Used Car Analyzer

Quick answer: type the car’s 17-character VIN. The tool checks its check digit, then asks NHTSA what the car was built as, which recalls cover its model year and what owners complain about most. Paste three or more similar listings to see where the asking price sits, tick what you saw at the viewing, and read out the talking points.

How to use it

Copy the VIN from the listing, then check it against the car: it is on the dashboard where it meets the windshield, on the driver’s door jamb and on the title, and all three must match. The check digit is tested as you type. With 17 good characters the tool asks the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) for the car’s build, its recall campaigns and its owner complaints, which can take up to 20 seconds the first time a car is looked up. No VIN yet? Open Year, make and model to see the recalls and complaints for any model year you are considering.

Then add what only you know: the asking price and the odometer, three to eight similar cars for sale (price, year and miles, one per line), what you saw at the viewing, what your mechanic found at the inspection, and each tyre’s date code. Every answer updates as you type, and Copy link keeps all of it, so you can send the sheet to the friend who knows cars.

How the VIN check digit works

Since the 1981 models, every car and light truck sold in the US has a 17-character VIN, set by federal rule (49 CFR 565.15). The letters I, O and Q are never used, so none can be misread as 1 or 0. The 9th character is a check digit, worked out from the other sixteen. If it does not match, the VIN was mistyped, copied wrong or altered: recheck the typing first, then compare the plates on the dash and the door.

Each letter stands for a number:

Each value is multiplied by its position’s weight, the products are added up, and the total is divided by 11. The remainder is the check digit, and a remainder of 10 is written X. Here is the sample VIN the tool’s Try an example button uses, 5J6RM4H79EL012345:

The products add up to 361, and 361 ÷ 11 is 32 with 9 left over: the check digit is 9, the 9th character, so this VIN passes. Type 5J6RM4H70EL012345 instead and the tool says the check digit should be 9; NHTSA’s own decoder says the same.

Which model year is it?

The 10th character is the model year. The codes repeat every 30 years, so the 7th character settles which cycle: for cars, and for trucks and SUVs up to 10,000 lb, it is a letter from the 2010 models on and a digit before them. A digit in 7th place means subtract 30 from the year below (E is 2014, or 1984).

U, Z and 0 are never model-year codes, nor are I, O and Q.

Recalls: what the tool can and cannot tell you

NHTSA’s recall list is by make, model and year: it names every safety campaign that covers some cars of that model year, the part, the risk and the fix. A recall repair is free at the maker’s dealer, but the law stops requiring that for a car first sold more than 15 years before the recall was announced (49 U.S.C. 30120(g)). Whether THIS car’s recall work was done is on NHTSA’s own look-up at nhtsa.gov/recalls, where you enter the VIN; the tool gives you a button to copy it. A seller who says a recall was fixed can show the dealer’s paperwork.

Owner complaints: a question, not a verdict

Anyone can report a problem to NHTSA, and nobody checks the reports, so the counts are signals to ask about. A model that sold more gets more complaints, which is why the tool compares each system with the model years on either side and with this year’s own total. It flags a system with at least a quarter of the year’s complaints, or three times the average of the years either side, and never one with fewer than 25. A flag is something for your mechanic to look at, with the complaint count to show why.

Worked examples

A 2014 Ford Focus. On September 25, 2026, NHTSA held 2,656 owner complaints for this model year, and 1,597 of them, 60%, named the power train: the transmission. The years either side show the same pattern (2013 and 2015 average 832), so it is flagged as the system most complained about, not as a bad year. Twelve recall campaigns cover the 2014 Focus. The talking point: have the transmission checked, and ask what work it has had.

A 2014 Honda CR-V EX-L (the example VIN). One recall campaign covers the model year, for the fuel pump. The engine leads its 587 complaints with 190, and two systems stand out against 2013 and 2015: tires (52, against an average of 3.5) and wheels (47, against 10.5).

