I purchased the car in October, 2023. The problem first happened in October, 2025 and not happened just once. The vehicle breaks unnecessarily and violently without any warning. Additionally the pre-sense collision indicator light displays when there is no apparent person, vehicle or object in the vicinity of the vehicle. The abrupt breaking is the most concerning since it has happened multiple times and at one point, I was in the middle of an intersection making a left turn into a shopping center on a busy street. There were cars coming in the distance but far enough away that it should not have stopped. Luckily they were far enough away that they could see me stopped because I could not get the car to move until I put the car in park and then back into drive. Additionally, there were cars behind me which could have easily rear ended me due to the unexplained abrupt stop. I have taken the vehicle to the dealer for the issue and they were not able to recreate the problem. They told me they changed some settings on the sensors and to keep the outside sensors clean. I keep my car very clean and do not live in an area where debris would accumulated on the sensors to create a problem. The adjustments they made did not help and I still experience the problems. I will be taking it back to the dealer again to report it again to them. At this point I do not feel safe driving the car and will express that to the dealer when I take it in.
While driving at about 60 mph on highway, several systems in the car failed without prior warning. The message on dashboard said Catastrophic Electric System Failure. Brakes would not work for a moment and then started working. All windows came down and went up on their own. No lights were working. No blinkers or side lights were working. With a lot of difficulty and hand signals moved to the hard shoulder. The engine would not turn off for several minutes and turned off after multiple attempts. Audi tested the vehicle and found multiple DTC's in various modules - all sporadic and happened at the same time. Audi did software update and is waiting for another software update to be approved by EPA. The Director of Service at Audi thinks the failure may be also due to a problem with hardware/battery. He said he does not trust the vehicle in its current state and the vehicle is presently grounded at the dealership.
No injuries · No fire · No crash
On August 11th, 2026 right before noon, the sunroof on my Audi Q5 (hybrid, 2021 model) exploded without warning. Luckily noone was hurt but the explosion alone was enough to distract someone to run off the road. Luckily there were no pedestrians around otherwise they could have been hit by flying glass. And luckily the sunroof cover was protecting me otherwise the glass would have been all over the cabin. I had never heard of exploding sunroofs but have since learned that it’s a known problem. I realize there was an investigation which was eventually called off with no results, but I want you to know that the problem is still there. There was nothing wrong with our sunroof. I wasn’t hit by any debris, it just exploded out of nowhere. I seriously thought I was shot at. I am emailing to bring this back to your attention in the hopes that you don’t shrug this off. The explosion was loud and freaked me out. People could have gotten hurt.
No injuries · No fire · No crash
On August 11th, 2026 right before noon, the sunroof on my Audi Q5 (hybrid, 2021 model) exploded without warning. Luckily noone was hurt but the explosion alone was enough to distract someone to run off the road. Luckily there were no pedestrians around otherwise they could have been hit by flying glass. And luckily the sunroof cover was protecting me otherwise the glass would have been all over the cabin. I had never heard of exploding sunroofs but have since learned that it’s a known problem. I realize there was an investigation which was eventually called off with no results, but I want you to know that the problem is still there. There was nothing wrong with our sunroof. I wasn’t hit by any debris, it just exploded out of nowhere. I seriously thought I was shot at. I am emailing to bring this back to your attention in the hopes that you don’t shrug this off. The explosion was loud and freaked me out. People could have gotten hurt.
No injuries · No fire · No crash
I and my wife were emerging from an intetstate highway entrance ramp when our car suddenly and completely lost power. A "Transmission Malfunction" warning suddenly (and for the first time) appeared on the dashboard.We had just completed a merge with heavy traffic going 70-75 miles per hour. Immediately behind our car was a very large tractor-trailer that hit its brakes but came within inches of the rear of our car before we could get on the highway shoulder--i.e., we came extremely close to suffering serious injury or death. The car was towed to the nearest Audi dealer, where it was determined that the Transmission Control Module had to be replaced, at a cost of $8,000. The warranty on the car is 4 years/40,000 miles, while our car is 5 years, 2 months old, and has 47,000 miles on the odometer. The dealer (Flow Audi of Charlottesville) confirmed the car's problem and determined that, because of the threat to safety, the cost of the repair, and the lack of any previous warning, it should be covered by warranty in spite of the car's age and mileage, but Audi has refused to do so. Audi has been aware of this problem with Q5e (plug-in hybrid) models such as ours, as they have published a Technical Service Bulletin about it (without provision for the affected vehicles to be examined or repaired). The vehicle is still at the dealer for repair (as of 06/08/2026).
No injuries · No fire · No crash
