Hi all, I got my wife a Kia Cerato 2015 and logbook states service it every 15k or every 12 months.
I spoke to a local Mechanic he advised ignore that and they always do every 10k.
Just wanted to get everyone thoughts?
Kia Cerato Servicing Intervals Recommendation
silkysmooth on 28/09/2025 - 21:53
Last edited 29/09/2025 - 11:35 by 1 other user
Last edited 29/09/2025 - 11:35 by 1 other user
Comments
every 15 k or every 12 months.
And which ever comes first
why was this negged. its correct
Giving your car a service renews its lifeblood and hence extends its durability and longetivity.
Hence your mechanic is 100% correct!
Especialy for a 10 year old car!!!!
If you want your wife's not-so-new car to last longer give it more frequent services.
Every 10,000km or 12 months is what every mechanic in Australia would recommend.
Servicing your car is not expensive
So this is by far the cheapest way to ensure your new car goes the distance my friend.Would servicing it every month or every week be better then?
why not make part of your daily routine? Mechanics will be happy.
More frequent visits = more money for the local mechanic
It also ensures this 10 year old car does not suffer from premature wear and tear or failure.
Any developing issues are picked up more quickly.
Longer service intervals = risk of more car breakdowns and failures = More new cars sold.
So its much cheaper and better for your 10 year old car to service your it every 10,000km
And when you compare what your mechanic charges for a service with what your dealership charges it works out much cheaper using your local mechanic.
Even with the more frequent 10K service intervals.Its 10yo. Changing the oil more often might give you a little extra engine life, but its not going to make a lick of difference to all the other stuff on the car.
Shortening the oil change interval is hardly likely to make the car last any longer at this point. As long as its done reasonably often itll most likely keep going as long as it needs to.
If you plan to keep it forever, maybe increasing the frequency might help. Lets face it though, its a 10yo Kia. Its hardly a collectible that an enthusiast is going to want to buy once youre done with it.
But there are tens of thousands of 10y+ cars getting plenty of life being under serviced. Once they are that old, a lot of oeople dont care and just keep driving.
I’d just do it annually, unless if you do more than 15k in a year then do it every 15k
I’d just do it annually
Do it every 13 months and save 8.3%
If wife is driving the car its likely she is doing lots of short trips.
This increases wear and tear on the car and the oil degrades more quickly.
Add the very important fact that its already 10 years old so already has suffered a fair bit of wear and tearSo sevicing every 10,000km or at lease once every 12 months is a very good idea!
i have a 2024 gt, i usually only travel short distances back & forth i do my oil changes every 7500km's myself
Worth getting a fumoto valve
Ive never understood these valves. What's so hard about undoing a sump bolt and replacing a crush washer?
It’s probably not for you then.
I find it much quicker as there are no tools required, other than jacking the vehicle up. It’s also less messy as the oil drains straight into a container with a turn of the valve - no more cleanup of oil splatters. Lastly, no more used oil smell! A lot time saved if doing multiple oil changes a year.
P.s. no more washers too
Run them on all my vehicles that I service myself, worth every penny.
Do you still visit dealership for its scheduled logbook services?
Yea every year or 10,000km to keep the 7 year warranty.
Exactly!
Short distances = higher wear and tear
Changing oil regularly helps prevent this
Its 10yo. IMO, id look at every 12 months unless it does a lot of kms, like over 15k per year. How long do you want it to survive? If you want it to live forever, service at 10k. If youre looking at upgrading in a year or 3, annual.
Every 10k is more about sending the mechanics kids to private school then it is about looking after your car.
Good luck as some private schools cost upwards of $30k a year!
You realise the mechanic would have more than one customer right?
Really? I thought mechanics just work on their own car every year!
Replacing oil & filter (even when paying a mechanic to do it) is far cheaper than replacing the engine/turbo, so you decide which works best for you.
I got my wife a Kia Cerato 2015
What did you get your mistress?
If turbo i would do 10k / 12months , else 15k / 12months for NA with Full syn oil per spec.
What have you been doing for the last 10 years? Changing now is unlikely to make a noticeable difference.
How many kilometres has the car done?
Servicing every 10,000 km isn’t a bad idea. Yes, it adds a bit of extra cost—maybe a couple of hundred dollars—but it also gives you the chance to catch and fix issues early, before they turn into bigger and more expensive problems. That is if the car has maybe done 100,000kms or more, but for less than that, 15,000kms intervals should be fine. Especially for a 10 year old car.
Your local mechanic just wants more $$$!
Comma splices without the commas. Impressive!
