AutoUtility currently tracks 29 official NHTSA owner defect complaints for the 2017 Chevrolet Spark. Powertrain & Transmission issues are the most frequently reported category, appearing in 9 complaints (31% of submitted records). Among these NHTSA complaint records, 5 filings cite a crash, 4 report one or more injuries.

Key Problem Findings
  • Total NHTSA Complaints: 29 reports
  • #1 Reported Problem Area: Powertrain & Transmission (9 reports • 31% of submitted complaints)
  • Secondary Problem Areas: Brakes & Traction Control (8), Air Bags & Restraints (6)
  • Crash-Citing Complaints: 5 filings
  • Fire-Citing Complaints: 0 filings
  • Complaints Reporting Injuries / Fatalities: 4 injury filings • 0 fatality filings
Reporting Methodology: Statistics describe unverified consumer submissions voluntarily filed with NHTSA. Complaint volume is not normalized for vehicle sales volume or miles driven. Multiple components can be cited within a single owner complaint submission.
Total Complaints
29
Submitted to NHTSA ODI
Crash-Citing Complaints
5
Filings citing a collision
Fire-Citing Complaints
0
Filings citing smoke or fire
Complaints Reporting Injuries
4
Filings citing one or more injuries
Complaints Reporting Fatalities
0
Consumer filings citing fatalities

Most Reported Problems for 2017 Chevrolet Spark

Top automotive subsystem defect categories ranked by unique owner complaint volume in federal records

#1 Problem Area 31% of complaints

Powertrain & Transmission

9 owner complaints submitted to NHTSA ODI
⚠️ 1 crash report
#2 Problem Area 27.6% of complaints

Brakes & Traction Control

8 owner complaints submitted to NHTSA ODI
⚠️ 3 crash reports 🩹 4 injury report entries
#3 Problem Area 20.7% of complaints

Air Bags & Restraints

6 owner complaints submitted to NHTSA ODI
⚠️ NHTSA Recall Context

NHTSA records list 1 official safety recall campaign for this model year involving the same broad component area:

*Component overlap means an official recall exists for the same broad vehicle system. It does not establish that an individual owner complaint was caused by, covered by, or resolved through that recall.
⚠️ 2 crash reports 🩹 5 injury report entries
#4 Problem Area 17.2% of complaints

Electrical System

5 owner complaints submitted to NHTSA ODI
✓ 0 crashes or fires cited
#5 Problem Area 13.8% of complaints

Visibility, Wipers & Glass

4 owner complaints submitted to NHTSA ODI
✓ 0 crashes or fires cited
Domain Share Note: Share percentage represents the proportion of unique complaint filings referencing each vehicle system. Because single complaints may cite multiple systems (such as engine and electrical simultaneously), domain percentages represent individual category incidence and may sum to over 100%.

Recent NHTSA Owner Reports for 2017 Chevrolet Spark

Representative defect filings submitted by owners to the NHTSA Office of Defects Investigation

Brakes & Traction Control NHTSA ODI ID: #11753620
Filed: 07/29/2026

"My transmission has been acting up like other stated where it will rev the motor high and then jerk and shift hard. There are no recalls for it when there are known issues with the transmission for the 2017. I was driving down the road and went to stop and my brakes were very hard and almost had to..."

Incident Date: 06/18/2025 • Raw NHTSA Component: POWER TRAIN,SERVICE BRAKES
Visibility, Wipers & Glass NHTSA ODI ID: #11747404
Filed: 06/30/2026

"The contact owns a 2017 Chevrolet Spark. The contact stated that while the vehicle was parked or while driving at various speeds, the A/C was blowing out hot air. A dealer was contacted. The vehicle was taken to the dealer to be diagnosed, and the air conditioning hose was leaking and the condenser..."

Incident Date: 06/15/2023 • Raw NHTSA Component: VISIBILITY
Powertrain & Transmission NHTSA ODI ID: #11676086
Filed: 07/25/2025

"When the car reaches a certain speed (50 mph plus) it jerks and jolts. The engine light is on and a P-code is present. Each mechanic says something different."

Incident Date: 01/01/2024 • Raw NHTSA Component: POWER TRAIN,ELECTRICAL SYSTEM
Powertrain & Transmission NHTSA ODI ID: #11608093
Filed: 08/12/2024

"I feel that there are issues with the transmissions on the 2017 Chevy spark. I noticed that there have been complaints in years such as 2014 and 2019. I find that my 2017 exhibits exact same transmission issues as years that came before or after. Lots of indecision with the car about whether to..."

Incident Date: 08/12/2024 • Raw NHTSA Component: POWER TRAIN
Brakes & Traction Control NHTSA ODI ID: #11520650
Crash Cited Filed: 05/05/2023

"vehicle brakes went out suddenly after hearing a loud POP sound...brakes wouldn't respond and pedal hard, ran off road and could only glide to a roll stop and not really then...fortunately a repair shop adjacent so drove their and rolled stop. initial look shop advised vacuum pump needs to be..."

