The new cars are faster, more efficient and safer than before – but they also come with a host of features that we consider a bit unnecessary.
After all, it’s getting harder and harder to stand out from the crowd.
Strict safety regulations mean that most new cars have similar styling, and strict emissions standards mean that small turbochargers – or electric motors – are the order of the day. day.
The death of knobs and dials means that essentially all new vehicles, from affordable SUVs to ultra-luxury limousines, have a variation on the same display setup. wide shape behind the steering wheel.
To compensate, brands have equipped their cars with a host of unusual features designed to surprise and delight potential buyers during a test drive.
From ambient lighting that syncs with your music to a driver monitoring system designed to prevent you from taking your eyes off the road while on the go, here are the features we think you can away.
Scott Collie: Lane Centering Assist
I completely despise most lane centering systems.
Keep lane I understand. It leaves you to set yourself up, before intervening when you stray towards the outer edge of the lane.
However, the lane centering feature, a more proactive method for parking, never seems to work as advertised. In some cases (ahem, Hyundai) you’re constantly playing tug-of-war with the system, as it ignores how you want to position the car according to its own program.
On the highway, it’s annoying to constantly feel like the car is trying to overtake you. On secondary roads, it is very dangerous; Sometimes the best thing you can do is cross the white line to avoid bicyclists, open doors, or parked cars, and active lane focus tries to stop you.
In other cases, the autopilot works so well that you feel comfortable and hold the steering wheel more comfortably… only when the car loses its mind and beeps asking you to put your hand on the wheel – though they never leave it.
Technology is supposed to make cars safer and make our lives easier. Lane centering falls into the uncomfortable gray area between human and automatic control, where it is capable of achieving those goals, but rarely does.
Paul Maric: Parking remotely
Remote parking is possibly the most useless feature I’ve seen on a new car to date.
It’s one of those gimmicks that works well in brochures, but when you really need to use it, it’s so uncertain in itself that you never know if you’ve lost half of it. vehicle or not while trying to exit a parking space.
We tested the remote parking feature on our Model Y when Tesla gave owners the feature late last year. It nearly compacted the car parked next to it and showed no sign of slowing down as it approached a metal bar at the end of our parking space.
If you don’t have an electric car, that car needs to be started and if it uses a dual clutch, it will wobble awkwardly every time it tries to move… yes, I’m just a disclaimer .
Tony Crawford: Automatic Parking Assist
I’ve never actually used the “Parking Assistant” function other than at launch (this has only happened once in 16 years).
The process to even get into the system is unintuitive, complicated, and often takes up to three times longer than if you were to park the car yourself.
Good idea, but no one uses it.
James Wong: Sound speed warning
Audio speed limit warnings and recommendations.
They drive me completely crazy – just put the speed sign graphic in my cluster or head display.
Alborz Fallah: Useless Driving Mode
The most useless feature in most cars are driving modes that do nothing. You know how in a Formula 1 racing car the driver is changing brake balance, differential percentage and god knows what else on a nearly corner-by-corner basis?
Well, that’s not what’s happening in the Toyota hybrid or a host of other new cars whose driving modes don’t improve the driving experience at all.
The new GT3 RS has some tweakable and usable settings right on the steering wheel and it’s great to see it in action, but what’s the point of having drive modes in a family SUV if all these What it does is change the way the accelerator responds to your input?
Couldn’t they put more effort into the driving modes? It makes much more sense to have individual buttons for things like suspension, exhaust and others when the car is actually equipped with them, but there are basically Sport, Eco and Normal modes. nothing is a stupid marketing gimmick.
What I would like is some feature innovation with driving modes – maybe a ‘no speeding ticket’ mode – which is essentially a dynamic speed limiter that you can turn on by press a button. You don’t need to keep setting the speed limiter as it uses its own GPS and camera data to read the signs.
Also a good idea? Porsche 911-style active driving modes use GPS, sensor and weather data to enhance traction in wet conditions. It certainly takes a little more thought, but what I can tell you is that the old Sport mode that does nothing is the most useless button in most modern cars.
Derek Fung: Voice Assistant
I echo all the comments about automatic parking assistants, so I wanted to provide voice recognition or natural language recognition built in.
No, I don’t want to tell my car to tell it to turn up the temperature, circulate the air, turn off the audio system, or move on to the next track. These are nothing more than a push of a button or a dial. And no, I also don’t want to use your keyword phrase “HEY CAR BRAND” to enable this feature.
Like Siri and whatever Google equivalent is called this week, the feature will be turned off immediately, because first I don’t want my car/phone to hear all of my conversations. its useless and secondly I have children.
Besides that, I occasionally use voice recognition, but only through Android Auto or Apple CarPlay, to change destinations on Google Maps.
Jade Credentino: Rear Seat Entertainment
When I was growing up, passenger screens were introduced into some luxury cars and I was adamant that one day my parents would buy a car with them. Unfortunately, they never did.
But now I think this feature is a bit disabled since the iPad came out.
When I take care of my baby, it’s almost a must-have item in her luggage if the car trip is longer than 10 minutes.
Entertainment screens served a purpose in the late 2000s, but now apps, games, and streaming services are available in the iPad. Installing a fixed screen in the back seat of the car no longer makes sense.
William Stopford: Voice Assistant
I’m a fan of car gadgets, from massage chairs to ambient lighting. Even things like Hyundai’s Intelligent Remote Parking Assist System, I can understand and can even see the use case. But I have my limits.
I’m not interested in voice assistants because they’re often used as an excuse to explain why physical switches have been dropped in favor of touchscreen-based controls. In my opinion, two inferior systems are not worthy substitutes for a good one.
Voice assistants also never seem to handle reminders as well as Android Auto or Apple CarPlay, unless it’s an incredibly simple prompt like “adjust the temperature to 20 degrees” or “open the sunroof.” “.
I’ll echo my colleagues’ thoughts on some other features. Semi-automated parking systems are gimmicky and never seem to work so well, although when they do, they’re impressive. And speeding warnings are an annoyance, especially when car manufacturers force you to turn off speed sign recognition to turn those damn warnings off.
The speeding warning systems in the latest Hyundai Motor Company products are the worst. They will sound a chime whenever a new speed limit is detected and multiple chime if you exceed that speed by more than 5 km/h. And the default system is on.
That’s annoying, but Hyundai says it’s a legal requirement in some markets and not some sort of misguided attempt at a convenient feature. Other companies will sound the bells, but they’re much more subtle – keep in mind, though, that nothing worries your passengers more than random bells and warnings that sound while you’re driving. car.
Jack Quick: Charge your phone wirelessly
While I believe wireless phone chargers are essential in cars without wired Apple CarPlay and Android Auto forms, I have yet to find a charger that works properly all the time with my iPhone 12 Pro Max. me.
In some cars the wireless phone charger has no defined edges and causes my phone to fly around, while in some other cars my phone overheats due to the coils in the charger Qi is not aligned.
I have also had cases in my car where the wireless charger completely refused to charge my phone, even when I removed my original Apple case.
I wasn’t too worried when the wireless charger didn’t work on shorter trips, but on longer trips when I was navigating and pumping tunes on Apple CarPlay, I really needed more power.
The last thing I do most of the time when I’m after work is just plug my phone in with a USB cable. This really defeats the purpose of wireless smartphone mirroring but if it means my phone will charge reliably then I will do it nine times out of 10.
