How to Display the Total Mileage on a Civic?

[OSimon]

Take the key and enter the driver's cabin, placing the key in the wireless charging area for phones. Press the car's start button to power up the entire vehicle. Once the vehicle is powered up, you will see the current total mileage, Trip A, or Trip B displayed at the bottom left of the instrument panel screen. There is a circular button at the top of the vehicle's steering lever. By pressing this button, you can switch between the three different mileage display modes. When the fuel tank is full and you want to record the mileage for that fuel level, press the circular button on the steering lever to switch to Trip A or Trip B.

[WalkerFitz]

There are three buttons below the right side of the steering wheel, and the middle one with a small arrow is the toggle button. After the car is powered on, the dashboard defaults to displaying the trip mileage. Press the button a few times, and you'll see the total mileage appear on the LCD screen between the tachometer and the coolant temperature gauge, displayed in white characters. I always check this number before each maintenance because the 4S shop insists on a 5000-kilometer interval, and I need to verify its accuracy. When I first bought the car, I often forgot when the trip mileage was last reset, which led to frequent errors in calculating fuel consumption.

[DelPaislee]

I've been driving a Civic for ten years, and I can operate those black buttons on the right side of the dashboard with my eyes closed. Look for the button labeled TRIP—press it once for Trip A, twice for Trip B, and the third press shows the total mileage. If you're driving an older model with mechanical gauges, the numbers will appear in a small window below the speedometer. Once, a friend insisted the odometer had been tampered with, but after showing him how the total mileage didn't match the maintenance records, he changed his tune. The newer models with digital displays are even more intuitive—just hold down the toggle button to reset the trip mileage.

[MarianaMarie]

Checking the total mileage is actually related to the vehicle model year. When I helped someone inspect a car, I found that for the 10th-generation Civic, you need to start the engine first, then look for the button with the instrument cluster icon at the lower left of the dashboard. The newer 11th-generation model changed this to operation via the multifunction steering wheel buttons—you need to press the HOME button first to enter the menu selection. Last week, a young guy bought a used car with a modified digital instrument cluster and couldn't find the way. Later, we discovered the total mileage was hidden on the second page of the vehicle status, requiring a page flip to locate it.

[KaydenDella]

The displayed total mileage is located at the bottom right corner of the dashboard, but it can be hard to see clearly on rainy days. Last time I inspected a car in the rain, I taught the customer to use the cross keys in the right control area of the steering wheel to navigate left and right. When you see the 'ODO' label, that's the total mileage. For older Civic models, note that the trip mileage and total mileage toggle buttons are separate, so don't confuse them with the engine start-stop button. Last year at the inspection site, a modified car was almost rejected due to unclear mileage display, but it turned out to be caused by the reflection from an anti-spy film.

[McJuliana]

Used car dealers know this issue best. When inspecting a car, first confirm the key's power-on status. For mechanical instrument clusters, press the TRIP button to enter ODO mode and wait until the numbers stop flashing to get an accurate reading. Be cautious with modified instrument clusters. Once, while purchasing a car, I found the total mileage display covered by a film. Upon dismantling the center console and checking the ECU data, it turned out the odometer had been tampered with. Nowadays, newer models even allow you to calibrate mileage errors in the vehicle settings, which is much more convenient than older models.