2008 Toyota HIGHLANDER - Ratings, Complaints and Recalls

The 2008 Toyota Highlander 4-DR. w/SAB has received exemplary safety ratings in various crash scenarios. It scored a 5 in both the front crash driver side rating and side crash driver side rating, while also achieving a 4 in the front crash passenger side rating. The rollover ratings were also favorable, with a score of 4. This model comes equipped with standard electronic stability control, which enhances the vehicle's handling in challenging driving conditions. However, it does not have forward collision warning or lane departure warning features.

On the downside, there have been a relatively high number of complaints, totaling 388, and the car has been subject to 13 recalls. Despite these concerns, the overall safety performance of the 2008 Toyota Highlander is commendable, making it a solid choice for those prioritizing safety on the road.

auto generated summary, may be inaccurate.

Top stats at a glance

Complaint Count

388

Recall Count

13

Investigation Count

2

Safety Rating

Not Rated

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Safety Features

2008 Toyota Highlander 4-DR. w/SAB Safety Features

Here are the safety features that come as standard on the 2008 Toyota Highlander 4-DR. w/SAB

Electronic Stability Control (ESC)

ESC is an advanced safety feature in vehicles designed to help drivers maintain control during challenging driving conditions. By continuously monitoring various factors such as steering angle, vehicle speed, and individual wheel speeds, ESC can detect and reduce the risk of skidding or loss of control. It achieves this by automatically applying brakes to specific wheels to stabilize the vehicle.

Standard
Forward Collision Warning (FCW)

Forward Collision Warning (FCW) is a safety feature in vehicles that helps prevent frontal collisions by alerting the driver of an imminent collision with a vehicle or obstacle ahead. Using sensors such as radar or cameras, FCW monitors the distance and speed of vehicles in front, and if it detects a potential collision, it provides visual and/or auditory warnings to prompt the driver to take evasive action.

No
Lane Departure Warning (LDW)

Lane Departure Warning (LDW) is a safety feature in vehicles that alerts drivers when their vehicle unintentionally drifts out of its lane without signaling. Utilizing cameras or sensors to monitor lane markings on the road, LDW detects when the vehicle crosses these lines and triggers visual, auditory, or haptic alerts to notify the driver of potential lane departure.

No

2008 Toyota Highlander 4-DR. w/SAB Safety Ratings

Here we have the crash and rollover ratings for the 2008 Toyota Highlander 4-DR. w/SAB Where possible we've included the ratings for the oldest and latest models of this car so you can compare how the safety ratings have changed over time.

Frontal Crash Ratings

Combines Driver and Passenger star ratings into a single frontal rating. The frontal barrier test simulates a head-on collision between two similar vehicles, each moving at 35 mph.

Test 2005 Score 2008 Score 2024 Score
Overall Front Crash Rating Not Rated Not Rated 4
Front Crash Driver Side Rating 5 5 4
Front Crash Passenger Side Rating 5 4 4

Side Crash Ratings

Combines Side Barrier and Side Pole Star Ratings into a single side rating.

Test 2005 Score 2008 Score 2024 Score
Overall Side Crash Rating Not Rated Not Rated 5
Side Crash Drivers Side Rating 5 5 5
Side Crash Passenger Side Rating 5 5 5
Combined Side Barrier Pole Rating - Front Not Rated Not Rated 5
Combined Side Barrier Pole Rating - Rear Not Rated Not Rated 5
Overall Side Barrier Rating Not Rated Not Rated 5

Rollover Ratings

The Rollover Resistance test measures the risk of rollover in a single-vehicle, loss-of-control scenario.

Test 2005 Score 2008 Score 2024 Score
Rollover Rating 4 4 4
Rollover Possibility % 0% 0% 0%
Dynamic Tip Result No Tip No Tip No Tip
Side Pole Crash Rating Not Rated Not Rated 5

Complaints for the 2008 Toyota HIGHLANDER

This chart show the number of complaints for each car component. A Higher number of complaints could indicate that this car might have a common fault. Something to look out for when purchasing one.

