Car Recall Alerts

Find out your car has a safety recall — the repair is free.

com.ibrahimtxy.carrecall · Auto & Vehicles

A recall letter goes to the address the manufacturer has on file, which for most used cars is the previous owner's. NHTSA publishes every campaign as open data the day it is filed, and nobody reads it on your behalf.

This app is NOT affiliated with NHTSA. A recall covers a RANGE of vehicles and only your VIN says whether yours is inside it, so treat a match as “check my VIN”, not as “my car is affected”. No VIN is ever asked for or stored. Recall repairs are free by law and are arranged at a dealer, not in this app.

What it does

Pick a model year, make and model — the lists are read live from NHTSA, not baked into the app
Tells you when a new recall campaign covers your vehicle, and when an open one is escalated to “do not drive” or “park outside”
Every alert carries the component, the manufacturer, the campaign number and whether the remedy is available yet
No VIN is asked for or stored — a recall covers a range of vehicles, so a match means “check my VIN”, not “mine is affected”

How you set it up

You create one watch — for example “2021 Ford F-150” — and close the app. At the interval you choose it checks safety recalls published for a vehicle you choose; when NHTSA publishes a recall for a vehicle you watch your phone gets a notification. It never tells you about the same thing twice.

Who it is for

Anyone driving a used car, and anyone who keeps an eye on a parent's or a teenager's.

What it does not do

It does NOT book the repair, does not contact a dealer and does not ask for your VIN. It points you at the official record; the free repair is arranged at a franchised dealer. • It does NOT sign in, does not create an account and never asks for vehicle registration or personal details.
It asks for no account. No sign-up, no password.
It collects no personal data: no analytics, no crash reporting.
The free tier shows Google AdMob ads: a bottom banner, interstitial, rewarded, rewarded interstitial, app-open and a “Ad”-labelled card inside the list. Paid members see no ads and no ad request is made.

Permissions

Permission	Why
`ACCESS_NETWORK_STATE`	To avoid pointless attempts while offline, and to tell mobile data from Wi-Fi.
`INTERNET`	To reach the public NHTSA recall list.
`POST_NOTIFICATIONS`	To tell you a recall was published for your vehicle. That is the whole app.
`READ_BASIC_PHONE_STATE`	So the ads library can tell Wi-Fi from mobile data. It grants no access to your phone number, IMEI or call log; the app does not declare it, the ads library adds it.
`RECEIVE_BOOT_COMPLETED`	So your watches resume after the phone restarts.
`VIBRATE`	To vibrate when a notification arrives.
`WAKE_LOCK`	So the phone does not fall asleep in the middle of a check. The app does not ask for this itself; the background work library (Android Jetpack WorkManager) adds it.
`BILLING`	So you can buy a paid membership through Google Play. The app does not declare this permission itself; the Google Play Billing library adds it. Your payment details (card, address, invoice) never reach the app and are never seen or stored by it — Google Play takes the payment. All the app learns is whether your membership is active.
`AD_ID`	Ads in the free tier are served by Google AdMob, which may read the device advertising ID (AAID). The app does not declare this permission itself; the ads library adds it. Paid members make no ad request at all. You can reset or delete the ID in Settings › Google › Ads.

Source

Where the data comes from: the NHTSA recalls endpoint at api.nhtsa.gov, published by the U.S. Department of Transportation as open data. Notifications link to the official record on nhtsa.gov.

Car Recall Alerts is an independent app. It is not developed, endorsed or supported by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration or any manufacturer.