European New Car Assessment Program (NCAP) — an independent and well-regarded safety body for the automotive industry — is set to introduce new rules in January 2026 that require the vehicles it assesses to have physical controls to receive a full five-star safety rating.
While Euro NCAP testing is voluntary, it is widely backed by several EU governments with companies like Tesla, Volvo, VW, and BMW using their five-star scores to boast about the safety of their vehicles to potential buyers.
“The overuse of touchscreens is an industry-wide problem, with almost every vehicle-maker moving key controls onto central touchscreens, obliging drivers to take their eyes off the road and raising the risk of distraction crashes,” said Matthew Avery, director of strategic development at Euro NCAP, to the Times. To be eligible for the maximum safety rating after the new testing guidelines go into effect, cars will need to use buttons, dials, or stalks for hazard warning lights, indicators, windscreen wipers, SOS calls, and the horn.
The Euro NCAP’s safety guidelines aren’t a legal requirement, however, car makers take safety ratings pretty seriously, so any risk of points being docked during such assessments is likely to be taken into consideration.
Ya know what? Lets get a mulligan. Lets go back to the begining. Let’s start from the begining with vehicles again. From now on, the only vehicle allowed to be produced is the Ford model T that came out in like 1914. Every car is now that car.
No screens. No gimmicks. No seatbelts. Not even a heater or an enclosed surface. If you crash, your ass is getting thrown from the car onto the pavement! HEADS UP ASSHOLE!!! PAY ATTENTION TO THE GOD DAMNED ROAD YOU CELL PHONE DRIVING DISTRACTED FUCKCLOWN!!!
Let’s just get back to basics, ya know?
I think Euro NCAP ratings would have more teeth if it was mandatory for manufacturers of standard passenger vehicles to submit a reference model for testing. Voluntary testing doesn’t work since manufacturers would be averse to submit cars for testing if they thought they’d get a bad score. And while Euro NCAP does sometimes buy cars for testing, they don’t do it for every make and model.
And if the cheapest dogshit cars on the road (Kia Picantos, Dacia Sandero’s etc) can have buttons, dials, wipers and indicators then so should everything above it. Companies like Tesla remove controls to cheap out on having to make a part, but they attempt to pass this off as innovation when it puts people’s lives at risk.
More physical controls is great, so I see this as a win. For navigation and media, I don’t want to be without the screen, but I hate that my ventilation controls are 50 % hidden under touch controls, meaning I usually don’t bother to change them while I drive, because it requires looking away too much.
Jesus finally. Death to touch screens in cars
Monkey paw curls
Same exact cars but with button navigated non-touch screens.
I’d take that deal. My touch screen died in my car and guess what can’t control it? The steering wheel buttons, despite having full directional/enter/return.
button navigated
2000s Volvo?
Or 2000s BMW?
Gimme a keyboard and mouse. I can drive the whole car and operate the infotainment with my 250 apm
What’s your EPM though, like 20?
Replace the steering wheel with a Steam Deck.
That’s a plus. I drove a hire car with a joystick/dial/button thing that could control the touch screen. It was so much easier to pay attention to driving while controlling something on screen. With touch screens you need to watch your finger as you press because there’s no tactile feedback.
people don’t seem to understand what’s going on here.
Nothing on the infotainment unit needs to be adjusted while driving, it can have a brail interface for all it should matter.
Core controls are being put behind touch screens, that’s the whole point of changing NCAP requirements.
leaving them on a screen with less direct control is objectively worse. need to use turn signal? now you need to select it first.
Same exact cars but with button navigated non-touch screens.
I love it!
As someone who drives a mazda with infotainment designed before touchscreens (it has one), I’m fine with this.
I borrowed a Mazda 3 with the joystick dial a few times. It’s absolutely brilliant.
I bought my Mazda 3 used. The captain’s knob will be sorely missed if I ever get a different car.
My car is the same. I know the current state of the infotainment based on what is entering my ears. I also know the location of the physical controls and how they alter that state without taking my eyes off the road. Non-touch screens and physical controls is fine.
This whole thing started because manufactures are putting core controls behind touch screens. This would in fact be the very definition of “not fine”
literally nothing important should be on the infotainment system anyway.
Less screens? Why does a car even need one screen?
The mandatory in EU reversing camera.
Holy smokes. That’s nuts. I’m glad I font live there then.
The United States, Canada, and Japan have the requirement, too. Australia’s takes effect in November 2025.
You can prise my windscreen from my cold dead hands.
You afraid of getting bugs in your teeth? Coward. /s
The rate of decline of insects in the last few decades is quickly making that a non-issue.
😂👍
Reversing camera
Those things would be way more useful if they had a wider FOV. I hate how most people now use them as the only way of checking behind them when backing up, because you really can’t see shit well enough for that. It’s meant for seeing something small and close that even physically turning around to look, you wouldn’t see it. Like an animal or a child directly behind you.
All they’ve done is make people drive less safe because so many people just stare at the fucking camera screen instead of actually turning their head and checking their blind spots.
