The 2021 VW Atlas is equipped with Forward Collision Avoidance Emergency Braking System. This technology detects an imminent accident with the help of sensors onboard. The emergency braking system will automatically stop the car without help if the driver doesn’t respond to an emergency situation.  However many Atlas drivers are reporting problems with the braking system and it not working correctly, requiring many trips to VW dealers for repair.

One 2021 Atlas owner reports to the NHTSA “Hello. I have approx 12000 miles on my vehicle. Vehicle last week gave numerous warning lights and would not start. …Today, while driving the car, it came to a compete stop on the roadway and would not allow me to turn it back on. I drove the car back home and it would continuously stop and I would have to restart. I almost got into two accidents. There needs to be a more serious recall as someone is going to get hurt. Dealership says there is still no fix.”

The 2021 VW Atlas complaints about the forward collision avoidance braking system continues on NHTSA “Although this is not the first issue with my VW 2021 Atlas, it will be my last. As I was driving down a two lane highway to my daughter’s softball practice, the emergency break turned on and my vehicle completely jolted to a stop. By the grace of God, no one was behind us. Prior to this recent incident, the windows started to roll up and down on their own and the “Fault Parking Break” alert will appear on my dash. This occurs randomly, day or night, sunny or rainy, cold or hot. The vehicle has been to the dealership for this issue, but the alert continues.”

Another 2021 VW Atlas owner reports on NHTSA “My car has randomly slammed on the brakes while driving. I was driving with my daughter and when it happened, she thrusted forward and almost hit her head on the dash. The seatbelt did lock. I reported it to my dealer and the car was checked out and found no issues. They just said that people have been complaining about “squeaky” brakes, which I have taken my car in for before along with a grinding noise coming from my front driver side brakes and was told nothing is wrong.”

As of now, Volkswagen has not issued a safety recall for the problems with the emergency braking problems, leaving 2021 VW Atlas owners without the ability to repair the problems.

Electrical Problems

VW prides itself with equipping the 2021 VW Atlas with the most advanced and intuitive technology.  VW states “To enhance your driving experience, we’ve equipped your 2021 VW Atlas with several features, such as keyless access, available wireless charging^⁠ and remote start and more functions including VW Car-Net Safe & Secure, and VW Car-Net Hotspot.”

Despite the claims of advance technology in its 2021 VW Atlas, many owners are experiencing electrical problems and reporting defects including a defective wire harness.   Just read this VW Atlas electrical complaint on NHTSA, “My 2021 Volkswagen Atlas is having an issue with a faulty wiring harness in the driver-side door that causes the car to brake unexpectedly while driving in traffic, putting me at risk of causing an accident or being rear-ended. This issue also causes the windows the randomly roll down, and I can no longer lock or unlock the driver’s side door. When I put the car in drive, the warning light for the door being open comes on the dashboard and it plays the warning sound as if the door is open.”

Read this VW Atlas electrical complaint on Edmunds,  “picked up 2021 Atlas R Line that we purchased from the dealership. Since then, we have had to visit your dealership 5 times (in the past 5 months) for an issue that remains unresolved. Each time that we leave the dealership, we are assured that the issues have been resolved. We now video the problems and send them to the service manager. The infotainment system seems to be the problem – we’ve had continued intermittent issues with the bluetooth not working for phone calls and playing music, radio volume shuts off and we can’t bring the volume up, backup camera freezes or goes black, and climate control don’t work. The car has had two new radio modules installed in an attempt to fix the ongoing issues. We were told by the dealership that this was not a known issue by VW and our vehicles was the only one with this problems. We approached two with the same vehicle and they had experienced similar problems. We love the vehicle when it works but would not recommend buying one until these problems are fixed.”