2023 Polestar Polestar 2 Owner Complaints

The contact owns a 2023 Polestar Polestar 2. The contact received notification for NHTSA Campaign Number: 25V615000 (Back Over Prevention). The vehicle was taken to the dealer for the recall repair; however, the dealer informed the contact that the recall remedy could not be completed because previous software updates were not completed. The contact stated that the dealer would only complete the recall if the previous software updates were completed, and the updates were not covered under the recall. The contact stated that the dealer failed to complete the software updates previously. The vehicle was not repaired. The manufacturer was not notified of the failure. The contact had not experienced a failure.

NHTSA ID

11749104

Incident

Mar 11, 2026

Over the last 1.5 months, the liftgate system on the vehicle has failed to fully close and latch. The vehicle shows the liftgate as unsecured and the liftgate has play despite being partially latched. Investigation of the vehicle shows that the tailgate damper drive unit wiring harness is designed in a way that the wires pinch and short to ground. This design flaw causes the vehicle to lose communication with the position sensors in the tailgate damper drive unit and prevents the tailgate from closing fully.

NHTSA ID

11736507

Incident

Mar 10, 2026

Polestar 2 software version 4.2.13. While reversing out of a parking spot the rear camera briefly turned on, but after a second, the infotainment system crashed, with the screen shutting off. The infotainment system automatically rebooted after ~1min of driving. This system crash also temporarily disabled rear cross traffic alert and the parking sensors. Backup cameras are a federally mandated safety feature which reduce the risk of collisions when reversing. Without this safety feature, the risk of a collision increases.

NHTSA ID

11728323

Incident

Mar 31, 2026

The backup camera consistently fails and displays a "Backup Camera is Temporarily Unavailable" message. Polestar is only issuing a software fix for this on model year 2026 Polestar 2s and a solution has not been offered for over 8 months now.

NHTSA ID

11728097

Incident

Mar 29, 2026

the rear camera on this car has been having issues for well over a year. The dealership says they are well aware of the issues and that it's common but there is nothing they can do about it and that I just need to wait for an update to eventually come. They do not know when the update is coming. This has been an ongoing issue that is a big safety issue. The rear visibility on these cars is bad to begin with, so the rear camera is essential for safety. it either doesn't go on at all every other time I try to go in reverse, or it will just cut off mid-reverse driving. This is just on top of all the rest of the infotainment system issues this car has.

NHTSA ID

11725216

Incident

Mar 31, 2024

Rear‑view camera intermittently fails to provide a usable image when shifting into reverse. Symptoms include delayed activation, black screen, frozen frame, or extremely choppy video. This results in intermittent loss of rear visibility and does not comply with FMVSS 111. The defect has persisted for several years despite multiple Polestar software updates and multiple NHTSA recall campaigns intended to correct the issue. The failure is reproducible and appears strongly load‑dependent. It occurs most often immediately after vehicle startup or when the infotainment system is busy with background activity such as app initialization, updates, or UI redraws. Under these conditions, shifting into reverse frequently produces no usable camera image. If I wait several seconds for the system to stabilize before shifting into reverse, the camera usually works, which indicates a resource‑contention or performance‑limitation issue within the Intel Atom–based infotainment head unit used in earlier Polestar 2 vehicles. The recall remedies have not resolved the defect, and the failure continues to occur under predictable, real‑world conditions. Because rear‑view camera activation is time‑critical for detecting pedestrians, children, pets, and obstacles, this ongoing defect presents an unreasonable safety risk. The repeated failure of software‑only remedies suggests the underlying cause may be hardware‑related. Newer Polestar and Volvo vehicles equipped with the Snapdragon‑based infotainment unit do not exhibit this behavior, which further supports the possibility of a hardware limitation in the original head unit. I request that NHTSA re‑evaluate the effectiveness of the current recall remedies and determine whether a hardware‑based fix is required to bring the vehicle into full compliance with FMVSS 111. This defect remains active despite multiple attempts to correct it and continues to compromise rear visibility and overall safety.

NHTSA ID

11724728

Incident

Mar 16, 2026

When put into reverse, display just shows Camera is temporarily unavailable. This is after the OTA update 4.2.13 that was supposed to fix the issue. Rear cross traffic braking is also unavailable at this time.

NHTSA ID

11717689

Incident

Feb 12, 2026

Constant camera issues. The rear camera only works half the time and when it does go it, it'll just cut off while driving in reverse. It's completely unreliable and dangerous. New update has affected the cars acceleration. Now when its below a certain degrees outside they changed it so the car can no longer accelerate at its normal speed and instead, barely responds when you hit the gas causing a multiple second delay before the car moves. It's incredibly dangerous and makes it impossible to move out of the way if needed in an emergency. Issue was reported and was told that just how it is now and there is nothing they can do about it. This is dangerous and not the vehicle I purchased.