They are called rear vision mirrors/ side mirrors, and neck muscles.
You can’t see something small right behind you with that.
It served humanity just fine for decades. My car is 25 years old and never ran anything over. Look before you get in, check your mirrors, crane your neck, look over your shoulder, activate parts of your brain. I plan on never owning one of these over complicated modern cars. You do you though I guess.
Yea and sweetening wine with lead never hurt anyone, the Romans turned out fine!
Your position is that rear view cameras didn’t save any lives?
If you’d used one you would know they show you angles you can’t see otherwise.
If it works for you, all good. It’s not for me though 👍
thank god. I hope this trend migrates to other countries. The amount of effort/distraction for touch screens combined with the additional cost of having to replace full on infotainment systems is annoying.
Be still my heart
Driving and texting is dangerous. Put down that phone and stare at this ipad in your dash! Further the ipad is slow, designed by imbeciles, is glitchy, buggy, and not intuitive and doesn’t follow modern design standards.
To be fair, it’s at least closer to the windshield, so you’re more likely to see something through peripheral vision with the dash screen than your phone, which you need to keep out of view of police.
Still bad, but probably not as bad.
now with #ADS, please tap the x to continue changing your GPS.
Your brakes will be available again after this mandatory 30s ad.
cars will need to use buttons, dials, or stalks for hazard warning lights, indicators, windscreen wipers, SOS calls, and the horn.
Not enough, in my opinion. I’ve never had a car with these on touch screens, but I can’t imagine why anyone would think it’s a good idea. I’d like entertainment centers to stop being touch screens as well, but this doesn’t go that far. Hopefully they do in the future, though, since this is a good start!
Not far enough indeed.
I dont need all my entertainment as physical controls but I do at least want volume - and that is totally justifiable as a safety consideration too. Sometimes you need to mute it quickly if you think you heard something of concern on the road, or if you are like me, just to concentrate on driving when things get tricky!
There are so many other items you can apply similar safety arguments for:
Blowers and demisters - you shouldn’t be messing around in a touchscreen when you see your windows starting to fog
Cabin temperature - Uncomfortable driver = distracted driver
In my opinion, the place to draw the line should be this:
If the need to interact with the feature is triggered by external road conditions it MUST be physical. (Example: wipers, heating, blowers, all headlight and fog light controls, enable or diasable lane assist, cruise control)
If the driver has the ability to themselves choose when to engage with the feature and can do it only when safe, then it can be fully touchscreen. (Example: satnav route, fuel economy settings, electric seat position)
I hope the standard makes it clear that touch buttons are about as bad as a touch screen is
If they could ban the “confirm you know the rules of the fucking road” dialogue box that would be great.
Screen consoles in 4000lb bullets were the dumbest engineering idea ever. It’s probably a contributing factor as to why accident rates are up.
Up until 2018 I could manipulate my entire console without shifting my eyes from the road. Doing this by touch alone only works with physical buttons and knobs.
The second dumbest engineering idea. The dumbest was clearly the car itself, letting the average person control a device that can accelerate hundreds or thousands of kilograms to speeds where reaction times of fractions of a second matter for safety was clearly one of the stupidest ideas ever.
Maybe the evolution. My grandmother told stories of her dad scaring her mom with his “crazy” driving, speeding up to 40, sometimes even 45 mph.
Finally!!!
“Don’t stare at your phone but instead stare at this screen that controls your car.”
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My vote is:
- Button layouts that have worked for 20-30 years
- Heads-up displays for readouts of current values. Mph/kmph is displayed by default and the display temporarily changes when something like volume, heat, radio station, track, etc. is adjusted
Best of both worlds
Exactly!
This pretty much summarises it.
I disagree. I don’t want to have to take my eyes off the road to change my music, or turn the volume up/down. They need to be physical buttons/knobs.
I have a giant screen, and physical buttons for volume and air temp.
Super happy with it.
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If you get the fancy steering wheel option
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There should be two screens. One only visible from the navigators seat and always available. The other can be where it makes sense, but it should be disabled for all input when the car is not in park. When the car is in motion only limited information is allowed - you shouldn’t be able to tell what the name of the song playing is as that isn’t something you have any business reading. You should get some indication of what the next turn is, but even that needs serious UX work to ensure it is not distracting.
One thing I really like about the Lucid Air is that the big screen retracts. Makes it look and feel quite different, almost like an older car without the big screen.
Important controls like seats, temperature, and volume/pause are physical. So you can have the big screen when you want it, and it goes away when you don’t. More cars should do that, though the additional moving part probably isn’t great for longevity.
I think I agree. I would be fine with an infotainment system that:
- doesn’t cripple the car when broken
- isn’t integrated with non-screen controls like climate
- still has functional buttons on the steering wheel
My malibu meets 2 and 3, but the fact that if the infotainment system breaks it cripples the entire car, puts me on edge. This would be mitigated if actual functionality was outside of it, and that the touch screen was just a control layer.
