A woman filmed herself trying to keep a 2025 Mercedes-Benz C300 in its lane after both of her digital displays went completely dark, and she had no way of gauging her speed.
The video has drawn more than 78,800 views, and the comment addresses an issue her dealer eventually had to address: a 144,049-vehicle Mercedes recall issued in May for the exact fault she presented in the clip.
The 30 second clip was posted by April Lynn (@aprillynn1106), a Kentucky mom whose channel mostly documents the build of a “barndominium” home on rural land.
“Don’t buy a Mercedes-Benz,” she narrates from behind the wheel. “Currently driving, nothing is working. I have turned it off, turned it back on, locked it, unlocked it, got back in and still won’t do anything. So I’m driving it, I have no idea how fast I’m going. Um, yeah, so this is great. 2025 with 16,000 miles on it. Don’t buy this garbage.”
What Happened To The Mercedes’ Dashboard?
The video shows what April sees from the driver’s seat. Both dashboard displays are entirely black. The car has no analogue instruments, so the loss of the screens leaves the driver with no speedometer, no tachometer, no fuel level reading, no transmission gear indicator, no warning lights and no climate-control feedback. The nearest Mercedes service center to her, she says in the caption, is an hour and a half away.
April was not alone in experiencing this failure. In replies under her video, other 2024–2026 Mercedes owners said the same thing had happened to them.
Sydnee, who also bought a 2025 C300 in November, wrote, “This literally happened to me this morning!” Matt, with a 2026 Mercedes, said the dealer “basically called me a liar,” and that the issue is still ongoing on his car. A 2025 CLE 53 owner said the failure had recurred three times in 11,000 miles. “I’m currently in the process of selling mine,” she added. “Not worth the headache.”
The Mercedes Recall
Five days after April’s video, Mercedes-Benz USA filed a formal recall covering the exact failure she documented. Motor1 reported on May 11 that the company is recalling 144,000 vehicles across the 2024–2026 AMG GT, C-Class, E-Class, SL-Class, CLE-Class and GLC-Class lines because the infotainment control unit “might trigger an increased number of system resets,” producing brief or sustained blackouts of the instrument cluster while the car is in motion.
The remedy is a software update Mercedes had already begun pushing over the air in August, before the formal recall was filed. As we previously reported, by the time the recall went official, about 62% of affected vehicles had received the patch.
Boston 25 News separately confirmed the recall is registered with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) as 26V281, with affected owners scheduled for notification by mail after 26 June. Mercedes and NHTSA both say they are not aware of any crashes or injuries tied to the issue, though Mercedes acknowledges “numerous” warranty claims and service reports.
What Did The Mercedes Dealership Say?
In reply to a commenter who told her every car eventually has electronics fail, April wrote, “It’s actually at the dealership now. Hard resetting it wouldn’t have did any good. It was a recall.”
She reported that she had called her local dealer, who told her the issue had been “a common thing happening” and that she needed to bring the car in. The same dealer warned her the system could “send error codes to the computer and possibly leave you stranded on the side of the road,” a separate symptom April said she had already experienced. The car would intermittently refuse to start, she said, sometimes for 15 to 30 minutes at a time, both before and after the screen failure she filmed.
That second symptom is not covered by the recall, according to the public documentation. The blank-display recall is specifically about the infotainment unit’s resets affecting the instrument cluster, not a no-start condition.
Is This Recall A Safety Hazard?
Mercedes’ public statements lean on the lack of injuries so far, but that doesn’t change ongoing safety implications on the ground. A driver who does not know the car’s speed, fuel state, gear, or any warning indicators is forced to rely on their own memory and gut feelings. As April says in her voiceover, “I have no idea how fast I’m going.”
April had the car scheduled at the dealership for a service visit on the 11th, which should have confirmed whether or not the patch had landed. Several commenters with newer Mercedes said the same update fixed the issue on their cars and that it has not recurred. Others said the update came, the screens went black again, and they have decided to get rid of the vehicle.
Motor1 reached out to April Lynn via TikTok direct message and to Mercedes-Benz USA via media relations for additional comment. We’ll be sure to update this if either responds.
