79.7%
Audi A6
Audi A6 vs BMW 5 Series
Buying a used Audi A6 or BMW 5 Series? Compare their MOT pass rates, common problems, mileage and how they hold up as they get older.
Already found one of them? Check its finance, write-off, theft, mileage and keeper history with a £15 vehicle history report.
MOT pass rate head to head
Initial MOT tests in 2025, retests excluded. The UK average across all cars is 72.3%.
79.7%
BMW 5 Series
0
percentage point gap
On this measure there is nothing between them, so the decision comes down to the individual car. The figures come from 122,793 tests of the Audi A6 and 205,807 of the BMW 5 Series.
A pass rate is not a reliability score. It records whether cars met the roadworthiness standard on test day.
Which one holds up better with age?
A headline pass rate mixes three-year-old cars with fifteen-year-old ones. Split by age, you can see what each model does over time.
The BMW 5 Series gives up less as it gets older. Between cars aged 3 to 5 years and those aged 11 years and over it loses 15.2 percentage points against 17.4 for the Audi A6, a difference of 2.2 points.
| Age at test | A6 | 5 Series |
|---|---|---|
| 3 to 5 years | 89.7% | 87.8% |
| 6 to 10 years | 83.8% | 84.8% |
| 11 years and over | 72.3% | 72.6% |
On a ten-year-old example that is the figure to weigh, not the headline number.
What each one fails on
The areas testers recorded most often across every failed 2025 test for each model, as a share of recorded failure items.
Audi A6
BMW 5 Series
Both models fail most often on tyres, which tells you what to look at on either. The difference between them is in what comes next on each list. These are recorded failure categories, not faults every car has.
The specific items testers wrote down
One level deeper than the category: the individual defects recorded most often on each model.
Audi A6
- Tread depth tread depth below requirements of 1.6mm
- Pins and bushes pin or bush excessively worn
- Malfunction indicator lamp inoperative or indicates a malfunction
BMW 5 Series
- Tread depth tread depth below requirements of 1.6mm
- Coil spring fractured or broken
- Condition has ply or cords exposed
What this comparison can't tell you
Everything above describes two models across the whole UK fleet. It says nothing about the one car in the advert. Two A6s of the same year and mileage can be worth thousands apart because of finance, a write-off, a theft record or a clocked odometer, none of which appear in MOT data.
Check the car you are about to buy. One £15 report, instant results, backed by a £30,000 data guarantee.
- Outstanding finance
- Write-off records
- Stolen markers
- Mileage history
- Previous keepers
Read more on each car
Other comparisons with these cars
Audi A6 vs BMW 5 Series FAQs
Is the Audi A6 or the BMW 5 Series more likely to pass its MOT?
They are level. Both recorded a 79.7% first-time MOT pass rate in the DVSA 2025 data, so the model badge is not the thing to decide on. The individual car is.
Does a higher MOT pass rate mean a more reliable car?
No. An MOT records whether a vehicle met the roadworthiness standard on the day it was tested. It does not test the engine, clutch or gearbox, and it does not measure how often a car breaks down. Pass rates are useful for comparing how two models are holding up across the whole UK fleet, and nothing more than that.
Which holds up better with age, the Audi A6 or the BMW 5 Series?
The BMW 5 Series. Between cars aged 3 to 5 years and those aged 11 years and over, it loses 15.2 percentage points of MOT pass rate against 17.4 for the Audi A6 in the 2025 data.
Which is cheaper to keep on the road, the Audi A6 or the BMW 5 Series?
This data does not price servicing or repairs, so it cannot answer that directly. What it does show is what each model most often fails on, which is a fair guide to where the money goes. The Audi A6 fails most often on tyres. The BMW 5 Series fails most often on tyres.
How do I check the actual Audi A6 I have found?
Enter its registration. A Carpeep car history check reports outstanding finance, insurance write-off markers, stolen markers, the mileage recorded at every MOT, previous keepers, tax and MOT status, import and export markers and scrapped status in one £15 report. None of that appears in model-level MOT statistics.
MOT figures are aggregated from the DVSA MOT Anonymised data set for 2025 (class 4 initial tests, retests excluded), licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. MOT results describe roadworthiness at test, not mechanical reliability.