2020 Chevrolet Silverado 15004th gen (2019–), second year

Updated 2026-08-31NHTSA counts read on this date — 708 complaints. They rise over time.

Both Transmission Recalls on the 2020 Silverado Are Diesel Only. 184 of the 220 Transmission Filings Aren’t Diesels.

Twelve recall campaigns cover this model year. Two of them are the transmission, which is more than the 2019 got — that truck has none.

Both apply only to trucks with the 3.0-liter diesel. Decode the VIN on every transmission filing here and 217 of them come back with an engine. Only 33 of those are diesels. The other 184 are gas — the 4.3, the 5.3, the 6.2, the 2.7 turbo, and three that decode as heavy-duty 6.6s — and no campaign on this model year covers their transmission.

The engine section does not have a campaign either. 178 filings, 53 of them naming a lifter.

Owners have filed 708 complaints with NHTSA about the 2020 model year. Chevrolet sold 575,569 Silverados in calendar 2019 and 593,057 in 2020 — that is the whole Silverado line, not just the 1500 — and 2020 trucks were sold across both of those years. 708 complaints against a few hundred thousand trucks is not a failure rate, 708 filings are not 708 owners, and the number is only worth anything because every other year in this series is counted the same way.

The basics

Second year of this body, and the year the engine lineup gets wide. The 3.0-liter Duramax inline-six diesel arrives, the ten-speed automatic spreads from the 6.2 to the 5.3, and the 2.7-liter turbocharged four and the 4.3-liter V6 carry over.

Specs

Displacement and cylinder count are from NHTSA’s vPIC catalog, which holds what the manufacturer submitted. Fuel economy is EPA, city / highway / combined, in mpg.

The diesel’s 27 mpg combined is the best number in this series — the same engine repeats it on the 2021 truck. The next best here is the 2.7 turbo at 21.

What owners filed

Sections below are sorted by count. Each complaint is counted once, assigned to the first section it matches in a fixed order that runs steering, brakes, transmission, engine, electrical, body, air bags, suspension — the same order on every year in this series. The cross-year table on the model page uses NHTSA’s own component labels instead, so a section here can be bigger than the matching row on that page.

The sections below add up to 643. The remaining 65 are spread across the smaller categories, and the last section below breaks them out.

Configuration comes from decoding the VIN attached to each filing. 699 of the 708 decode — seven of them to 2500 or 3500 heavy duties that were filed under the 1500 — and 694 come back as a crew or extended cab — 84.7 percent crew and 15.3 percent extended. vPIC calls the Double Cab an extended cab, and so does everything below. Regular cabs, and filings whose VIN does not give a cab, are not in any of the cab percentages below.

This is not a failure rate by configuration. Nothing here divides failures by how many of each cab GM built, because the complaint record does not contain that. What the sections below show is how far each one moves off that 84.7 percent baseline.

Transmission — 220

Counted as filings NHTSA tagged power train, plus those that name the transmission, a shudder or the torque converter.

65 describe a shudder or a vibration. 39 describe a hard shift, a bang or a clunk. 34 name the torque converter.

The two campaigns here cover 33 of these filings at most. 24V797000 names diesels only, and 26V083000 covers just the trucks repaired under it. Of the 217 filings in this section whose VIN gives an engine, 33 are the 3.0-liter diesel.

ODI 11749281:

“The contact owns a 2020 Chevrolet Silverado 1500. The contact stated that while driving at approximately 40 MPH, the vehicle shuddered and downshifted independently. No warning lights illuminated. Additionally, an OBD2 diagnostic scan retrieved diagnostic trouble codes: U0146, U0101, and U0100. A local dealer was contacted; however, the vehicle was not diagnosed or repaired because the VIN was not included in any recall. Additionally, the contact related the failure to NHTSA Campaign Number: 24V797000 (Power Train). The manufacturer was not made aware of the failure. The failure mileage was approximately 84,000.”

That truck decodes to a 4.3-liter V6.

215 of the 220 list a cab, and 81.9 percent of those are crew, three points under the baseline.

