The Future is Coming, So Say Goodbye to Your Knobs

Steph Willems
by Steph Willems

If you like your dashboard to function like a 1970s stereo, then you’re an outlier in a society that increasingly desires a Minority Report-style driving experience, according to Automotive News.

A five-year forecast by industry analyst IHS Automotive predicts a steep increase in manufacturer demand for high-tech vehicle controls, meaning more touch screens, gesture controls and voice-recognition technology.

This also means the buttons, switches and knobs that were once the hallmark of moderns vehicles (“Look at all those buttons – you must be rich!”) could soon be rarer than a Kia K900.

Over the next half-decade, IHS predicts that sales of voice recognition technology will rise by 12 percent, while touch screens and gesture controls will rise by 13 and 35 percent, respectively. Steering wheel switches will see an 11 percent bump in sales, while good old-fashioned button controls will rise just two percent.

“Consumer electronics are a leading indicator for [cockpit controls] in the car,” explained IHS analyst Mark Boyadjis.

For automotive purists, this trend is tantamount to heresy. After all, buttons, knobs and switches lend an intimate, tactile element to the driving experience. Who doesn’t like feeling like they’re in the cockpit of a 1950s Stratofortress circling a fail-safe point in the High Arctic?

Many people, apparently.

Offering “the latest thing” is the norm for the auto industry, which once offered dashboard record players and drink sets, so there’s a tradition at work here.

Having an ultra-modern cockpit can be great advertising, but automakers risk turning off buyers if their state-of-the-art infotainment technology becomes known for being difficult/annoying to use.

Steph Willems
Steph Willems

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  • Chan Chan on Mar 21, 2016

    The only things voice recognition is good for are speed-dialling and entering nav destinations. Everything else is more quickly taken care of by knobs and buttons.

  • Ammom_rouy Ammom_rouy on Mar 21, 2016

    The end of knobs! And I just found a terrific knob polisher.

  • Jeff S Jeff S on Mar 21, 2016

    Is that a digital knob polisher?

  • RightWheelDrive RightWheelDrive on Mar 23, 2016

    You'd talk to someone first, and then touch and then push buttons as you get more intimate, and there's a reason for that

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