More than half of all recall notices have not been followed up on by vehicle owners, with just 47.7 per cent of cars returning back to the dealership for repair.
The findings were revealed in an Auto Express investigation.
One of the biggest issues that has affected vehicles since 2012 was caused by the Takata airbag scandal, which affected millions of models including those made by BMW, Honda and Toyota.
The Toyota Yaris, Corolla, Avensis, the BMW 3 series, the Honda Civic, Jazz Accord and CR-V were all diagnosed with airbag problems and recalled but not all have been fixed.
In the past five years, the DVSA has overseen 1,484 individual recall cases involving more than nine million vehicles.
Auto Express said: “The figures uncovered during this investigation are staggering, and highlight how much of a problem the industry has in getting drivers to have recalls done.
“The Takata airbag recall was a huge scandal at the time, and cars that aren’t repaired are a massive danger – not just for the owner of the vehicle, but also those other drivers who could be following a car that has a failure.”