Incident Date: 05/04/2023 • Raw NHTSA Component: SERVICE BRAKES
Consumer Narrative Notice: Excerpts are sanitized text descriptions submitted by vehicle owners to the federal ODI database. They reflect the reporting consumer's observations at the time of filing and have not been independently confirmed by vehicle manufacturers or government investigators.

Complaint History for Chevrolet Spark

Reported defect complaint volume across sibling model years (2015–2022)

Model Year NHTSA Complaints Crash Reports Safety Recalls Detailed Report
2015 Chevrolet Spark 83 4 7 View 2015 Problems →
2016 Chevrolet Spark 42 3 3 View 2016 Problems →
2017 Chevrolet Spark Current Page 29 5 1 Current
2018 Chevrolet Spark 9 0 0 View 2018 Problems →
2019 Chevrolet Spark 14 4 1 View 2019 Problems →
2020 Chevrolet Spark 19 6 0 View 2020 Problems →
2021 Chevrolet Spark 6 2 0 View 2021 Problems →
2022 Chevrolet Spark 3 1 0 View 2022 Problems →
Comparative Disclaimer: Complaint totals are unadjusted historical counts and are not normalized for vehicles sold, active fleet size, or total road mileage. Newer model years naturally have had less calendar exposure time to accumulate owner filings.

Detailed NHTSA Component Breakdown for 2017 Chevrolet Spark

Complete distribution of consumer defect reports across all 21 granular NHTSA system and subsystem classifications

Vehicle Component / System Total Complaints Crash Reports Fire Reports Reported Injury Entries Reported Fatality Entries
Service Brakes NHTSA category: SERVICE BRAKES 4 2 0 1 0
Air Bags NHTSA category: AIR BAGS 3 1 0 2 0
AIR BAGS,SERVICE BRAKES 2 1 0 3 0
Engine NHTSA category: ENGINE 2 0 0 0 0
Powertrain NHTSA category: POWER TRAIN 2 0 0 0 0
ELECTRICAL SYSTEM,SERVICE BRAKES 1 0 0 0 0
ELECTRICAL SYSTEM,VISIBILITY/WIPER 1 0 0 0 0
EXTERIOR LIGHTING,VISIBILITY/WIPER 1 0 0 0 0
POWER TRAIN,ELECTRICAL SYSTEM 1 0 0 0 0
POWER TRAIN,ELECTRICAL SYSTEM,ENGINE 1 0 0 0 0
POWER TRAIN,ENGINE 1 0 0 0 0
POWER TRAIN,SERVICE BRAKES 1 0 0 0 0
POWER TRAIN,UNKNOWN OR OTHER 1 0 0 0 0
POWER TRAIN,VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL,FUEL/PROPULSION SYSTEM 1 0 0 0 0
Seat Belts NHTSA category: SEAT BELTS 1 0 0 0 0
Seats & Restraints NHTSA category: SEATS 1 0 0 0 0
STEERING,POWER TRAIN,WHEELS 1 1 0 0 0
SUSPENSION,ELECTRICAL SYSTEM 1 0 0 0 0
Other / Uncategorized NHTSA category: UNKNOWN OR OTHER 1 0 0 0 0
Visibility / Glass NHTSA category: VISIBILITY 1 0 0 0 0
Visibility & Wipers NHTSA category: VISIBILITY/WIPER 1 0 0 0 0
Data Attribution & Reporting Methodology: Complaints are unverified voluntary submissions to the NHTSA Office of Defects Investigation (ODI). Because multiple vehicle components can be cited within a single owner complaint submission, component-level rollups may sum to more than the unique complaint count (29). Injury and fatality entries in the detailed table reflect raw values entered by reporting consumers across individual submissions; they are not deduplicated casualty statistics and may include duplicate or unverified entries. Complaint volume is not normalized for sales volume or vehicle mileage and does not represent an audited component failure rate.

Official NHTSA Defect Investigations (1)

1 CLOSED

Formal safety defect inquiries and engineering analyses opened by the NHTSA Office of Defects Investigation (ODI)

Official Federal Inquiries: NHTSA opens a defect investigation when safety screening or consumer defect trends indicate a potential unreasonable safety risk. An open investigation is a formal inquiry and does not by itself confirm a defect or result in a mandatory recall.
CLOSED Defect Petition (DP) ODI Action #DP22005
Opened: 2023-01-27 • Closed: 2023-08-07

Pedestrian alert sounds

Affected Component: ELECTRICAL SYSTEM:PROPULSION SYSTEM

NHTSA received a petition on or about July 18, 2022, requesting that Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard (FMVSS) 141 be applied to all electric and hybrid vehicles operating in the United States. The petition can be reviewed at NHTSA.gov under ODI Number 11486072. FMVSS 141 establishes performance requirements for pedestrian alert sounds for motor vehicles. The standard applies to hybrid and electric vehicles that have a gross vehicle weight ra...

✓ Resulted in Safety Recall Campaign: 22V063000 Official NHTSA File →
Official US Government Data Provenance

The complaint records on this page are retrieved directly from the NHTSA Office of Defects Investigation (ODI) public database.

Local Production Store Compiled: August 2026 • Deterministic Audited Dataset • Zero Dynamic External API Runtime Latency.