Mercedes A-Class review - Reliability & safety

The Mercedes A-Class’ reliability seems no better than average at the time of writing, but the A-Class boasts a five-star Euro NCAP safety rating. In our Driver Power owner satisfaction survey, the A-Class impressed with its interior styling and seemingly excellent build quality, but it’s offset by the sheer number of electronics with the potential to go wrong and average reliability credentials.

Mercedes A-Class reliability

In the most recent 2024 Driver Power customer satisfaction survey, the Mercedes A-Class rose to 31st place out of the top 50 cars compared to a 39th-place finish out of 75 the year before. Buyers loved the car’s infotainment and interior – the two areas where it scored the highest. 

Quality and reliability for the model were less of a high point, with the A-Class coming in 36th place in that category. Our most recent brand-focused survey was carried out in 2023, in which Mercedes placed 25th out of 32 manufacturers. Unfortunately, reliability was slightly worse than average, with 28% of Mercedes owners reporting an issue with their car in the first year.

Safety

This A-Class has been crash-tested by Euro NCAP, achieving a five-star rating. All models get a good level of sophisticated safety kit as standard: automatic emergency braking, lane-keeping assistance, Mercedes' ‘Attention Assist’ system that looks for signs of drowsiness in the driver, speed-limit assistance and cruise control all feature. Adaptive Brake Assist incorporates hill-hold and hill-start systems, while all models have an electronic handbrake.

There’s also an active bonnet that pops up in a collision to help minimise pedestrian injury. Optional equipment that helps improve safety includes adaptive LED headlights and Mercedes’ Parktronic with front and rear parking sensors and automatic parking ability.