Component Complaints

Choose a component to see what complaints people have made about them.

Complaint:
"on september 25, 2021, my husband was driving our 2008 highlander locally to the store. the low pressure light came on and said pull over immediately. he pulled over and and checked the oil dip stick and our car was totally out of oil. he also notice oil under our car and a line of oil going up the street. the following day, i contacted toyota experience center and was informed their were no service campaigns on my highlander. i had the car towed to my local mechanic and he verified that the car had no oil and replaced the failed oil cooler hose. my concern is that the oil cooler hose failed, draining all of the oil in minutes. i feel this is a safety issue because of how rapidly it occurred and if we couldn't immediately stop the car our engine could have seized up and made the car stop."
Components Involved: ENGINE
Date of incident: 2023-01-09
Complaint:
"i was driving my vehicle on a short trip on the highway with my eight year old daughter when a hose on the engine oil cooling assembly burst. this resulted in all of the oil in the vehicle being drained in a very short amount of time. no warning light came on as a result of this. i didn't discover the issue until pulling back into my driveway in which there is an incline. then the light indicating low oil pressure finally came on. i opened the hood and found the dipstick to be completely dry. i also found a slow drip of oil under the car (only slow since it was only a small amount of oil remaining). i then discovered that the entire undercarriage of the vehicle as well as the back hatch of the vehicle were covered with oil. my daughter and i are very fortunate that the oil that covered the vehicle did not catch fire and as far as i know the oil slick on the highway did not cause any accidents. i am now being told by toyota that this is a known issue, but it is not listed as a recall. not only did their known engineering issue put my family and other families' lives in danger, they are also not willing to pay for the repairs of the damage to the vehicle that their known defect caused. there is a "warranty enhancement" that was issued by toyota for this defect. according to toyota the warranty enhancement notice was issued to the previous owner of my vehicle and i was not made aware of the issue. i have also had other work performed at the dealership since then and was never made aware of the defect or warranty enhancement. i am trying to understand how a manufacturer can know a defect exists that can potentially cause engine seizure, fire and accidents, but not issue a recall. instead they limit the notice to a "warranty enhancement" which isn't caught by the dealership from a vin check."
Components Involved: ENGINE
Date of incident: 2020-12-12
Complaint:
"while driving on i40 near texas/nm state line, oil cooler line failed resulting in the highlander dumping oil on the roadway for over a mile before it was noticed. pulled off immediately, saw oil pouring out from bottom passenger side of engine cover. exterior lower passenger side and rear of vehicle were also covered in oil. no dash indicator lights ever warned of issue. this left us stranded on side of busy interstate with heavy semi traffic for hours while waiting for a tow to a shop for repairs, where we had to wait a day for the part. completely unacceptable toyota knew of a defective design that could lead to accidents and death, and chose not to issue a recall! will be seeking legal action."
Components Involved: ENGINE
Date of incident: 2022-06-11
Complaint:
"the incident happened while i was driving my family north on interstate 81 at 1:00 am. we were traveling at about 75 mph. in my driver-side mirror, i noticed what looked like a mist getting kicked up behind the car and covering the rear window. in the dark, i couldn't tell if it was water or some other liquid. the road was dry so my wife and i planned to get off on the next exit and inspect the car, we had children in the car, and stopping on the side of the road did not seem safe. while we were looking for the next exit, i kept looking for indicator lights to come on and checking the temperature gauge to see if i could discern if