Maintenance & Service
How to Check Car Battery Health
Most car batteries give warning before they strand you — if you know what to look for. Here are the…
- Reading time
- 4 min
A red battery symbol meaning the charging system is no longer replacing the power the car is using.
Can you continue driving?
Yes, with caution — get it checked soon
The charging system is not putting current back into the battery. Despite the symbol, the battery is often not the problem — the car is simply running on stored power, and stored power runs out.
Switch off everything you do not need — air conditioning, heated seats, heated rear screen, the stereo — and head for somewhere you can safely stop.
Do not switch the engine off until you are where you want to be, because it may not start again. How long you have varies from a few minutes to about an hour.
If the symbol appears together with an engine temperature warning, treat it as a broken drive belt and stop immediately: the water pump has probably stopped too.
Promptly, and before any journey you cannot easily abandon. A car that will not restart is an inconvenience on a driveway and a serious problem on a motorway slip road.
Maintenance & Service
Most car batteries give warning before they strand you — if you know what to look for. Here are the…
Driving & Safety
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Troubleshooting
What the car does when you turn the key narrows the problem down fast. Work through the symptoms in order…
Troubleshooting
The red battery symbol is not telling you the battery is low — it means the charging system has stopped…
Dashboard symbols are largely standardised; these are the models with guides that mention this one.
