How many times can a car fail an MOT?
There is no legal limit. A car can fail an MOT as many times as needed — there's nothing stopping you from repairing the faults and retesting, over and over, until it passes.
No limit on failures
The DVSA does not cap how many times a vehicle can be presented for an MOT test. Every time a car fails, you have the option to repair the listed faults and book a retest. As long as you're willing to repair the vehicle, you can keep going.
In practice, the limiting factor isn't the rules — it's the money. At some point, the cost of ongoing repairs exceeds what the car is worth, and most owners decide to scrap or sell it rather than continue.
How retests work
When a car fails its MOT, the tester issues a VT30 refusal certificate listing every failure point. You then have two options for the retest:
Retest options
A partial retest only covers the items that failed — the tester doesn't re-examine the whole vehicle. This is usually significantly cheaper than a full MOT, though garages set their own retest prices (the DVSA sets a maximum partial retest fee of £27.43 for a Class 4 car).
Can new faults be found on a retest?
On a partial retest at the same garage within 10 working days, the tester is only required to check the original failure items. However, if they observe a new dangerous defect during the retest, they can — and should — record it. This is rare in practice, but worth knowing if your car has deteriorated since the original test.
If you take the car to a different garage for a full retest, the entire vehicle is inspected again from scratch, and any new faults will be added to the failure sheet.
When does a failing car become not worth fixing?
There's no universal answer, but a common rule of thumb is that if the total repair cost exceeds 50–70% of the car's current market value, it may be time to cut your losses. Common expensive MOT failure categories include structural corrosion, brake system components, suspension, and emissions systems — any of which can run into hundreds of pounds.
Tip: Before committing to repairs after a failure, get a written quote from at least one other garage. You're never obligated to have the repairs done at the garage that tested the car.
Important: If the tester marks any item as a dangerous defect, you cannot legally drive the car away — not even to a repair garage. Dangerous defects mean the vehicle poses an immediate risk to road safety.
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