What does a clicking noise when turning mean?

The type of sound is the most reliable clue, and each type points at a different component. Clicking or popping during slow, tight turns — parking-lot maneuvers, pulling into a driveway, U-turns — is a worn CV joint, most common on front-wheel-drive cars ($300-$600 per axle). Whining or moaning that's loudest at parking-lot speed or near full lock is the power steering system — usually low fluid ($0 to top up) or a failing pump ($300-$600). Clunking over bumps while turning is worn sway bar end links or suspension bushings ($100-$400). Grinding during turns that's also there cruising straight, and changes with steering direction, is a failing wheel bearing ($300-$500 per wheel). Creaking at low-speed full-lock turns, worse when cold, is usually a strut mount. The single best move is the free parking-lot full-lock test: windows down, drive a slow tight circle in each direction, and listen — the sound you hear and the direction it's loudest in name the part before a shop ever quotes you.

A clicking CV joint is drivable in the short term — days to a few weeks — but not indefinitely. The clicking means the joint is worn and has lost the grease it needs, usually because the rubber boot tore and let grease out and grit in. As the wear accelerates, the joint can fail completely, and on a front-wheel-drive car a failed outer CV joint means a sudden loss of drive to that wheel — the car stops pulling, the axle can flail against nearby components, and it tends to happen without warning at the worst moment, like pulling into traffic. It is a loss of drive rather than a loss of steering, which is bad enough. So fix a clicking CV joint within about two to four weeks. If the clicking has progressed to a grinding or clunking, that's the later stage of the same failure, and you should fix it within days rather than weeks. The good news is that a CV joint caught at the clicking stage is a straightforward, moderately priced axle replacement, not a safety emergency — as long as you don't keep driving on it until it becomes one.

Whining or groaning specifically when turning — especially loud at parking-lot speeds or with the wheel near full lock — almost always points at the power steering system. The most common cause is simply low power steering fluid, which is free to top up: look for a small capped reservoir under the hood, usually labeled 'power steering' or marked with a steering-wheel symbol, near the firewall, and check it against the MIN/MAX marks. When fluid is low the pump cavitates — pulling air instead of fluid — and that's the whine, worst at slow speeds where the pump works hardest. Use the exact fluid type your manual specifies, because the wrong fluid damages the seals. If topping up quiets it but the noise returns within weeks, you have a leak to find and fix. And if your car has electric power steering — common on cars built after roughly 2010 and near-universal on new ones, though many trucks and SUVs kept hydraulic racks much later, so check for a fluid reservoir rather than trusting a model year — whining when turning points at a failing electric motor or rack instead — a pricier repair, so check for a steering warning light and get the chassis (C-) codes read before anyone replaces a $1,000-plus part on a guess.