You only need to let a car 'cool down' if its been working hard in the few minutes before stopping. Eg steep hills, highway speed or towing. Hardly likely to need it in regular urban driving. Anything more than about 5 minutes of regular driving should be enough to 'cool down' a car.
Why? A hybrid car shuts the engine off after hard acceleration without causing any issues.
Usually you would be in sports mode etc if accelerating hard and that would disable stop start. Cool down is recommended after track session etc. For regular use its not required.
I hardly ever use sports mode, even then it still stops. The only way to keep it running is flick the gear shifter over to manual.
The only car that needs to be turned off to cool down is one with a damaged cooling system.
The thermostat automatically regulates the flow of coolant and keeps the engine temperature stable at operating temperatures
What is this garbage?
Bought a 2006 Hyundai Accent with 105,000 km on it and just followed the manual—oil change every 15,000 km. Since I only drove about 10,000 km a year, that worked out to once every 15 months. No issues at all. Sold it at 225,000 km and it was still running like a champ. I also kept up with stuff like the timing belt and air filter, even though the car never showed any signs of trouble.
Honestly, I’ve always felt modern synthetic oils are built to last way longer than people think—definitely more than 15k or a year. If you’re curious, snap a photo of your fresh oil and check it monthly. After a year, you’ll probably find it still looks decent.
Manuals are usually on the cautious side—not just for oil, but to remind you about other checks. If you’re not doing big kms or driving hard, stretching the interval a bit is totally fine in my experience. YMMV
Sold it at 225,000 km and it was still running like a champ.
Impressive! Was it a private sale or trade-in and for how much?
Bought in 2013 for $7,000, sold privately in 2024 for $1,500—main reason was all four tyres needed replacing.
Engine oil is also a kind of liquid rubbish bin.
It collects all the engine blow by soot and suspended metal particles. The longer you leave it, the dirtier and grittier it gets. That translates to more engine wear.
If you have a car you want to keep in top condition, then the old rule is change the oil every 8000kms (5000 miles). If you asked any mechanic for one piece of basic car advice, I think most would say to to always change the oil and filter regularly. So easy and saves so many issues.
So in your case I would do a service every 15.000kms but change the oil myself after 7500kms or at 6 months.
It is a very easy thing to do.
100% this!!
I would change the oil every 7.5k but if took 12 months to drive that far, I wouldn’t change it any earlier.
I've had two cars from new that I drove to 220,000km. Both serviced every 15,000km as suggested by the engineers that designed the vehicles, and both never had problems with their engines.
Is changing oil more frequently going to do any harm? No. Will it be beneficial? There's a chance it can be. Will I stick to what the manufacturer states is the proper change cycle when they give a seven year warranty? Yes.
If it was just the engineers, they would probably recommend more frequent oil changes but the marketing of the vehicle would suffer.
Marketing team want to be able to say 12 month/15000km intervals because that sounds hassle free for the user, but that is pushing in terms of the oil and filter.12 month / 15k kms is normal these days. 25K kms might be pushing it. But many car manufacturers do recommend that as well…
25,000 km would be be considered severe / asking for problems by many mechanics.
Oil would have too many pollutants in it by then@King Tightarse: 100% especially water with modern short runs.
“I don’t need to change oil, it hasn’t gone down” isn’t a good sign.
12m/15k km is indeed standard. Some manufacturers like Mazda held out with 12/10k service intervals right up to their 2023 models, but even they changed to the industry standard.
15k services have been around for a long time. My first car in 2000 had 12/15k intervals.
Having said that, if you drive in severe conditions then halving the distance traveled is an excellent idea. Most people don't realize only traveling very short distances in a car is considered severe usage.
Camry ?
The only thing more frequent servicing will hurt is your wallet, but will extend the lifespan and condition of your engine. I service mine every 5000km.
Comes down to the oil being used and type of driving.
Good Synthetic Oil easy 15k
Now some German cars won’t have set intervals. Basically designed so the engine lasts the warranty period.Oil change is cheap, removes the rubbish.
Here’s the catch if the oil hasn’t been changed for years, especially transmission if you do change it pray…Here’s the catch if the oil hasn’t been changed for years, especially transmission if you do change it pray
Blatantly false.
It also depends on your typcial trip duration. If you drive short distances, less than 10-15 mins per trip, than you would want to religiously replace your engine oil every 12 months regardless of kilometers travelled.
Reguarly oil changes is a cost effective way to reduce chances of mechanical faults in the future. If youre cost sensitive, learn to do it yourself.
A 2015 year old car would benefit from regular oil changes.Ah..oil change intervals…that is a debate akin to a holy war.
