Jaguar Land Rover North America told federal safety regulators on September 17 that a power converter in 23,677 of its SUVs can fail so completely that the vehicle loses drive power and its exterior lighting. The part is the DC-DC converter, the unit that supplies the 12-volt system running the car’s electronics, and NHTSA files the defect under campaign 26V599.
The recall reaches well beyond Range Rovers, Defenders and Discoverys. Nine model lines are on the list, two of them badged Jaguar, and NHTSA publishes a single combined count rather than a split by model.
A converter that overloads under high demand
NHTSA’s campaign record describes two triggers. The converter may malfunction because of an electrical overload during high power demand, and a software error can also stop it from working at vehicle start-up under certain circumstances. In either case the result, in the agency’s wording, is loss of 12-volt system charging and complete loss of drive power and exterior lighting. The stated consequence is short: with the converter down, the vehicle can stop pulling and its exterior lights can go dark while it is still on the road. The agency classes the component under its electrical system and propulsion system headings, a pairing that reflects how directly the converter is tied to the vehicle’s ability to keep driving.
Drive power and exterior lighting go together, which is the combination the agency flags.
Nine model lines, two of them Jaguars
The record lists the Jaguar F-Pace and E-Pace from 2021 to 2024, and the Land Rover Range Rover and Defender from 2020 to 2024. It also covers the Range Rover Sport (2019 to 2024, with 2022 absent from the list), Range Rover Evoque and Discovery Sport from 2020 to 2024, and the Range Rover Velar and Discovery from 2021 to 2024. Fox Business reported on September 22 that Jaguar Land Rover estimates all of the listed vehicles are affected, so the 23,677 figure is the population the company expects to need the fix.
Because the total is one pooled number, NHTSA’s record does not say how many Defenders, Discoverys or Jaguars sit inside it. The count applies to the nine lines together and not to any one of them. The agency’s vehicle-level listing for a 2022 Defender returns the campaign too, which shows the record is searchable by individual model and year for owners who want to confirm a specific vehicle rather than rely on the nameplate.
Jaguar Land Rover reported the problem to NHTSA on September 17, about five months after it first filed 26V248 in April. The agency’s record treats the two as linked campaigns on the same component, and its listing shows the Land Rover customer service line carrying both recalls under separate internal reference numbers: D126 and H575 for the April campaign, E008 for the new one.
An expansion of recall 26V248
The new campaign states that it expands an earlier one, NHTSA recall 26V248. That earlier record, received April 17, 2026, covers 170,169 units across Range Rover, Range Rover Sport, Velar, Evoque, Discovery, Discovery Sport, Defender, F-Pace and E-Pace models, and blames insufficient electrical load balancing during times of high demand for a current overload and malfunction of the DC-DC converter. Its consequence line says the same thing in substance: the driver loses the power needed to keep moving.
The earlier campaign’s remedy was a central software update, with interim owner letters mailed June 17, 2026. The September filing carries the same overload description and adds the start-up software error as a second route to failure, which is the part that is new in 26V599, since the April record describes only the load-balancing overload and says nothing of a start-up error. Its model-year coverage also differs: the April record lists the Evoque as 2020 to 2023, the Discovery Sport as 2020 only and the E-Pace as 2021 to 2022, while 26V599 lists all three through 2024.
The software remedy and the limp-home mode
Dealers will update the vehicle software. According to Fox Business, the update introduces a limp-home mode that alerts the driver if the converter malfunctions, which is a warning and fallback behavior rather than a replacement of the converter hardware. NHTSA’s record says interim letters notifying owners of the safety risk are expected to be mailed on November 13, 2026, with additional letters to follow once the final remedy is available. Owners can check a specific vehicle by VIN on NHTSA’s recall lookup.
Jaguar Land Rover’s own number for the campaign is E008, and Fox Business noted that no accidents, injuries or fires had been reported at the time of filing. The final remedy date is the one item NHTSA’s record leaves open: the November 13 letters are interim, and the agency lists no date for the letters that will carry the finished repair.
This article was produced with the assistance of AI and reviewed by Morning Overview editors prior to publication.
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