there was anything wrong with the vehicle. no indicator lights came on and the temperature gauge stayed within normal levels. then after a few minutes, about 5-6 minutes, the engine seized. all of the indicator lights came on and the display said there was a problem with the vsc system. thankfully the car continued to roll and i was able to pull the car to the side of the road and turn on the emergency blinkers and called for assistance. when finally we got the car towed to the nearest toyota dealership we were informed that the oil coolant line had "blown" and our engine had seized from a loss of engine oil. two weeks before this incident the car also displayed the vsc warning so we had the car towed to beaman toyota where we paid 1818.60 to have, among other things, the water pump and drive belt replaced. knowing we were going on the above trip we had all the recommended repairs performed so we could be confident in the car during our trip."
Components Involved: ENGINE
Date of incident: 2021-02-11
Complaint:
"i had an engine oil cooler hose rupture at 131000 miles. i left an oil slick a mile long on the street causing a hazard in the road and a mess in my garage. engine oil had sprayed all over the lower half of the engine and onto the catalytic converter which was heavily smoking and i noticed a small fire down in the lower half of the engine compartment so i had to pour water on the fire. toyota has known about this issue for a good 7 years because i received a "warranty enhancement notice" (ze2) in 2014 stating that the oil cooler hose could spring a "leak" and they were extending the warranty for said part to 10 years or 150,000 miles. but toyota played down the severity of the issue stating that a majority of vehicles with this known defective part wouldn't fail. toyota knew that the rubber hose will fail on all vehicles due to the heat/cool cycle by its close proximity to the catalytic converter (about 6 inches away) so they redesigned the oil cooler lines to be all metal. all toyota/lexus vehicles with the 2gr-fe engine (2007-2011) will experience this catastrophic failure of the rubber oil cooler hose(s) over time and i'm sure vehicle fires have already happened due to this known design flaw."
Components Involved: ENGINE
Date of incident: 2020-04-09
Complaint:
"tl* the contact owns a 2008 toyota highlander. the contact stated that while driving approximately 65 mph, smoke was suddenly present coming from under the passenger side of the front hood before the engine stalled. after stopping and examining under the hood it was discovered no oil was present in the engine and oil had spilled onto the engine. the vehicle was towed to an independent mechanic who diagnosed that the engine oil cooler line had burst causing oil to leak from the engine. the vehicle was not yet repaired. the manufacturer was notified of the failure. the local dealer was not contacted. the failure mileage was 82,652."
Components Involved: ENGINE
Date of incident: 2021-06-07
Complaint:
"tl* the contact owns a 2008 toyota highlander. the contact stated that while driving at 65 mph, the engine oil cooler pipe ruptured without warning which caused the vehicle to stall. the contact pulled over, shutoff the vehicle and inspected the vehicle. the contact became aware that the oil was completely drained from the engine. the vehicle was towed to an independent mechanic to be inspected. the inspection confirmed the driver's assessment. the mechanic informed the contact of a manufacturer's extended warranty coverage on similar vehicles however, the warranty had expired on the vehicle. the contact stated that he was never notified of the extended warranty prior to the failure. the vehicle was not repaired. the failure mileage was 82,156."
Components Involved: ENGINE
Date of incident: 2020-04-07
Complaint:
"while driving my car at approximately 55mph all the dashboard lights flashed and then the check hybrid system light came on and stayed on. it said that there was a problem with the hybrid system to pull over as soon as you could safety and to contact the dealer. well the engine died abruptly and loss power immediately. luckily i was on a one lane road with a shoulder and no one immediately behind me. the mechanic said that it was a lower end motor failure but really could not figure out what is wrong with it. in fact it is still at the mechanic's and they are still trying to figure it out. it appears that it may be the engine inverter but still not sure. this is a very unsafe situation and toyota should have address this. my car is a 2008 highland hybrid with 119,000 miles on. *tr"
