European car safety body is coming for touchscreens. The European New Car Assessment Programme mandates that key controls need physical buttons or switches

Carmakers are equipping their latest models with fancy touchscreens, but that could cause problems with Europe’s largest car safety authority.

The European New Car Assessment Programme (NCAP) is revamping its rating system starting Jan. 1, 2026 to mandate that five of a car’s primary controls — its horn, windshield wipers, turn signals, hazard warning lights and SOS features — will need physical buttons or switches.

Car models will have to comply to get NCAP’s coveted five-star rating. The scheme is voluntary but is heeded by most automakers because it’s closely monitored by consumers.

Belgium-based NCAP says that purely digital controls are a potential safety issue.

Maggoty,

Can we just use the European safety regulations for American cars? I’m tired of watching them get all the safety stuff a decade ahead of us.

Churbleyimyam,

I expect you will. I think It will be cheaper to have a single spec globally for a given model of car.

Potatos_are_not_friends,

(laughs in freedom while eating food containing chemicals banned in the EU)

HubertManne,
HubertManne avatar

banned and produced. im looking at you france.

Churbleyimyam,

This reminds me of the Taliban outlawing the sale of opium except to infidels.

EssentialCoffee,

Both my and my husband’s US cars already have all of the items listed as physical buttons. I don’t know that it’ll really change much.

hessenjunge, (edited )

I’m afraid they won’t. When I was a Student I had a summer job at Mercedes assembling cars. At the time cars sent to the US needed bigger airbags - you’d think it’d be less error prone at negligible extra cost to just equip all cars with the bigger airbags but they didn’t.

If they can save a couple of cents by having less buttons they’ll have less buttons.

CileTheSane,
@CileTheSane@lemmy.ca avatar

Of they can save a couple of cents by having less buttons they’ll have less buttons.

Are buttons actually more expensive than a touch screen?

hessenjunge, (edited )

You’ll have a touch screen either way and it’s possible that the functions of the buttons are available on some app too.

Just as basically all cars except current Teslas do.

I think the EU would be doing Tesla a favor if they force them to add physical controls to switch between D, R, N, P.

Edit: The current Tesla Model 3 should comply with the new rule (not 100% sure about hazard lights).

Cethin,

I have no idea how airbags work, but I assume you can just slot in different sizes?

Adding buttons requires certain infrastructure to be present in the vehicle. There needs to be places to insert them, though they could have separate dashboard panels if they want to build two for each vehicle, and wires/inputs for them. They could have two versions for all this, but it does require some extra effort.

hessenjunge,
  1. Just think about the logistics involved ensuring the correct airbag is slotted. You don’t want to be sued in the US because someone got hurt or killed because the airbag was not up to spec. The damage to the brand would be bad too. Any way, it’s not as simple as just plugging in one thing or the other.
  2. You could absolutely have the same wiring on both versions and just slot in different front ends (button/buttonless). I recall a couple of cases for that as well - e.g. wiring for a (DAB) antenna that is not in every version of the car or hard drives where the capacity is defined by the firmware (though having identical hardware)
HubertManne,
HubertManne avatar

grand caravans had a screen that was not availble on all trims. if you did not have it you just had a plastic plate in its place.

Churbleyimyam,

Interesting. Is that because Americans have bigger heads or weigh more overall?

hessenjunge,

According to Wikipedia it’s weight:

US regulation FMVSS 208 requires that bags be engineered and calibrated to be able to “save” the life of an unbelted 50th-percentile size and weight “male” dummy.

Assuming the regulation in the EU is similar and given that US average weight/BMI is higher than European average US airbags need to be bigger.

dunestorm,
@dunestorm@lemmy.world avatar

This is the perfect example of, just because you can doesn’t mean you should. Physical buttons are always more reliable without having to take your eyes off the road.

caveman,

That’s actually a good idea, because when your finger is wet the touchscreen doesn’t work and on touchscreen is more difficult to develop muscle memory, so you spend more time distracted trying to find the spot on screen to touch

mastod0n,

I only have a touch screen for entertainment and configuration and still notice how distracted I get when I have to use it. No haptic feedback and multilayered menus are just a bad idea while driving.

Cherry in top is driving at night with astigmatism when theres’s a whole illuminated panel in your face.

