2018-2023 Jeep Wrangler Oil Life/Oil Change Light Reset Guide

Last Updated on June 11, 2023 by Nick

Hey guys, what’s up. I just finished changing the engine oil in my car. So now I’m going to show you how to reset the oil life or oil change required minder light on my Jeep Wrangler. When the light comes up and says, you know, oil change or whatever it is, I’ll show you how to get rid of that.

It’s a little bit of a procedure, and it’s a little different than many other vehicles. You press a button and scroll through a few screens, but I’ll show you how to get past and reset it. So let’s jump right into that.

The Easy Way To Reset Oil Life in Jeep Wrangler (2018-2023)

This is the quickest and most common way to reset oil life on all Jeep cars. So let’s going to reset the oil change indicator with these simple steps:

• Turn the ignition keys to the RUN position or press the START button twice without turning the engine
• Once you’ve done that, the lights will flash, and you have 10 seconds when you need to step on the GAS pedal three times.
• Once you do that, you can remove your keys from the ignition, which should be reset.

Another Way to Reset Oil Change Light on Jeep Wrangler JL

For your info, this operation work for the Jeep Wrangler JL (2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, and 2023 model years). For the older ones, you can reach it here.

What Effect Do Oil Additives Have on Your Car Engine?

Engine oils are complicated, and they include all kinds of different additives which are important for your engine’s health. So this is not a complete list of all the additives you can expect to find in oil, but we will touch on some of the major ones here. 

So we’re going to work through different additives, talk about what they are, what they are used for within the oil, and then what the consequence is of, you know, using that oil for far too long and not changing it on time.

Anti-Oxidant

The first one is anti-oxidants, and oxidation is the primary cause of oil degradation. The anti-oxidants are super important in reducing that rate of oxidation. So the consequence of waiting too long is that this oil starts to break down more and more, losing its effectiveness, and you have an increase in wear on your engine.

Zinc

We also have anti-wear additives; for example, zinc can be used to do this. These zinc additives help react with rough surfaces to create a sacrificial barrier and help smooth out that surface to reduce the friction and amount of wear you have. 

So over time, it loses its effectiveness as you use that zinc and remove those sacrificial barriers. Of course, you’ll have more wear if you have something preventing wear that goes away, or it’s not as effective anymore you have more wear.

Detergents

Detergents are very important for preventing corrosion within the engine and helping to prevent sludge from building up within the engine. So over time, as that sludge builds up and your detergents begin to lose effectiveness, well, that sludge can get within passageways and reduce oil flow. So if you reduce that oil flow through those passageways, you’re getting less oil through them, less protection, increasing friction, and increasing wear.

This can also lead to a decrease in the effectiveness of your detergents. You can have excessive carbon deposits starting to form within your engine. 

Dispersants

Also helping to prevent carbon deposits, we have dispersants. The dispersants are really cool. They’ll actually surround deposit precursors. They’ll attach themselves to it and suspend that deposit precursor within the oil, so it just circulates within the engine. Perhaps the filter will be able to filter it out; if not, it just continues to spread within that engine but doesn’t attach to anything and form a harmful carbon deposit.

So these dispersants help to suspend that deposit, and in doing so, you don’t have those deposits forming within your engine. Of course, the longer you wait, the more these you know deposit precursors will be held within your engine. So if you don’t change it out well, you’ve got all those deposits floating around in your oil just waiting to attach to something, and you’ve never actually removed all those deposits from your engine.

It’s actually a good thing, you know to see that dark oil coming out. It means you’re removing all those contaminants when you change the oil. However, you don’t want those contaminants in there forever, so you need to change your oil on time.

FAQ – Oil Change Required

So there you have it, simple, straightforward, but some people are unaware of how to get it done. It would help if you did this when changing the oil in your Jeep. So you can ensure that you are getting the proper counter for the next oil change. So you’re maintaining the appropriate maintenance of your Jeep Wrangler JL. Until next time, See you.