EVwire brief: Volkswagen is recalling 22,524 ID.4 crossovers in the United States over a potential battery fire risk. The German automaker is advising VW ID.4 owners to limit charging to 80% until a permanent fix is ready.
The recall covers 2023 to 2026 ID.4s built between January 1, 2023 and February 1, 2025, according to Volkswagen's safety recall report filed with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). The affected high-voltage batteries were supplied by Georgia-based SK Battery America.
Volkswagen estimates that only 0.1% of the recalled vehicles actually have the defect. This means that around two dozen ID.4s are expected to be affected.
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Volkswagen has yet to pin down what's causing the issue, as it noted in its recall report:
"The root cause is unknown, however in certain high-voltage batteries within the affected vehicle population, certain charging profiles combined with a state of charge over 80% may trigger thermal propagation within the high-voltage battery."
While Volkswagen tries to figure out the root cause of the issue, owners will get warning stickers to place in specific spots in their vehicles, reminding them not to charge the battery past 80%. Some ID.4s may also get their maximum state of charge capped at 80%, depending on the vehicle's configuration and online connectivity.
Interim letters are expected to go out to owners on November 27, 2026, with more letters to follow once the remedy is ready. Owners can check if their ID.4 is affected on NHTSA.gov, where VINs covered by the recall have been searchable since October 6. Volkswagen's own number for the recall is 93EX.
Here's NHTSA's acknowledgement letter for the recall:
If thermal propagation occurs, with heat from a failing battery cell spreading to the cells around it, Volkswagen said it may result in a vehicle fire. The automaker used assembly, battery traceability, supplier and charging records to narrow down the recall population, leaving out ID.4s with cells produced outside the suspect range or with recent charging data below its threshold.
The recall follows a months-long investigation, which began in June when Volkswagen's Product Safety Committee ordered a field study after early data pointed to a possible link between battery thermal events, isolation-resistance values and DC charging ratios. The committee reviewed the results on September 21 and decided on a voluntary recall two days later, with Volkswagen identifying 22 claims from US customers between January 18, 2024 and August 7, 2026.
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Context:
This isn't the first time Volkswagen has recalled ID.4s over high-voltage batteries. In its filing, the automaker noted that the field study behind the recent recall looked at battery systems from vehicles that weren't covered by its earlier HV battery recall campaigns.
For a sense of scale, EV battery fires remain rare. A report from EV FireSafe, which EVwire covered back in 2024, verified 511 EV battery thermal runaway incidents worldwide from 2010 to June 2024. EVwire estimated that this works out to roughly a 0.0013% chance of an EV fire.
Charging does play a role in some of these cases, though. About 15% of the incidents in the 2024 report's most recent 12-month period happened while the vehicle was charging.
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