2025 Polestar Polestar 3

The car software seemed to be experiencing a few glitches, and we arrived home and put it in park. Then front passenger door would not open from the inside, nor would the rear passenger doors, with kids in the backseat. Despite locking and unlocking, the doors would not open. I climbed out the driver window, and went around to open the doors, and despite the external door handle being up/open, the doors would not pull open, it was hard because there was slight wiggle in it like something was blocking it, but it would not open. The driver door would open and everyone climbed out. I plugged the car in, and got back in to try and perform a soft and hard reset, and none of those functions were working. We are still waiting to hear back from polestar.

Previous on board charger (GHCA) failed and was replaced in January of 2026. In February I noticed the car was charging slowly on a 48A home charger (car showed 5.4kw at 22A). I unplugged the charger, waited a minute, and plugged it back in. The car then reinitialized charging and showed 11kw at 48A. The car then started making audible electrical crackling noises. I have a video in which you can hear the crackling. Is this a fire hazard?

The contact owns a 2025 Polestar Polestar 3. The contact stated that while driving approximately 3 MPH in a parking lot, as he depressed the brake pedal, to slow down the vehicle did not slow down. The contact stated no warning light illuminated. The contact stated that the vehicle jumped a curb and ran over some shrubbery. The contact stated that the passenger side front and rear doors had scraped a light pole, and then the vehicle rolled out of the parking lot and over a retaining wall. The contact stated that the vehicle landed on a sidewalk and then continued out onto a road below the parking lot and finally stopped. The contact stated that a warning had illuminated that his rear driver's side tire had deflated. The contact stated that the lower front bumper had been damaged, and some plastic parts of the driver's side wheel well had broken off. The contact had no personal injuries. The contact was able to drive the vehicle back to the parking lot and had the vehicle towed to a collision shop. The contact had not taken the vehicle to a dealer for any diagnostic tests. The vehicle had not yet been repaired. The manufacturer was not informed of the failure. The failure mileage was 745.

The one pedal driving / regenerative braking would randomly deactivate. I have my car set on high one pedal driving. 99.9% of the time, the one pedal driving would work as expected with the car slowing down as the accelerator is released. However, the car would randomly deactivate one pedal driving, so when I release the accelerator, instead of slowing down or stopping, the car would continue going, some times it feels like there's even a slight surge. This has happened several times at slow parking lot speed and at fast highway speed. There's no warning. It's just random. It hasn't been inspected by the dealer yet.

Onboard AC charging has failed 3 times in 4 months. Each time the GHCA has been replaced with a new charger. When the GHCA shorts out it only impacts AC charging leaving everything else working normally. DC charging is not impacted and works normally. Each time the issue with the GHCA has been verified and confirmed by the Polestar service center in Princeton, NJ in September 2025, October 2025 & December 2025. When the issue occurs there is a loud pop and the AC charging message changes to waiting. It does not go out of the waiting state until the GHCA unit is replaced

As reported on Polestar Forums, the car throws critical system errors telling you to park, call support, etc. while driving. These alerts are false... Usually you ignore them and they go away the next time you start the car. The issue is a safety issue...when you are driving and you get a critical alert (error message), it diverts your attention and you need to pull over. On the highway this is extremely dangerous. My last error was yesterday... it said "Stop Safely - Critical suspension fault". I was close to home so I drove there, parked the car, turned it off. When I came out later and started the car, it was gone.... The list of errors reported is long... Critical Brake Issue, Critical Battery Error, etc. This vehicle also has issues where the system needs to be soft booted every few days to keep the screens up and the services working. This is totally unacceptable and dangerous. What happens when you ignore a real error and cause a major accident?

My vehicle has experienced repeated and unresolved software/firmware failures that cause loss of essential vehicle functionality and repeated vehicle immobilization. Since purchase, the vehicle has been taken out of service multiple times for software-related repairs, including firmware updates and system resets, yet the problems persist and the vehicle cannot be relied upon to operate normally. The failures are not cosmetic or infotainment-only; they affect core vehicle systems and overall operability. After service visits, the vehicle is often returned with the same or new software-related issues, requiring additional service visits and extended downtime. The cumulative time out of service now exceeds 30 days. An authorized Polestar dealer principal, who also serves on the brand’s national leadership board, explained to me that U.S.-spec vehicles are running materially different firmware than vehicles sold in other markets. According to this explanation, Chinese-developed firmware was removed for U.S. regulatory reasons and replaced with U.S.-developed firmware that was not fully validated at the time of sale. As a result, U.S. customers are effectively acting as beta testers for unstable software. Because modern EV software controls safety-critical vehicle functions, a vehicle that repeatedly fails, becomes immobilized, or cannot be reliably restored to service after software updates presents a safety and reliability concern. The vehicle’s unpredictable behavior and lack of dependable operation raise concerns beyond inconvenience and indicate a potential systemic defect affecting U.S.-spec vehicles.

Onboard charger (OBC), which is the unit that converts AC power (what home wall outlets have) to DC power (what the battery holds/uses has failed 3 times now in less than a year of ownership. Brand new car, leased from Polestar. 3/21/25 - Picked up car from Polestar Lisle, as soon as I got home from the dealership, it didn’t work out of the gate, couldn’t home charge. Ever. 5/8/25 - OBC replaced (first time) 6/2/25 - OBC replaced (second time), can’t remember when it actually failed. But this was the second repair date. 11/19/25 - OBC failed a 3rd time, first available repair date 12/26. 12/26/25 came and went, no part, no ETA. Meanwhile, I’m stuck having to pay about 3x the cost to charge at various superchargers/DC fast chargers since it can DC charge only. Paying a lease for an electric car that I can’t charge at home. Each time it breaks, I have to spend a lot of my time driving to and from the dealership for repairs, taking various less desirable loner cars (usually a Volvo XC40 or XC60). Just a big investment of my time (driving to and from dealership about a dozen times over the past 9 months), and financial cost of charging at 3x the rate, essentially at my own expense. Frustrating that a literally brand new car has had 3 pretty critical failures in less than a year of ownership and all the costs are dumped on the consumer. Paying full price for a car I can’t fully use (can’t charge at home, have to spend hours of my time just parked at charging stations)