2018 BMW 540I Interior & seats Problems

On and off system notification of "Passenger Restraint System Malfunction" with and without a passenger in the seat. Also, the Airbag off/disabled light on the instrument cluster illuminated. Can't seem to declare if it is an electrical shortage, seatbelt buckle related or passenger pressure sensor sensor in the seat. Find this to be a major safety concern should there be an accident, and unsure whether the airbags will deploy or not. BMW should investigate this concern.

NHTSA ID

11729268

Incident

Apr 5, 2026

i was just driving my bmw and a airbag light and a malfunction error popped up on my dashboard, that read that the Passenger restraint system has malfunctioned. and i was doing some research on what was wrong with my car, and all the forums are indicating that this is a very common issue on these cars due to a bad seat occupancy sensor mat. to fix this you either still have to have an extended warranty if you don’t have one you have to pay upwards of 3,000$ to get this part replaced at a dealer. and me personally i don’t have the money to just spend on car repair of that amount and im sure alot of the other people with this same problem are in the same boat as me. this could be very dangerous because it puts all my passengers at risk if i were to get in a auto collision it would be devastating. i mean this should 100% be a recall because of this is a wide spread problem that puts many many people at risk. i haven’t been to the dealer with it yet, but i can self diagnose because countless people have been reporting on forums and online the same issue with the same error on the dash. my car hasn’t been in an accident yet so i haven’t had it inspected by insurance companies or police. this problem first appeared today and my heart dropped.

NHTSA ID

11648020

Incident

Mar 12, 2025

Constantly pops up a message for passenger restraint system malfunction. I had an accident where I swerved off the road into a ditch at about 60 mph. I the driver was not hurt and the passenger wouldn’t have been hurt either if it was for the passenger seat belt not locking correctly at first and then repeatedly locking and unlocking the entire time hurting his chest.

NHTSA ID

11641549

Incident

Nov 22, 2023

The car's hood sensor did not alert us to the fact that the hood was not properly closed. This resulted in the car's hood opening while being driven, causing the driver to lose sight of the road and crashed into a guardrail in a canyon road (see photo). The car is currently being evaluated by the insurance company for a total loss, and the car may be available for inspection currently, although it may also be taken apart by the auto collision company for their estimate evaluation. The failure of the hood latch mechanism to properly and conspicuously notify us prior to driving the car put us at severe risk of being in a life threatening accident as well as potentially imperiling the lives of other drivers or pedestrians. The vehicle was inspected by BMW after I reported the incident to them, and I have a written report from them. BMW concluded they are "technically confident that no manufacturing defects, faults or malfunctions were present in the vehicle that could have contributed to this incident." There were no warning messages of the problem prior to the hood opening. We also provided BMW with a video taken after the crash whereby the hood latch on the right side of the car was intentionally left open, and the hood latch on the left side of the car was closed, and demonstrated in this situation that there was no indication on the BMW i drive screen of any notifications to alert the driver of the hood not being completely closed. Despite asking numerous times for BMW to address the findings in that video, which we shared with them at their request, they never provided any response to the video. I would like to share the video with you but am unable to upload MP4 files onto your platform.

NHTSA ID

11627712

Incident

Nov 5, 2024

When i have a passenger in the car I will intermittantly get the warning "Passenger restraint system malfunction" which will turn off the air bag to the passenger side when driving even when there is a passenger in the car. From forums it sounds like there is a pressure pad in the seat that is a very common malfunction for BMW. This seems like a pretty critical part to ensure the airbags are operational when a passenger is in the car, and feel it should not be as common a problem as it seems to be.