Engine — 178

Counted as filings NHTSA tagged engine, plus those that name a lifter, cylinder deactivation or a misfire.

53 name a lifter. 24 name the camshaft. 34 describe the engine losing power or stalling. 35 say the engine was replaced or rebuilt.

Nine filings in 2020, five in 2021, four in 2022, five in 2023, fifteen in 2024 — then 88 in 2025. The 2019 truck does the same thing in the same year, from 31 to 122.

Six filings list $10,000 or more for engine work. Worth reading those one by one — the largest dollar figures in this section are not repair bills at all but what owners paid for the truck.

ODI 11720353:

“My entire engine and the right bank lifters failed. Thankfully, these issues didn’t fail until my truck was parked in my garage. No warning lamps did not trigger until these issues started. There was no warning. I have been having engine issues with this truck dating back to 2022. I will include all documents showing the issues I’ve had in the past 3 years. I was informed by the dealer that this is a known issue with this year and model of truck and even they were surprised that GM hasn’t issued a recall. The vehicle has been inspected by the dealership only.”

176 of the 178 list a cab, and 90.9 percent of those are crew, six points above the baseline. Steering moves further, seven points the other way.

No campaign on this model year covers any of it.

Brakes — 88

Counted as filings NHTSA tagged service brakes, plus those that name the vacuum pump, the brake booster or brake assist.

No filing here names the vacuum pump. On the 2016 truck 64 did.

18 put the failure at low speed — backing up, a parking lot, a driveway, a drive-through. 11 describe a pedal that went hard, stiff or to the floor.

One campaign is here and it is a hard part, not software: 20V116000, brake caliper bolts.

Steering — 77

Counted as filings NHTSA tagged steering, plus those that name the power steering, the steering assist or StabiliTrak.

76 of the 77 list a cab, and 77.6 percent of those are crew, seven points below the baseline. That is the widest cab gap on this truck, and it points to extended cabs.

Electrical — 42

Counted as filings NHTSA tagged electrical system.

Body and structure — 21

Counted as filings NHTSA tagged structure.

Suspension — 9

Counted as filings NHTSA tagged suspension.

Air bags — 8

Counted as filings NHTSA tagged air bags.

Eight filings, and one of the twelve campaigns is a roof-rail air bag inflator.

The rest is thin

65 filings. The largest groups are 33 that NHTSA tagged unknown or other, 7 fuel or propulsion, 6 latches and locks, 4 tires, and 3 wheels.

Recalls

NHTSA files this model year under “Silverado 1500” only. Twelve campaigns. Ten of them landed between November 2019 and December 2021. The other two are the transmission pair, from October 2024 and February 2026.

Across all twelve, 14 filings say the owner’s VIN was not included in a recall they had read about. Counted as filings where “VIN” shows up in the same sentence as “was not included,” “not covered,” “not listed” or “not in the recall.”

The transmission, twice, and diesel only

24V797000 — October 2024, covering 2020–2022 Silverado and Sierra equipped with diesel engines. The transmission control valve may fail.

“Rear wheel lock-up can increase the risk of a crash.”

26V083000 — February 2026, and it is a recall of the repair: trucks “that may have been repaired incorrectly under recall 24V797.” Same valve, same consequence, sixteen months later.

Every model year in this series carries a campaign like that — one that exists because an earlier campaign did not finish the job. On the 2014 through the 2017 it is air bag software, where GM says the trucks “may not have received the complete software update” the first time. On the 2019 it is brake control software that shipped with an error in it. On the 2018 it is a roof-rail air bag inflator where each campaign widened the list of VINs the last one had missed — four of them in nineteen months.

Bolts, a pump and an inflator

20V116000 — February 2020. Brake caliper bolts that may not have been heat treated, and GM says they may break under load.

19V837000 — November 2019. A fuel pump missing its pressure regulator, which GM says can over-pressurize the system, crack the pump and leak fuel.

20V446000 — July 2020. The diffuser on the roof-rail air bag inflator may not have been crimped on properly, which GM says can degrade how the air bag performs in a crash.

