Volkswagen is recalling more than 640,000 vehicles in China due to a defect in the synthetic oil in the vehicles' transmission system, the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine announced on Thursday.

The Volkswagen Group China is recalling 11,171 imported vehicles produced between Jan 28, 2009, and June 4, 2013, such as the Scirocco, Golf and the New Beetle.

The Faw-Volkswagen Automotive Co Ltd is recalling more than 330,000 vehicles produced between Aug 8, 2009, and July 19 2013, including the Bora, Sagitar, and Golf and Magotan.

The Shanghai Volkswagen Automotive Co Ltd is recalling more than 291,000 vehicles produced between Oct 27, 2009, and June 22 2013, including the Touran, Lavida, Skoda Superb and Octavia, Passat and Polo.

The defect in the synthetic oil of the vehicles' gearboxes could result in power failures and thus cause the gearboxes to fail.

The three automakers will offer to replace the synthetic oil with mineral oil with all the recalled vehicles and update the controlling software for free, the administration said.