Ford recalled 1.74M SUVs over rearview cameras that flip or go blank

Ford filed two safety recalls with NHTSA in early 2026 covering about 1.74 million Ford and Lincoln SUVs over rearview-camera failures. Recall 26V-123 covers 889,950 vehicles — 2020–22 Escape (516,780), 2020–24 Explorer (178,233), 2020–24 Lincoln Aviator (110,696) and 2020–22 Lincoln Corsair (84,241). At startup, a pulse on the display's I2C data bus can rewrite a register in the display microcontroller, flipping or inverting the center-screen image — including the rearview camera while in reverse — until the vehicle is restarted.

Recall 26V-124 covers 849,310 more — 528,168 Broncos built September 2020 through February 2026 and 321,142 Edges from 2021–24. There the Accessory Protocol Interface Module can overheat to 105°C in sustained high ambient temperatures and shut down, taking the whole infotainment screen — and the camera image — blank until it cools. Ford's own Electronics Platforms engineering team flagged the issue to its internal Critical Concern Review Group, which opened the investigation.

Ford told NHTSA it knew of 809 warranty claims and one owner questionnaire on the first recall and no warranty claims on the second — no crashes or injuries. The fix is software, but when the recalls were filed no remedy existed for the inversion recall: dealers were notified March 5, interim notices were to go out April 17–22, and the update was expected only in the second quarter of 2026. Bronco and Edge owners were told to expect remedy notifications March 30–April 3 for a dealer-installed fix.

1.74M vehicles across two recalls (26V-123: 889,950; 26V-124: 849,310); free software fixes, 809 warranty claims, no reported crashes or injuries.

Both failures knock out the rearview image while reversing — a federal safety standard requirement — so the vehicles were out of compliance regardless of crash history.

The inversion bug needed no broken part: a startup pulse rewrote a register in the display microcontroller, a defect that appears only in specific configurations.

Ford discovered the APIM overheating internally through its Critical Concern Review Group, but the remedy was still months out — the recall shipped before the fix did.

2026 was tracking as Ford's worst-ever recall year on industry counts, putting large software-defined fleets through NHTSA campaigns at once.

Software-defined safety features fail in software ways — and a fix you have not written yet leaves millions of owners driving on an interim notice for months.

Owners get free updates over the air or at dealers once fixes ship; for the 889,950-vehicle inversion recall Ford said the software was not expected until Q2 2026, leaving owners with interim notices in the meantime. The camera campaigns landed in the same period as a recall of more than 604,000 Ford and Lincoln SUVs for defective wiper motors, and industry tracking data called 2026 Ford's worst-ever year for recalls.