are 6 recalls on this model year. Your own car may be covered by some, all or none of them, so check the VIN rather than the model.

In owners own words

These are complaints filed about the visibility/wiper, quoted as written. They are one persons account rather than a diagnosis, and they are here because a symptom described by a driver is easier to recognise than a component name.

This is a safety issue regarding the durability of windshields. I have had 2 incidents now with my 2020 subaru outback having a cracked windshield. Both times it came on suddenly with at least a foot long crack or more the first time and an 18 inch crack the second time just recently. I reported the incident to the service manager this time and he put me in touch with customer advocacy at subaru who is waiting for a report from the diagnosis on Monday, July 22. The first crack was in March 2024. Prior to the crack happening, I noticed a drip of dried substance running down the inside of my w

The windshield on my 2020 Subaru Outback spontaneously cracked while I was driving the vehicle on a cold morning (01/20/2021). This crack is the second such spontaneous crack that has occurred with this same vehicle. The first crack occurred in the original windshield in June 2021, after which the original windshield was replaced with an OEM windshield. This second cracking event occurred with the OEM replacement windshield. About 30 minutes into driving the vehicle at freeway speeds (65 mph), a crack with a total length of about 10 inches (5 inches vertical, 5 inches horizontal) formed sponta

Problem component: exterior mirror on driver side It was raining, I was driving, I heard what sounded like a loud explosion by my driver side window. After the initial shock, I thought a tire had blown out, but car drove ok and no tire warning light came on. It was a rural road with no shoulder, only deep stormwater ditch along the roadside, so there was no place to safely pull over in traffic to assess what may have happened. I drove about 2-3 miles before I could pull over at a safe spot.There I saw that the back side of my driver side mirror had completely disappeared. Wires were expose

TODAY 12-3-20 WE WERE DRIVING ON I-95 IN FLORIDA TO SEE MY SON FOR THE 1ST TIME IN OVER A YEAR (AIR FORCE). SMALL ROAD PARTICLES WERE STIRRED UP FROM THE ROAD, (NOT ANYTHING LARGE, YOU BARELY HEARD IT HIT THE WINDSHIELD, ALMOST LIKE SAND) AND THEN WE HEARD A CRACKING SOUND, LOOKED AT OUR WINDSHIELD AND THERE IS ABOUT A 9 INCH CRACK ALL OF THE WAY TO THE BOTTOM TOWARD WIPERS, UP TOWARDS THE TOP. I'M 40 YEARS OLD AND HAVE NEVER HAD A WINDSHIELD CRACK, MUST LESS LIKE THIS OVER SUCH ROAD SMALL PARTICLES. ABOUT 3 MONTHS AGO, I WAS DRIVING ON I85 TO WORK, AND THE SAME THING HAPPENED BUT I CHALKED IT

The windshield on my 2020 Subaru Outback spontaneously cracked shortly after I started the car on a hot summer day (06/28/2021). Roughly a minute after starting the vehicle and turning on the air conditioning, I drove a distance of about 100 ft and heard a really loud snap, but initially didn't see the cause of the sound. About 2 seconds later, a crack quickly spread horizontally from the driver's side edge at mid height of the windshield until reaching the center of the windshield. After continuing to drive the vehicle, the crack began to spread vertically for about 6 inches, and then spread

WINDSHIELD CRACK. HAVE OWNED THE VEHICLE FOR LESS THAN 3 WEEKS AND 250 MILES. STARTED THE CAR WITH REMOTE, AND AFTER ENTERING THE VEHICLE, NOTICED A CRACK AT THE BASE OF THE WINDSHIELD ABOUT 12" IN LENGTH. UPON INSPECTION, SAW AN AREA OF SMALL REFLECTIONS JUST BENEATH THE DRIVER'S SIDE WIPER WHERE THE IN-GLASS DEFROSTING ELEMENTS ARE LOCATED, THE CRACK EXTENDS FROM THIS POINT IN TWO DIRECTIONS; ONE DOWN TO THE BASE OF THE GLASS, THE OTHER DIAGONALLY UPWARD. FURTHER INSPECTION REVEALS NO CHIPPING OR ROUGHNESS ON THE EXTERIOR, THOUGH THE OUTER LAMINATION IS THE LAYER THAT IS CRACKED. THERE SEEM

Every component, by complaint count

The full breakdown of what owners named when they filed. Components below the top ten are grouped out of this table.

How other model years compare

The same nameplate across the years we hold. Complaint counts fall naturally for newer cars because fewer of them have been on the road for long, so read the column as a rough signal rather than a ranking. In this set the 2019 Subaru Outback has drawn the most complaints and the 2021 Subaru Outback the fewest.

How to use this before you buy or repair

The reports do not gather around one obvious symptom, so read a handful of the complaints above and see which descriptions match what your car is doing.

Buying a used 2020 Outback

Bring the complaint list to the inspection and ask the mechanic to check the components named most, rather than running a general once over.

If you already own one

Check your VIN for open recalls first. A recall repair costs nothing whatever the age or mileage of the car.

• Check the VIN for open recalls, not the model year.
• Ask the inspecting mechanic about the components named above.
• Get the part number before comparing retailer prices.
• Keep parts and labour as separate lines in any quote.