The price. Say that CR-V is listed at $14,995 with 86,000 miles, and you paste five similar listings between $11,900 and $15,200. Their median is $13,900, but the line through them puts a car with 86,000 miles at $14,334, so the ask is $661 over your listings. With the check engine light on, the sheet takes CarMD’s $554 average repair off: open at $11,346 and aim for $13,780.

The mechanic’s findings. Now say the inspection finds one axle of brake pads and a wheel bearing due. Published prices put the pads at $200–$500 and the bearing at $253–$510, so $453–$1,010 together: the sheet takes the higher sum off the opening offer and the lower one off the target, with the light’s $554 on both. Open at $10,336 and aim for $13,327, or ask the seller to do the work first.

What common repairs cost

These are the ten most common check engine light repairs of 2025 and their average cost, parts and labor, from CarMD’s 2026 Vehicle Health Index. It covers more than 39 million US vehicles, and ASE-certified technicians validated the data. The average check engine repair was $554. Dealers and luxury makes cost more.

For the bigger repairs a used car can need, from brake pads to a transmission, there is no single official price, so the tool shows the span between the publishers that price them: RepairPal’s national averages, YourMechanic’s quotes, J.D. Power, Endurance and CarMD. A transmission replacement runs $4,700–$6,764 and a head gasket $1,000–$3,337. Every figure, its publisher and its date is on the Car Repair Cost Estimator.

For the trip itself, AAA’s 2025 Your Driving Costs study puts maintenance, repairs and tires at 11.04¢ a mile for a new car, over five years and 75,000 miles; enter your trip’s miles and the tool does the sum. Expect an older car to cost more.

Walk-away signs

• The VIN on the dash and the one on the door jamb differ, or the check digit fails and it was not a typo.
• The title is branded salvage, rebuilt, flood or junk, and the price does not say so.
• The seller will not let your own mechanic inspect it. The FTC’s advice is to pay for an independent inspection, and it says a history report is no substitute for one.
• The seller will only take a wire transfer, a gift card, crypto or a payment app. The FTC says never to pay anyone who insists on those.

Buying from a dealer? The FTC requires a Buyers Guide in the window of every used car a dealer sells. “As Is – No Dealer Warranty” means the dealer will not pay for any problem after the sale. Dealers do not have to post one on motorcycles or most RVs, so ask about the warranty in writing.

Tyre date codes

The last four digits of the DOT code on a tyre’s sidewall are the week and the year it was made: 2319 is the 23rd week of 2019. Federal rules set how the date is marked (49 CFR 574.5), not how old a tyre may be, so the tool tells you the age and leaves the verdict to the tread, the sidewalls and your tyre shop. A three-digit code is from before 2000.

Common mistakes

• Checking the VIN from the ad and not from the car. A seller can paste a clean car’s VIN into an ad for a different one.
• Reading complaint counts as a failure rate. They are reports, not repairs, and popular models collect more.
• Comparing the price with listings of a different trim, drive or engine. Paste the same model within a year or two and similar miles.
• Skipping the inspection because the history report is clean. A report shows what was reported, not what is wrong now.

Free, and what Tools Pro adds

Everything above is free and stays free: the VIN check, NHTSA’s recalls and complaints, your listings, the walk-around and the negotiation sheet. Tools Pro adds My garage (save cars and compare them side by side, line by line), the buyer’s pack printed for the viewing with every checklist open, and Recall watch: we ask NHTSA about the model every month and email you when a new recall appears. AI credits buy four extras: a read of your walk-around photos (what they show, item by item, and what only a mechanic can check), a negotiation script from your findings, a plain-words explanation of a history report you paste, and questions for the seller and your mechanic. Your photos go to our AI provider only for that answer and are not kept.

Driving it home, or across the country

Buying in the US to drive into Canada? Read Can I buy a car in the US and drive it back to Canada?, and for the other direction, can a Canadian sell a car in the US? Before the long drive, pack the road trip essentials, and for winter, the gear that makes a winter road trip safe. Sleeping in it? See car camping setups that skip the tent.