A lot of new cars now have tablet sized touch screens to control the infotainment systems such as radio, air-con and even windscreen wipers and lights on some cars. I’m led to believe that screens are now cheaper to produce than buttons and we are used to touch screens in general for everything now.
However, a recent study showed that physical buttons on older cars always out perform the touchscreens in new cars in time take to perform tasks.
My car has a touchscreen radio with a physical knob for on/off and volume and rotary dials and buttons for the A/C, which are easy to feel and control without taking your eyes off the road. I’ve seen reviews of newer cars with everything on a touchscreen where to perform simple tasks, such as turning the fan down, you have to go into multiple sub-menus and wait for the screen to respond. It seems madness to me that we are trying to discourage drivers from using phones while driving but putting big tablets in cars.
46 comments
Hate it but there are so many buttons on the touch screen that you couldn’t possible put them all out as physically buttons anymore. Neccessary evil.
To really simplify it, I don’t like it and I think it’s fucking stupid.
Oh no no no no no no.
I hated when heating changed from dial to buttons, not looking forward to touch screens
My car has a touch screen and I really dislike it.
I dislike how you end up with finger prints smudged all over it, but mostly because when you are driving, and focused on the road, a physical button is easier to find without looking. Plus there is the actual click of a button to know you have pressed it.
Loads of times I have been pressing my screen, wondering why nothing is happening, for me to look and see that I am not even pressing anything.
Putting standard car functions on a touchscreen is infuriating.
Adding a touchscreen for additional complex functions (sat nav, phone integretation etc) is fine and the only sensible way to do it, really.
Though I would like it if my system had a dedicated physical button to go to the homescreen in Android Auto.
I hate the idea, I like being able to feel where the button is and press it without looking away from the road
Give me a dial and buttons, with how bumpy roads are it makes it near impossible to change anything while driving.
If it’s for a function you would need to look at the screen for anyway I don’t mind so much. What I do think is terrible is when the infotainment just looks like an iPad glued to the dash
There was a recent study in the states that showed that touchscreens cause much more distractions and significantly increase reaction times. I think that all those functions should be incredibly limited whilst the vehicle is moving. The driver does not need all that info and function.
I’ve got both
I can easily change the temperature without looking – physical buttons
If I want to change an album on Spotify I need to take my eyes off the road a lot.
Voice control for Android Auto is pretty good though.
Downright dangerous. I’m astonished it’s been allowed, to be quite honest.
My car’s climate control system is touchbased and I am not a fan (no pun intended). I can access most of the media controls through the steering wheel buttons, but again it’s all built into a fairly clunky touchscreen interface.
Some things need to be a physical button that you can locate without taking your eyes off the road – eg windscreen wipers, hazard warning lights, volume control/mute.
Anything that requires you to be stationary to operate it can comfortably be touchscreen, such as retuning the DAB, changing driving position or headlight angles, checking tyre pressure, etc.
That said, our car can do quite a lot on voice controls, which are activated by a button on the steering wheel. And I do like steering wheel buttons/knobs for simple functions.
Ok for non essential funtions, but not for driving stuff.
It’s just car manufacturers cutting costs and pretending it’s a feature. Same as the mobile phone manufacturers. You get less function but with a shiny screen to distract you from the fact.
Some things should always have physical easy access buttons, mainly heat/AC.
It’s terrible – especially for the car radio, because with physical buttons you can reach over and press a button without having to take your eyes off the road, as you can feel where the button is. When you need to press a button on the touchscreen, you’ve got to look.
I’m not a fan and I’m even less of a fan after watching this video:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uIgfdRdJ6xs&](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uIgfdRdJ6xs&😉
The reviewer said that he had the infotainment screen completely stop working. He couldn’t turn the heating or sat nav on, he had to disconnect the battery and then re-connect it.
Imagine some cold rainy day where you can’t control the temperature or any of that inside the car!
Not a fan.
As much as I like a big screen as a satnav, I don’t really like it for fan/AC, music controls etc – I don’t like having to look away from the road
I hate it.
It’s dangerous as it’s hard to find basic functions without staring at and flicking through a screen instead of relying on muscle memory
I had a courtesy Honda HRV and none of the buttons worked with sweaty hands making it impossible to drive after the gym or on a hot day. I at no point knew whether the handbrake was on as the touchscreen button was crap and the only indicator was the light in the button itself which was too dim to see during the day.
We don’t need all this over complication and screens. I drive older cars for a reason.
I’ve got a touch screen which can also be controlled by a physical button. I’ve almost never used the touch screen because the buttons are so much easier and quicker to use. The touch screen disables at 7mph I think which is a great safety feature! Well done Mazda!
The absolute worst I’ve experienced is in a Tesla model 3. I just wanted to change the AC setting and whilst driving and it was a nightmare. To be fair, I also found it difficult in a brand new Golf recently.
Is it too much to ask to just have a single dedicated rotating dial for climate control like in my 2017 A4? I feel like this is the most modern car I will own with tactile controls.
I think it’s a huge safety issue. Everything I have in my car right now I can interact with without taking my eyes off the road, because it’s tactile. Doesn’t matter if it’s essential for use of the car or not, I can run my hand along the dash and find the button.
God knows what I’d be activating if I did that on a touch screen, so of course I have to look. The more features on the screen, the longer I have to look.
Hate them. I can’t hit the buttons on the screen when the car is moving because my hand moves too much. Takes me five minutes to get the radio station I want.
