2010 Kia Soul — Should You Buy One?
Typical asking price: $3,500–$6,500. There is 1 high-severity known issue you need to know before handing over a check.
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Kestrel Take
The first-year Soul, and the record has an unusual shape: 135 complaints with 15 fires in them, and the biggest cluster is the electrical system with 11 of those fires — the pulsing speaker lights in the front doors had a wiring harness that could short and set the door panel alight, and there is a recall for it. That is the first thing to check on any 2010 Soul. After that it is a brake light switch recall shared with half the Kia range, an airbag cluster that is mostly crash non-deployment reports we cannot inspect for, and an interior that scratches if you look at it. At this price it is cheap transport with a real personality; buy one with both recalls closed, a dry, unmarked door panel around the speaker, and an automatic that shifts without a flare, and budget for the age rather than the model.
What we checked
Reconciled against public records, 2026-09-25
NHTSA holds 135 owner complaints for the 2010 Kia Soul, and 3 recall campaigns.
A big number here usually means a lot of these were sold, not that it is a bad vehicle — popular models collect more complaints for the same rate of trouble. So the total on its own says little. What is worth reading is the shape of it. The largest single group is electrics and electronics at 21%. That is notable without being overwhelming — worth checking, not worth panicking about.
3 recall campaigns cover this model year. Recalls are repaired free, for any owner, with no time limit on most safety campaigns — but only if someone books it in. Ask the seller to show it was done, or have any dealer check the VIN; it takes them a couple of minutes and costs nothing.
Looked at and set aside: airbags (21) — 21 complaints, 16 of them filed after a crash to report the airbags did not deploy, plus one Takata letter and one runaway acceleration report. There is no airbag recall on this year's record, and a buyer cannot inspect for non-deployment; the same pattern appears on every year of this Soul.
Counts come from the NHTSA complaint and recall database — free, public, and worth checking yourself.
Known Issues for the 2010 Kia Soul
Ranked by wallet impact. These are documented, recurring problems — not freak accidents. How we decide that.
Recall 10V388 covers 2010 Souls built September 7, 2009 to July 30, 2010: the wiring harness for the light-up speakers in the front doors can short when the lights are on, and the door panel catches fire. Owners describe smoke from the speaker grille while backing out of a parking space, then the door melting and burning. The remedy is a replacement harness, free. The electrical cluster also holds a horn that stops working, a battery that died twice in a year, and the automatic transmission harness written up below. Run the VIN on NHTSA's recall lookup, then look and smell: a heat-discoloured or warped speaker grille on either front door is a car that has already had the short.
Repair cost: $0 with the recall — verify it was performed
Source: NHTSA complaints filed under electrics and electronics (28); 3 NHTSA recall campaigns on this model year.
Recall 13V114 covers the 2010 Soul among a long list of Kias: the brake pedal switch can fail, so the brake lights do not come on, the cruise control will not disengage with the pedal, the shifter may refuse to leave Park, and the push-button start (where fitted) may not work. The fix is a new switch, free, and it takes minutes. Have someone stand behind the car while you press the pedal, and check the VIN lookup shows the campaign closed — it was issued in 2013 and plenty of cars never went back.
Repair cost: $0 with the recall — verify it was performed
Source: 3 NHTSA recall campaigns on this model year.
The four-speed automatic in this Soul uses an internal wiring harness with the fluid temperature sensor built in, and owners of Kias and Hyundais with this gearbox report it failing well before 100,000 miles. The codes are P0713 (temperature sensor) and P0765 (shift solenoid D), and the car goes into a limp mode with harsh shifts or a missing gear. The harness itself is a modest part; the labour is the bill. On the test drive, drive from cold and look for a flare between second and third or a clunk into Drive, and have a scanner pulled for stored transmission codes.
Repair cost (estimate): $300–$900 for the harness and sensor; $1,800–$3,200 for a used or rebuilt transmission — around 64% of what this car is typically worth
Source: NHTSA complaints filed under the transmission and drivetrain (11).
Recall 14V822 covers 2010–2013 Souls with a sunroof: a plate in the headliner can detach when the side curtain airbag deploys and hit an occupant. The remedy is industrial adhesive strips to hold the plate, applied free at a dealer. Only sunroof cars are affected, so check the roof first; if it has one, check the VIN. This cluster also holds two owners whose hatch glass shattered on its own while closing a door, and two crash fires, one of them a car that burned 15 minutes after a 10 mph hit on a tree.
Repair cost: $0 with the recall — verify it was performed
Source: NHTSA complaints filed under the body and structure (21); 3 NHTSA recall campaigns on this model year.
Most of the structure cluster is the same complaint written six ways: the hard plastic on the door panels, pillars, console and glove box marks so easily that a one-year-old car looked ten years old, and a dealer told one owner the interior had hurt the trade-in value. Kia promised a fix that never came. It is cosmetic and costs nothing to live with, but it is a fair negotiating point on a car whose value is already mostly gone. Look at the driver's door panel where the seat belt buckle touches it.
Repair cost (estimate): $0–$150 for a trim panel from a breaker
Source: NHTSA complaints filed under the body and structure (21).
Walk-Away Red Flags
- ✗Heat-discoloured, warped or replaced speaker grille on either front door
- ✗Brake lights that stay off when a helper presses the pedal
- ✗Flare or clunk between gears on a cold automatic
- ✗Sunroof car with recall 14V822 open on the VIN lookup
- ✗Horn that works some presses and not others
Good Signs
- ✓Recall 10V388 shown closed on the NHTSA VIN lookup, with the original speaker lights still working
- ✓Brake light switch recall 13V114 closed, brake lights bright with the pedal
- ✓Invoice for a transmission harness or a fluid service on the four-speed automatic
- ✓Smooth shifts from cold through all four gears with a clean transmission scan
- ✓Manual-transmission car, which avoids the automatic's harness entirely
Found a specific Kia Soul?
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Known issues on this page are based on documented owner reports, NHTSA complaints, class-action records, and manufacturer technical service bulletins. Individual vehicles vary. A pre-purchase inspection by a trusted mechanic is always worth doing.
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