[RahulNagaraj]

In a bid to simplify the interiors of a car, automakers are slowly removing physical buttons/knobs and integrating the controls into the vehicle's infotainment display. Drivers now have to navigate through multiple menus on the car's touchscreen to even make simple adjustments.

Kelly Funkhouser, Consumer Reports' manager for Vehicle Technology, stated that touchscreens require drivers to shift their focus onto a screen, search for a feature and tap the spot to control it. While simple controls, like gripping a knob or feeling a button are easier to use without requiring the driver to take their eyes off the road.



With this in mind, Consumer Reports is said to have evaluated the interiors of hundreds of new vehicles to come up with a list of cars which have the easiest-to-use controls in each category. The cars, according to CR, balance form & function without skimping on features, comfort or style.



Among the small SUVs, the 2023 Honda CR-V tops the list. The SUV comes with a traditional gear selector along with physical buttons and knobs to control the most-often used features. Among the affordable sedans, the 2023 Honda Accord tops the list, with a close alternative being the Toyota Camry. Among the compact luxury sedans, the Audi A3 tops the list, while the new Nissan Leaf takes the top spot for electric vehicles. Finally, in the large SUVs/minivans category, the Chevrolet Traverse takes the top spot.

Source: Consumer Reports

Link to Team-BHP news

[lordrayden]

Brilliant move from Consumer Reports to have a ranking like this.

In typical corporate culture with its "metric fixation", a plain old simple dumb number can sometimes stir execs into action. Said such exec: "I don't fully understand how this business works, but there seems to be a number/ranking for our product ... improve it" .

Hopefully in the future, we'll find a good balance between touch screens and physical buttons.

[PreludeSH]

I wish if they could give a row of buttons that can be programmed. What is useful for a user is sometimes too much inside menus.
Add to this there are even hold a button on wheel for long press to activate things and is really complex.

[GTO]

Originally Posted by PreludeSH

I wish if they could give a row of buttons that can be programmed. What is useful for a user is sometimes too much inside menus.

BMW does this & I find it incredibly useful.

Buttons marked 1 - 8 are custom shortcut keys. I've set up iDrive shortcuts on them (e.g. no. 3 takes me directly to vehicle status & maintenance information). Attention to detail, you ask? Get this = place your finger on any button (without pressing it) and you'll see a preview on the iDrive screen of where that shortcut key will take you. Ze Germans really spoil you!

[Reinhard]

Originally Posted by RahulNagaraj

In a bid to simplify the interiors of a car,

Important words - "for THEM". .
By no means is this touch-ification simplifying cabin for the driver/passenger. These touch based settings are making life hell in the cabin, especially while driving. I'm thankful to the gods that all 3 of my cars (all entry level hatchbacks of course, no gizmos) - have physical buttons for everything I need while driving. Dreading the day when I have to buy a car in future with no physical buttons. Of course - there must be many - who like these touch sensitive controls rather than old-school knobs and buttons. No offence to them.

This move to touch-sensitive controls must be contributing at least a small % to road mishaps. I have already seen people busy on their touchscreen HUs while driving at speeds without looking at the roads.

Glad to see these small exceptions as mentioned above. Hopefully better sense prevails sooner rather than later.

[Nazaar25]

Luckily all the cars that we own have a lot of buttons which makes life much easier on the go especially for the ones behind the wheel.
The worst trend in new cars according to me is the integration of air conditioning controls in the infotainment system which makes a very simple and frequently used function a 2 or 3 step process.
It’s very distracting and unlike audio controls which are also present on the steering wheel, for air-con controls the driver will have to rely on the screen!

[ghost-was-here]

Originally Posted by Reinhard

Important words - "for THEM". .
By no means is this touch-ification simplifying cabin for the driver/passenger...

I too feel the same. No way people prefer having to take their eyes off of the road FOR EVERY SINGLE FREAKING THING.

God knows I'm grateful for the physical air-con controls on the compass. The one in our City (Gen3) drives me nuts, so much that I only use that car if I have a co passenger that can control the air-con and radio/media.

[Dr.AD]

Originally Posted by GTO

BMW does this & I find it incredibly useful.

Buttons marked 1 - 8 are custom shortcut keys. I've set up iDrive shortcuts on them (e.g. no. 3 takes me directly to vehicle status & maintenance information). Attention to detail, you ask? Get this = place your finger on any button (without pressing it) and you'll see a preview on the iDrive screen of where that shortcut key will take you. Ze Germans really spoil you!

Absolutely! This is a great feature and I love this in my 320d. All 8 buttons are programmed for the most commonly accessed functions by me. Another very nice detail: Not only you can program the buttons to access a specific menu item/shortcut, you can even program it to perform specific tasks. For example, in my 320d, I have programmed button 1 to directly call my wife. All I need to do is to press 1, and it enters the call mode, picks up the direct call shortcut and makes a phone call to my wife. Incredibly useful when I need to call her in a hurry when I am driving around.

Coming back to topic, yes I believe that "touchscreen + physical buttons" is the best of the both worlds. Thankfully many cars are offering this now. BMW does it the best. Having checked out many recent cars with fancy touchscreens and fancier controls, I find the BMW's iDrive, the physical iDrive controller, and then the array of physical buttons on the center console makes it the best system so far. At least for F30 and G20 (before LCI) cars.

[fhdowntheline]

Dont know about easiest controls because the laggy buggy ICE on some of Indian Hondas does affect the ease of operation. But the cars are easy to drive/ handle from a pure driving standpoint.

[VwRabbit]

Japanese cars always seem to have easy to understand/use controls and good ergonomics rather than complex controls of German cars like how a big brand from the latter introduced gesture movements for volume control which from my experience is only a fancy gimmick that doesn’t work half the time ,but now with improvements in AI ,voice assistant ,better tech and bigger touchscreens the Japanese brands seem to be playing it safe and old school(with their dated and laggy touchscreen infotainment from the 2000’s) while others are moving ahead.

[RunGaDa]

The question here one must ask is if the control compels the driver to take his or her eyes off the road then it’s not correctly designed. It may be a manual control or on a screen.
However, the difference is due to touch memory drivers get used to manual controls.
A thorough study needs to be done.
For example sickle we have rear camera integrated with the touch screen, it may make sense to keep the reverse gear on screen controls. But will that be quick enough to a lot in case of an emergency like approaching flow of water or wild animal?
For long time regulations did not allow Tesla to integrate parking button option in the system as touch control, it was given in weird places as manual option. Same with lock and unlock. How easy it would be to lock the car from screen controls? What if there is a threat of muggers?

Many German cars retained manual Speedometer and tachometer for manual cars as there is a demand by hard core car enthusiasts not to make them digital. I thought it may not be needed to make them mechanical and graphics can be shown simulating manual speedometer. The car brands can also allow options of digital vs manual in this case.

We are living in a digital world where in a loaner car given by Tesla can be used in minutes after the user sets his own personal profile. This is a very high degree of automation and should be standardized to allow cut across other EV brands.

[btyalbert]

I recently purchased the Honda CR-V Sport Hybrid 2WD in Dallas, Texas a week ago and its done 115 miles in that much time. I love the physical knobs, buttons and the gear lever. The knobs feel very premium and so does most of the interiors. Its a well built product. I was leaning towards the Accord Hybrid but found the ride a bit more stiff than my liking. The low tyre profile must have also contributed to that. 235/40/19s in the Accord vs the 235/60/18s in the CR-V.
I am going to do a review after around 250 miles. Here is an image of the feature list of the trim that I bought -



Had to Blur out few details - VIN and Engine Number as this is the Car I bought.



I am going to start drafting the review this weekend.