Components Involved: ENGINE
Date of incident: 2020-01-05
Complaint:
"the rubber oil cooler line (part number: 040004-29131) of our 2008 toyota highlander burst at 139,000 miles causing an oil spill and complete and irreversible engine failure due to oil starvation while vehicle was in high-speed motion in a congested highway during icy-and foggy conditions. driver managed to remove the vehicle from the road, not causing any accidents, just before the engine irreversibly broke and shut down. two days prior the incident, oil-change scheduled service was performed by a toyota-certified dealership showing no signs of engine/engine oil-cooling line abnormalities. defective software displayed warnings on the dashboard of low engine oil/pressure seconds before the engine shut down. this defective part has been specifically acknowledged in the toyota's 2014 "warranty enhancement program, ze2" for repairs at no cost until january 31, 2016 or past that date for "10 years from the date of first use or 150,000 miles, whichever occurs first." toyota claims they mailed a letter for "several months" after "late july 2014" for ze2 to owners but the owner of this vehicle neither ever received such letter nor was notified by toyota corp./dealership. vehicle has been under *consistent, scheduled, and regular car services* since its original and sole purchase in 2008. this should have been a recall to the nhtsa upon *unreasonably dangerous design* for using rubber pressurized pipes in v6 engines instead of metal-based materials, defective part awareness, incident history, and the extent of the high hazard risk that involves this part failure: oil spill (not oil leaking as stated in ze2) can occur at high resulting in a non-opportunity to prevent vehicle loss and high probabilities of crash, injuries, fire, and/or fatalities. this is also exacerbated by the embedded defective software in terms of poor timing to display engine failure."
Components Involved: ENGINE
Date of incident: 2020-02-03
Complaint:
"the engine oil cooler pipe on my 2008 highlander was defective and leaked at 124,000 mile/12 years (in feb 2020). happened while i was on a highway & smoke in my cabin. toyota has set a limit of extended limited warranty (lcs-ze2) to fix this defect but only if it occurs at < (or equal) 10 yrs or 150,000 miles. many reports on the web indicate cars past the toyota arbitrary cut offs for time and miles. this is a serious safety defect/risk because all of the oil could leak out from a defective pipe & engine could catch fire or freeze. i had smoke in the cabin and a low oil pressure warning light. of note, my car was serviced (oil change) and a multipoint inspection by toyota 3 weeks prior to oil leak (in jan 2020) and the oil leak was not noted. this means that the leak occurred recently and well past the arbitrary time interval/mileage limit set by toyota. at no time did my toyota dealer notify me regarding the extended warranty enhancement or that this could e a problem or nor did my toyota dealer specifically look for this problem on my car during inspection. a full scale recall is required for this defect, not a limited warranty enhancement letter. attached are 1- the invoice to fix the oil engine pipe leak 2- the inspection from toyota dealer with no evidence of an oil leak (jan 2020) 3-warranty & webchat other owners complain of similar dangerous effects of the oil leak and expensive repairs that occurred past the toyota arbitrary limits 4. invoice documenting the oil change (jan 2020) showing no evidence of a leak when toyota set the limits on the extended warranty of 10 years or 150,000 miles, they had no idea if that would be sufficiently in length to catch all the problems. because toyota owners keep their vehicles for a long time, these arbitrary intervals are not sufficient. therefore a full recall is required."
Components Involved: ENGINE
Date of incident: 2021-09-02