NHTSA ID

11591952

Incident

Jun 1, 2024

My car has around 74k miles on it. I had the following service request warning present itself this last week, 'Passenger restraint system malfunction:' on my drive into work in the morning. At first I dismissed the message and closed it to see if it would clear itself. It did not clear. It came back up a couple of minutes later. This time I left it alone. It proceeded to close itself and reopen every minute or so for about 10-15 minutes. Then it turned off and didn't come back on until I started my car later in the day and again the following morning. After taking it into the BMW dealer, the warning light was able to be replicated by the dealer and they've told me it is the seat mat (occupancy sensor) that was faulty. No outside influence appears to be at fault for the failure. Just that the part went bad. This is the diagnostic message given: CHECK CONTROL MESSAGE PRESENT FOR PASSENGER RESTRAINT MALFUNCTION. PERFORMED VEHICLE TEST, FAULTS PRESENT REGARDING PASSENGER FRONT SEAT OCCUPANCY DETECTION. PERFORMED TEST PLAN AND INDCATED PASSENGER SEAT OCCUPANCY DETECTION IS FAULTY. RECOMMEND REPLACING PASSENGER SEAT OCCUPANCY DETECTION. According to the dealer, if this if not fixed the airbag and/or seatbelt won't perform in the event of an accident. This appears to be a very common issue for BMW and similar to a 2017 BMW Technical Service Bulletin MC-10146769-9999. There was no warning of this issue prior to receiving the error message. There has been no opportunity for moisture to compromise the sensor (via window, sunroof or drinks spilled). Nor has any cellphone been stored on the passenger seat as I've read of some reasons provided to other Owners with the same error message. This seems to be an ongoing issue with this part for some time and it would seem to be an important issue for BMW to resolve in their design for the safety of the user.

NHTSA ID

11542421

Incident

Aug 30, 2023

The seat occupancy sensor malfunctioned. The technician said the computer showed it had moisture that caused the problem. I had the sensor replaced and the repair shop siad there was no sign of moisture contamination. I took pictures of the seat cushion allow with the imbedded sensor and there is no sign of moisture. I feel the sensor was defective and BMW should have been responsible for the replacement but they use the excuse that moisture caused the problem.

NHTSA ID

11519021

Incident

Mar 8, 2023

Passenger seat indicator light keeps going off intermittently. Dealer says its a seat pad issue. We identified it in 2018 but dealer was not able to fix it and it continually keeps happening and didn't do anything because dealer did not fix it at that time. Now dealer is re-diagonising it saying it is a different diagnostic code but we have seen the same issue since we got the car. After reasearching this, there was a recall in 2017 with similar issues. It is related to the sensor and if not properly working, the airbags may not deploy when needed. This appears to be a safety feature of the car so should be recalled like previous. Please investigate.

NHTSA ID

11480988

Incident

Feb 15, 2018

FOR A FEW MONTHS NOW, MY CAR HAS BEEN THROWING A "PASSENGER RESTRAINT SYSTEM MALFUNCTION" ERROR. IT HAPPENS SPORADICALLY AND ONLY STAYS UP FOR BETWEEN 1 AND 5 MINUTES AT A TIME. IT WILL HAPPEN WHETHER THE CAR IS MOVING OR NOT, AND EVEN SOMETIMES AS SOON AS I TURN THE CAR ON. I HAVE BEEN SUBMITTING THE TELECOMMUNICATIONS SINCE IT STARTED. I TRIED TO HAVE IT FIXED BY THOMPSON BMW, ONLY TO BE TOLD, LIKE THE OTHER USER WHO HAS THIS PROBLEM ON HERE, THAT THEY THINK MOISTURE IS THE CULPRIT. I HAVE NEVER HAD ANY RAIN OR ANY OTHER MOISTURE GET INTO THE CAR, AND EVEN IF IT DID, THIS WOULD BE A HUGE SAFETY RISK. THOMPSON REFUSED TO FIX IT AND SAID I WOULD HAVE TO COME OUT OF POCKET FOR THE SEAT, WHICH IS RIDICULOUS. I HAVE BEEN IN CONTACT WITH THE SERVICE MANAGER, AND THE CAR IS SCHEDULED TO GO BACK TO THE SHOP SOON. I WILL UPDATE WITH ANY DEVELOPMENTS, BUT IT WOULD APPEAR THAT MINE IS NOT AN ISOLATED INDECENT.

NHTSA ID

11110925

Incident

May 1, 2018

Mileage

6,500 mi