TheTimeKnife,
@TheTimeKnife@lemmy.world avatar

Fucking good, everything being touchscreen is completely insane.

daft61lunacy,

Also can you please ban piano black from interior?

a9249,

can we please throw in banning blue LED headlamps too?

arc,

I think they need to be super explicit to stop the likes of Tesla weaseling out or doing the bare minimum:

  • Wipers, speed settings, auto on/off should be on a stalk for front and rear wipers
  • Indicators should be on a stalk with
  • Hazard lights must be a physical button
  • Horn may be on the wheel or a button
  • Lights on/off/full beam/dip/auto must be a dial or a stalk
  • Demister / heated window must be physical buttons
  • Gears must be a physical rocker, lever or dial

And button / dial etc here means an actual push up/down button not some haptic / touch sensitive shit.

Because at the moment Tesla are basically cheaping out of providing physical controls to save money. It doesn’t matter if someone crashes their car fiddling to set the wiper speed because Tesla saved $20 on a stalk and that’s all that matters.

yokonzo,

Bit pedantic but a stalk + assembly could cost closer to $200, I’m not sure about design and manufacturing though

SkyezOpen,

On a 30k+ car. Fuck your 200.

yokonzo,

Chill tf out no one said I agree with it

elucubra,

That may be the price if you buy a spare part. OEM for manufscturing it’ll be much lower.

I recently had to buy a hose for my car. At the dealer it was 170€. At an online diwcout parts store it was 14€. Name brand, Gates.

dream_weasel,

Eh. I don’t think you need to specify “stalk”. I would be fine with physical buttons anywhere within easy reach. If they want to make a racing wheel that has 30 switches on it, I think I’m fine with that.

I appreciate that SOME things don’t have buttons now: getting into a BMW with that has the same number of buttons and switches as the cockpit of an airliner is ridiculous.

spizzat2,

And, for the love of dog, please require that the volume knob not rely on software! I hate trying to turn down/off the radio and then wait while the car decides whether I’m serious.

When I first start my car, the screen has to go through the boot up sequence and safety warning before the volume knob starts responding. The music starts playing right away, though, at whatever volume the previous driver deemed appropriate.

uis, (edited )

They forgot add acceleration, breaks and clutch to this list.

But as ussual: EU, I belive in you!

strawberrysocial,

Good, now North America needs to do the same. Sick of touchscreens. Also make it so it’s harder to steal my car too thanks.

helenslunch,

Add it to the list of “shit nobody wants but car manufacturers keep fucking doing”, along with gloss black trim and capacitive buttons.

asliceobread,

Capacitive buttons are the fucking worst. Even when the manufacturers try to incorporate haptic feedback, it’s never enough when you’re in a moving vehicle with bumps in the road…

tb_,
@tb_@lemmy.world avatar

Feel/touch and press/activate shouldn’t be the same action

HubertManne,
HubertManne avatar

europe is my hero.

uis,

I say “EU, I belive in you!”, now you can say it too.

hydration6148,

the bar was so low

HubertManne,
HubertManne avatar

oh yeah. around these parts the bar is so low im continually amazed at how fast the can dig to keep lowering it.

JasonDJ,

I don’t see anything about gas, brake, or steering. Next generation EU market Tesla will feature drive-by-theremin.

a_wild_mimic_appears,

Maybe they’ll go low-tech and introduce drive-by-terrain

Fr0G,

Practically a nightmare, but as a fantasy kinda cool. Initial D but they are theremin drifting would be kinda sick lol

theotherverion,

Common EU win

ocassionallyaduck,

Fucking good. Long overdue.

I love some EVs, but I drove a Polestar 2 and a Model 3 on road trips for work in California. Never again. The nighttime driving experience is miserable imo, and the issues with the lack of stalks and buttons is real.

The Polestar is the only car to ever make me so angry I had to pull over. It had some kind of sensor issue, and decided the right way to notify my at 80mph on the highway was to A) cover my gate cluster with the error notification B) disengage my cruise control suddenly, at 80mph, and C) begin beeping.

I almost drove my rental into the Pacific Ocean out of spite.

havocpants,

All of the functions described in the article are already on physical buttons and stalks in the Polestar 2 (I have one), so not sure how this is going to change anything? I’ll agree that some of its error reporting and collision avoidance in particular are almost dangerous in their implementation, but that has no bearing on the physical buttons thing.

ocassionallyaduck,

No buttons for climate control / fans, and Android auto on it is also kinda jank.

zerog_bandit,

Zero dog in the game (I own a Mazda3) but I rented a Polestar and found it very enjoyable. Different, absolutely, but good enough that I was glad there is an alternative EV to Tesla if I wanted to get one.

ocassionallyaduck,

I am glad there are other players in the market but the user experience was just miserable for me. Between the lack of buttons for all the climate control and the error messages, as well as subpar android auto support in favor of their own janky android OS (not great for rentals).

Maybe Polestar 3 will fix all this. Maybe.

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