Recalls for the 2008 Toyota HIGHLANDER

Component Recalls

Choose a component to see what recalls people have made about them.

Recall:
"gulf states toyota is recalling certain model year 2005-2010 vehicles for failing to comply with the requirements of federal motor vehicle safety standard no. 110, "tire selection and rims." these vehicles were sold between september 1, 2005 and june 2, 2008 without the requisite load carrying capacity modification labels."
Consequence:
THIS DOES NOT MEET THE STANDARD REQUIREMENTS.
Remedy:

DEALERS WILL MAIL TO CONSUMERS THE CORRECTED LABEL OR THE CUSTOMER WILL HAVE THE OPTION FOR DEALERS TO INSTALL THE LABEL FREE OF CHARGE. DEALERS WILL ALSO CORRECT THE OWNER'S MANUAL. THE SAFETY RECALL BEGAN ON MAY 27, 2010. OWNERS MAY CONTACT GULF STATES TOYOTA AT 713-580-3300.

Component(s) Involved: EQUIPMENT > OTHER > LABELS
Date of incident: 2010-02-03
Recall:
"southeast toyota is recalling certain model year 2005-2011 passenger vehicles for failing to comply with the requirements of federal motor vehicle safety standard no. 110, "tire selection and rims." these vehicles were sold without the requisite load carrying capacity modification labels."
Consequence:
A DRIVER MAY OVERLOAD A VEHICLE WHICH MAY INCREASE THE RISK OF A CRASH.
Remedy:

DEALERS WILL MAIL TO CONSUMERS THE CORRECTED LABEL OR THE CUSTOMER WILL HAVE THE OPTION FOR DEALERS TO INSTALL THE LABEL FREE OF CHARGE. THE SAFETY RECALL BEGAN ON MAY 27, 2010. OWNERS MAY CONTACT SOUTHEAST TOYOTA AT 1-800-301-6859.

Component(s) Involved: EQUIPMENT > OTHER > LABELS
Date of incident: 2010-02-03
Recall:
"toyota is recalling 27,080 model year 2005 through 2010 passenger cars built from september 1, 2005 to may 4, 2009. these vehicles were not equipped with load carrying capacity modification labels which fails to conform with the requirements of federal motor vehicle safety standard no. 110, "tire selection and rims.""
Consequence:
INCORRECT LOAD CARRYING CAPACITY MODIFICATION LABELS COULD RESULT IN THE VEHICLE BEING OVERLOADED, INCREASING THE RISK OF A CRASH.
Remedy:

TOYOTA WILL NOTIFY OWNERS AND PROVIDE THEM WITH A NEW, ACCURATE LABEL TO BE INSTALLED OVER THE INACCURATE LABEL FREE OF CHARGE. THE SAFETY RECALL BEGAN ON AUGUST 18, 2009. OWNERS MAY CONTACT TOYOTA AT 1-888-270-9371.

Component(s) Involved: EQUIPMENT > OTHER > LABELS
Date of incident: 2009-06-15

TOYOTA Overall Complaint Ranking

This table shows the ranking of car manufacturers when it comes to most complaints and recalls. The manufacturer with the most complaints is at the top. However this doesn't necassarily mean they should be avoided. Some manufacturers might just have more popular or affordable cars which a lot of people have bought. Which means there's more scope for a complaint to be made. Use the ranking table below as a part your wider research into buying a car.

TOYOTA ranks 3 out of 44 in the complaints ranking table.

Manufacturer Complaint Count Recall Count Ranking
FORD 208,358 3,259 1
CHEVROLET 111,306 2,082 2
TOYOTA 81,019 1,852 3
HONDA 61,937 1,268 4
NISSAN 56,226 930 5
DODGE 45,756 827 6
HYUNDAI 44,150 649 7
GMC 34,441 1,410 8
KIA 29,832 501 9
CHRYSLER 27,698 254 10
TESLA 26,230 730 11
BMW 24,890 1,877 12
VOLKSWAGEN 23,125 829 13
MERCEDES-BENZ 19,066 2,925 14
SUBARU 18,513 703 15
MAZDA 10,599 364 16
PONTIAC 10,430 138 17
CADILLAC 9,434 444 18
AUDI 7,865 1,093 19
BUICK 7,851 279 20
SATURN 7,672 84 21
MERCURY 7,374 135 22
LEXUS 6,373 408 23
LINCOLN 5,897 423 24
ACURA 5,722 382 25
MINI 5,585 366 26
INFINITI 4,000 187 27
MITSUBISHI 3,912 397 28
VOLVO 3,875 727 29
PORSCHE 2,646 1,231 30
SUZUKI 2,272 123 31
FIAT 2,205 80 32
SAAB 1,536 76 33
JAGUAR 1,195 198 34
SMART 528 17 35
GENESIS 436 42 36
ISUZU 249 37 37
ALFA ROMEO 161 37 38
MASERATI 76 46 39
BENTLEY 46 159 40
POLESTAR 42 2 41
LUCID 14 6 42
CODA 4 2 43
MAYBACH 0 0 44

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