Dacia Duster – Reliability & safety
An average Euro NCAP score is disappointing, but there’s more safety tech on board than ever
A 22nd-place finish in the manufacturers’ standings put Dacia in the lower half of the table in our 2024 Driver Power customer satisfaction survey. Unsurprisingly, it ranked highest of every brand when it comes to value for money, and the cost of running was another area where it was rated among the best.
The new Duster hasn’t been in the hands of owners long enough to feature in our Driver Power car satisfaction survey, although the previous generation came first in our 2024 list of the best models to own, so we hope that the latest version will continue this trend.
A three-star Euro NCAP safety rating is a little underwhelming, and is caused by a shortfall of driver-assistance systems and a merely adequate Adult Occupant Protection mark.
On a positive note, the Duster was praised for its strong passenger compartment, but it’s a little worrying that in the frontal impact tests, chest protection for both the driver and passengers seated in the back was only rated as being marginal.
There are more safety features on the Dacia Duster than ever before to help prevent you from getting into a collision in the first place. Among them are automatic emergency braking, traffic sign recognition, a speed-limit alert, rear-parking assist, lane-departure warning, lane-keep assist and driver-attention alert.
Many drivers can find these systems intrusive. The Duster’s solution is the ‘My Safety’ button on the dashboard, which drivers just have to press twice, activating a personalised mode for the ADAS suite.
| Key standard safety features | Euro NCAP safety ratings |
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Warranty
While a three-year warranty looks pretty unremarkable when compared with some rivals, as long as those cars are brought back to a main dealer for scheduled servicing, the cover can be extended up to seven years or 75,000 miles.
The battery in the Duster Hybrid is covered for eight years or 100,000 miles, but the degradation limit of 63 per cent capacity is greater than the coverage offered by other manufacturers, who guarantee the battery pack won’t drop below 70 per cent.
Servicing
The Duster is available with a variety of main dealer service plans, with a three-year package coming in at less than £500. All plans above the basic three-year/30,000-mile package come with one free MOT test.