Three tire campaigns and four carried over

20V684000, 21V115000 and 21V985000 are tires — two are Continentals cured too long in production, and the third is a spare that does not match the accessory wheels some trucks were sold with.

Four more campaigns cover both this truck and the 2019: the driveshaft weld 20V650000, the battery cable 19V888000, the seat belt pretensioner fire risk 19V814000 and the seat belt brackets 20V792000.

What doesn’t show up in the complaints

NHTSA gives the 2020 Silverado 1500 four stars in the frontal test on every cab. Regular and extended cabs are five stars overall; the crew cab is four. Side impact is five and rollover is four across the board. That is the same set of scores as the 2019 and a step down from the 2018, which was five overall and five frontal on every cab.

The diesel is the quiet story in this data. It is the mileage leader in the series at 27 mpg combined, it is a small share of the complaint record, and it is the only engine here whose transmission got a recall.

What the complaint curve says

2019    1     2022   56     2025  242
2020   70     2023   71     2026  132
2021   46     2024   90

The record sits between 46 and 90 for five years, then 242 in 2025, with 132 more through August 2026.

Two sections do that, and they have to be read differently.

The transmission goes from 26 filings in 2024 to 94 in 2025 — the largest section in both years. The month it turns is November 2024: filings in this section go from 1 in October to 10 in November, and 161 of the section’s 220 have come in since. 24V797000 was announced on 24 October 2024 and the owner letters went out on 12 December. The record cannot separate the two. The filing quoted above is a man who read that campaign, decided it was his, and was turned away because his VIN was not on it.

The engine goes from 15 to 88 with nothing like that behind it. No campaign on this truck covers the engine, and by 2026 it is the larger of the two sections, 52 to 49.

A rising complaint count can mean owners got a recall notice, not that the trucks got worse. On this truck it looks like both, in different sections.

Complaint databases collect complaints. Nobody files to say the lifters are quiet. You cannot compare these numbers across models unless you count them the same way on both. What this data supports is the ranking inside this truck and the shape of its curve.

If you’re looking at one

Ordered by what it costs you if it goes wrong, not by how many people filed.

Listen to it start from cold, and ask what has been done to the engine. 53 filings name a lifter and 24 the camshaft. 35 say the engine was replaced or rebuilt. There is no recall, so a repair sits in the service records as warranty or customer-pay work, never as a completed campaign.

Find out whether it is the diesel before you read the recall list. The two transmission campaigns, 24V797000 and 26V083000, cover diesels only. If it is a 5.3 or a 6.2, they are not yours — and 184 of the 220 transmission filings on this model year are not diesels.

If it is the diesel, ask whether 26V083000 was done, not just 24V797000. The second campaign exists because the first repair may have been performed incorrectly.

Ask about 20V116000 by number. Caliper bolts that were not heat treated, and GM says they can break under load. It is a hard part, so a completed repair means something was actually replaced.

Drive it long enough to feel the transmission shift and to feel it coast down to a stop. 220 filings are the transmission, 65 describe a shudder and 34 name the torque converter.

Numbers worth writing down

The 2021 truck is next, and its engine section is the largest in the series at 315 filings.

Sources

• NHTSA complaint database — 708 complaints for the 2020 Silverado 1500, quoted above by ODI number
• NHTSA recall API — twelve campaigns, quoted from the campaign summaries and consequence text
• NHTSA vPIC — engine, cab and drive type, decoded from the VIN attached to each filing
• NHTSA safety ratings — 2020 Chevrolet Silverado 1500
• EPA fuel economy — city / highway / combined
• GoodCarBadCar Chevrolet Silverado sales figures

Complaint counts and quotes come from NHTSA’s public database, retrieved 2026-08-31; each quote lists its ODI number so you can look it up. Configuration comes from decoding the VIN attached to each filing — 699 of the 708 decode. Recall applicability depends on the VIN — check yours at nhtsa.gov/recalls. This summarizes what owners reported. It isn’t buying or repair advice.