It depends on the functions that are being put into the touch screen.
If it’s an essential function for driving, then physical controls are essential. I think that Tesla went way too far putting wiper controls or even the shifter on the touch screen.
If it’s a non-essential function for actually driving (media controls etc.) then I have less of an issue with it.
I don’t mind that my car’s climate control is mostly on the touchscreen though, I just keep mine at the same temperature all year around, I never need to mess around with it apart from demisting (which does have dedicated buttons).
Buttons can be felt while focusing on the road.
Touchscreen almost always requires focus to be taken from the road to correctly locate something on the screen.
I fucking hate them. Not only is it dangerous to have to take your eyes off the road to look at them, but you also need to be extra careful when touching the screen as a wrong press will take you to the wrong menu etc.
Then on top of that, they always seem to crash or have general performance issues, freezing or not responding to inputs.
It’s just another example of technology for technologies sake. No-one (selling these cars) cares if it’s good for the customer or not, what matters is that they can sell more cars now because they can say they have “upgraded technology”, and enough people will fall for those words and want the latest model, so they don’t have to worry too much about how effective, or safe, it really is.
Physical buttons and dials are better in almost every way.
They look better. They feel better. They sound better. But most importantly of all they are more practical and less dangerous.
The advantages of screens is that you can perform more complex tasks, a wide range of them, and also display any kind of information…
I think car designers are to blame here. They could easily design a combination of both, rather than going all in with a screen.
Touch screen monitors in cars can make them feel dated real quick.
I was looking forward to a touch screen on my new car. After a year, I hate it. Absolutely hate it. With buttons I could rely on muscle memory to put my hand on, say, the radio controls without looking. With a touch screen I have to go to the right screen, touch, touch again.
The best screen is the one between the speedo and rev counter because that has info I can scroll between using a button on the steering wheel.
I wonder if there will be a retro-fit after market in better replacements
It’s just like putting a smartphone in your car that you are allowed to use. It irritates me that laws are so lenient for using your phone whilst driving. A 2 year driving ban would soon stop people.
I drive the quintessential touchscreen car made by mr musk. Really I can’t see the issue – get in the car, make sure the temperature is where I want it to be, radio on the right channel and then off I tootle; all stuff that I did in my old car laced with buttons and switches. If it’s nighttime the headlights are on before I set off and the main beam is on the indicator stalk. Gears are on another stalk and volume is on a little dial on the steering wheel. Hazards have a physical button as per legal requirements too.
Really unless I start dicking around with my music or the map, or need some emergency fog lights the touchscreen gets minimal-zero interaction while I’m driving. What needs so many constant button presses for everyone?
Any other buttons that I might need quickly eg demister are in fixed places so like a button it’s muscle memory to push the right place – only thing missing is some kind of haptic feedback.
They’re so fucking annoying, I’ll try to turn my sat nav off and it takes 4-5 attempts and it usually does something completely different, it’s so distracting
I think a lot of car manufacturers are going back to button for all the climate control stuff now. Touch screens are down right dangerous.
I had a touching experience with one once. Our eyes locked. The rest is a blur.
Should be illegal unless there is *also* a physical control to do the same actions for core operational functions. If I need to operate a touchscreen to alter climate controls, lights etc. then you’ve failed at making a car.
Tesla’s are fucking awful for this. You have to use the fucking touchscreen to open the GLOVEBOX.
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THE GLOVEBOX.
Absolutely hate them. I can accept little bits of touch screen stuff like using android auto and navigation, things you normally set up before leaving. Apart from that I want a physical button for everything else. A/C controls, parking sensors, seat heaters, volume, On/off, tuning, accept/decline calls should all be a physical button on either the wheel or dash as far as I’m concerned.
Everyone’s talking about physical and touch screen buttons but nobody has mentioned why there isn’t voice control on these devices. Surely that is the correct answer for safety?
Has any manufacturer incorporated voice control into their device? Things like Alexa or Android’s SpeechToText are easy things to add to any touch screen and would make it easy to control without taking your eyes off the road.
I think touch screens should be banned and there should be a strict list of buttons and knobs that are allowed.
It’s a pain in the arse. Fortunately android auto has voice control which makes life easier
Last time I bought a new car this is one of the reasons I didn’t choose a particular model. If I need to change the temp up or down on the one I went with I can just reach out and adjust without looking at it as it has a physical button. The other one it was on the touch screen which took my attention away from the road.
Hate the fact that it takes 2-3x longer to do a simple task. The voice command functions are hardly any improvement on this, especially as they’re rarely integrated with CarPlay or Android Auto.
I like having a touchscreen for certain functions. However functions like the volume nob, air con controls, light controls etc need dials or switches do you can use them with muscle memory.
I really really hate the emerging trend of putting touch sensitive buttons on steering wheels! I think it’s mad considering how easy it could be to tap the buttons by accident.
Dislike them deeply. A touchscreen as well as physical backups would be fine (might be easier for the passenger to figure out a GUI over buttons and dials they rarely use) but having touchscreens as the only option is not an improvement in any way.
A plague on this planet
Apparently the market is now for wheeled infotainment centres rather than transportation. More insidiously, the close integration will create a whole new generation of vehicles that become uneconomical to repair due to failure of a non-critical feature, plus the ability for a manufacturer to hold your car to ransom remotely for whatever reason occurs to them.