NHTSA ID

11717270

Incident

Feb 9, 2026

Rear backup camera continues to not function reliably, even after updating to the latest firmware 4.2.13

NHTSA ID

11715971

Incident

Feb 4, 2026

After multiple software OTA updates due to previous NHTSA recalls, the rear backup camera consistently has issues to where the image of the rear of the vehicle cannot temporarily be displayed.

NHTSA ID

11707307

Incident

Dec 27, 2025

Car rear camera constantly freezes, doesn’t appear or just stops during vehicle usage

NHTSA ID

11703101

Incident

Dec 1, 2025

Despite a recall, rear camera does not activate when putting the car into reverse. This poses immense safety risks as the rear of the vehicle is poorly visible from the driver seat and mirrors when backing up. I have previously noted this instance a few months ago after the recall for this issue, and yet the issue is persisting. There are no warnings or indicators of an electrical or other problem. I have not taken this in for servicing for this problem. But this issue is reproducible every time getting into the car and putting it into reverse, on the center display where the cameras would display, an error message appears, again, exactly as occurred prior to the recall. In summary, despite recall, rear view cameras/backup cameras do not properly work when putting the car into reverse to reverse.

NHTSA ID

11703091

Incident

Dec 4, 2025

An ongoing issue with Polestar 2 vehicles has been its unreliable rear camera. When reversing, the rear camera does not always engage, leaving either a blank space on the dashboard screen or sometimes the phrase “Rear camera currently unavailable”. This continues to occur despite software updates from the manufacturer.

NHTSA ID

11702172

Incident

Dec 1, 2025

-The rearview camera fails intermittently when gearshift is placed in reverse and when the car drives in reverse. -Passengers and pedestrians are at risk of collision due to restricted view around vehicle. -I have not reported the problem to the dealer or manufacturer because they are well aware that this problem exists, although they claim it was remedied by software updates. -I have not had my vehicle inspected by anyone to date, but will do so if the problem is not effectively addressed soon. -There is a warning message at the time the vehicle is placed in reverse that the rearview camera is temporarily unavailable. -The problem, and the error messages, have been recurring for months. -In addition, as a result of the software changes, the vehicle radio and Google maps fail intermittently.

NHTSA ID

11698981

Incident

Nov 2, 2025

The back up camera repeatedly fails, and does not work, when I put my car into reverse.

NHTSA ID

11693369

Incident

Oct 12, 2025

Infotainment system continues to be intermittently unresponsive. Today, the system was totally frozen which made it so heat/air conditioning could not be controlled, no sound for turn signals were present, and backup camera was not functioning.

NHTSA ID

11692572

Incident

Oct 10, 2025

Rear camera does not work quite often and I get a message that the system the rear camera is unavailable. This is a safety hazard when reversing the vehicle. Polestar stated that the new software they released a few months back would fix this but it did not fix it at all (software version 3.6.4)

NHTSA ID

11690853

Incident

Jul 7, 2025

I received the NHTSA Recall No. 25V-280 and had the vehicle updated to Software 3.6.4 in July 2025. Following this update I still have issues with the rear camera while the vehicle is in reverse. This includes 1) the camera not available with the system showing this error, 2) the camera not available with the screen continuing to show content not related to the camera, and 3) when the camera is available there are refresh issues that cause interrupted visibility concerns.

NHTSA ID

11689653

Incident

Sep 24, 2025

The rear view camera does not always work when putting the car into reverse and gives a "Camera Unavailable" error. My car is on the latest software revision which was supposed to resolve this, but it is still occuring. With the very small rear window, having a 100% working rear camera is imperative.

NHTSA ID

11686386

Incident

Sep 9, 2025

The reserve camera shows unavailable after the recall software update. My car is on 3.6.4 and camera unavailable happened twice in one day.

NHTSA ID

11682991

Incident

Aug 24, 2025

A recall was issued April 25 because the rear camera fails. It is supposed to be addressed by OTA software update. I have NOT received an update, and I've been unable to get an appt to have it installed by Service. It's been 4 months, and I'm told there are no appts for several more months. This seems very dangerous...

NHTSA ID

11681966

Incident

Apr 25, 2025

Backup camera becomes unavailable. This is after the latest update supposedly to fix the issue.

NHTSA ID

11678023

Incident

Aug 2, 2025

When reversing, the backup camera often displays "Camera is temporarily unavailable". This prevents me from safely backing up because there is poor visibility directly through the back window. This can easily be reproduced and replicated on any Polestar 2, and happens most frequently on startup of vehicle and backing up. This was already the subject of a recall that Polestar offered a software update for. However, despite the software update, it continues to happen regularly. I an updated to software version 3.6.4 and still get this problem.

NHTSA ID

11677916

Incident

Aug 1, 2025

Backup camera consistently fails to initialize when putting the car in reverse.

NHTSA ID

11677902

Incident

Aug 1, 2025

Specifically related to the two items checked above as the rear camera failing to come on when the vehicle is put into reverse software 3.6.4 was supposed to correct this issue, but it has since come back.

NHTSA ID

11677718

Incident

Jul 31, 2025