Can modern synthetic oils do 15,000km? All laboratory chemical analysis I have seen says yes, emphatically.
But I still change mine at 7,500km. Most cars including my own do a lot of short trips - this isn't 7500km of highway driving - and according to all manufacturers oil should be changed more frequently in that case…which applies to most of us.
Is it necessary…?
Probably not :)Many if not most manufacturers recommend changing engine oil and filter at basically half the regular interval under 'sever conditions', but many people don't really grasp what severe conditions really are. Severe conditions for your motor oil includes short trips and extended idling, as well as towing and harsh temperature conditions.
Massive difference in what would be best for engine oil changes between car A that does 15,000km and 80% of that is highway cruising, vs car B that does 15,000km and 80% of that is short trips and stop start traffic.
Thanks all
You can always send your used oil off for analysis. Say test at 10000kms, 12500kms, and another at 15000kms. You can draw little bit of oil with aquarium air tube from the dipstick tube at those KM intervals. Then you can decide if your car needs more regular oil changes.
The important question is: how many kms do you average in a year?
If it’s less than 10k, you should still stick to the 12-month interval. But if it’s more than that then servicing every 10k is fine except you may be wasting a bit of money doing it earlier than necessary.About 15 k per year.
Stick to annual then.
My friend missed a 15k service and his 2022 Cerato engine blew up with only 47,000kms on the clock. Kia quoted $30,000 to repair and denied his warranty claim which is fair enough I guess
Engine was full of sludge somehow just from missing that 1 service, I’m not saying it’s bad missing the service however I believe most engines wouldn’t sludge up that quickly
So car had no service for 20-30,000km?
Yes, but personally I think most modern engines should be able to tolerate that using fully synthetic oils. So my recommendation to OP is to service it every 10k if it’s cheap enough or you can do it yourself
Definitely 10k if it's turbocharged, which OP didn't state.
None turbo, but I’ll stick to 10 k servicing to be safe.
Why? Manufacturer recommends 15k. Just stick to annual.
I want to run my cars into the ground get as many years as I can. I was reading above about the 10 k recommendation hence.
@silkysmooth: You do you, but i dont reckon more than annually will make any difference to longevity of the engine. Its a kia. Its not a highly strung engine amd the manufacturer is happy with 15k.
@Euphemistic: Thanks mate,
You have good point.
I have a Hyundai Santa Fe turbo diesel to, 260km would you stick to 15 km servicing as well as it’s a turbo and high km?
@silkysmooth: Is it 15k servicing from factory? Diesel plus turbo and id be changing the oil more rather than less often.
@silkysmooth: If it's money you're worried about there's a lot to be saved by changing the oil every 15k rather than 10k. Most cars go to the wreckers for issues completely unrelated to infrequent oil changes.
10 year old car. I'd go 15k if going a mechanic.
Id probably do it between 10-15 or annually at an opportune time/sale if doing my own oil change.
I’m going to watch some YouTube video give it a go my self.
At one point Mazdas had to be serviced every 6 months while in the UK the same car needed to be serviced every 12 months
See here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qBISqS9oNB4
The car is well out of warranty, 15.000km will be fine.
lol if it is that old just drive it into the ground and buy a new car
Check the manual service intervals for extreme conditions. These conditions often include stop/start city driving and short trips, which you may be doing. Quite usual for shorter oil chang periods.
10yo car that you plan to keep forever- If you can change the oil yourself, then do the oil and oil/air
/cabin filter yourself every year, and then take it to the mechanic every 2nd year for oil change, inspection and brake fluid change.After 10 years, a full service book is not important. Condition is more important if you want to sell it.
I’ve had 3 cars in my lifetime that I owned from new/near new that I kept long term. After 100km and well out of warranty, the started to service it myself.
Car 1 was sold to a friend at 180km. Car 2 reached 220km, it had numerous issues unrelated to servicing so I got the wrecker to tow it away. Car 3 was given to a family member at 190km and still going strong. Unfortunately the family member isn’t too mechanically minded so I’m still doing the oil and oil/air
/cabin filter for them.Hey, if you're doing the oil replacement yourself maybe do 10k changes. I had a new 2015 Cerato, serviced every year on time and the engine failed at 70,000km in 2020. While driving the engine just turned off while I was getting off the freeway. Get your wife roadside assistance just in case.
Here's a Kia engine teardown, it's not the same engine but probably similar problems of burning oil. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0n3jim7ylTA
Commiserations to your wife. Apparently 10k is the normal common interval while the turbo models can be 15k. It's best to maintain it if she's doing that much every year anyway.