Why Has It Takes So Long For Automakers To Fix This Huge Problem?
If you’re a true gearhead, you’ll know that one of the greatest sins ever committed against us was the invention of the entertainment screen and its more modern brother, the touchscreen interface. These things debuted in the 1990s as German automakers were inventing new shock-and-awe features to outdo each other. As most technology does, it eventually filtered down to more affordable cars and that’s when the second-greatest sin was created against our people.
It was the invention of the reverse camera, which the US government decided was a must-have. Thanks to people not being able to just look behind them, the touchscreen interface is now ubiquitous, but we have some good news. According to the J.D. Power 2024 U.S. Multimedia Quality and Satisfaction Study, they are getting better. Finally. That only took 30 years. We’ll get to the improvement later on, but first, a rant.
What’s Our Beef With Touchscreen Interfaces?
Buttons just do a better job. You want the radio on, you push a button. If you want Dave Grohl to sing louder, you turn the dial. If it’s feeling a bit balmy on the inside, you press the AC button. And if you want a bit of fresh air, you press the electric window switch down. Those are all the amenities I need in a car, but even I have to admit that touchscreens were a good idea, especially when Apple CarPlay and Android Auto came along. These third-party products made in-car entertainment so much easier, but that’s where it should have stopped.
Unfortunately, the automotive industry reached a tipping point where it became cheaper to fit a screen than using old-school buttons. For proof, look no further than third-world cars like the Renault Kwid. Renault can’t afford to add an ABS system and more than one airbag without increasing the price out of the range of an average buyer, but you can bet your ass that it has a touchscreen interface with Apple CarPlay. It has now become more expensive to design and produce analog instrument clusters, which is why Porsche ditched its famous center analog rev counter.
Automakers love to call their new interior designs minimalist, but there’s a good reason why everything is now controlled by the screen. It’s just more affordable than providing you with an old-school button. That’s where it all went wrong. The moment the buttons for the most used features were ditched and moved to the car’s touchscreen interface is where it all went horribly wrong, and consumers have been complaining ever since.
We cover almost every J.D. Power quality and reliability survey, and for the last five years, the main issue people have with their cars has had nothing to do with the engine, gearbox, or suspension. The most complained about feature was the multimedia, and it’s not hard to fathom why. I’ve been testing cars for many years, and I have three main gripes with modern infotainment.
Don’t Take Away My Buttons
I can stomach a touchscreen interface as long as the features I use most often are kept separate. I don’t care what interior designers have to say. A slide action on a touchscreen interface will never be able to recreate the satisfying rolling motion and resistance of a dial when it comes to setting the temperature for the climate control. Having to choose between Eco, Normal, and Sport modes is already annoying in itself, and it’s even worse if I have to go into a menu within a menu to make my sporty car feel sportier. Why isn’t it just sporty all the time? I digress.
Don’t Make Me Talk To My Car
I love my car, and it does feel like a friend. But I do not want to talk to it. I’ve seen Her. (If you haven’t, it’s about a dude who falls in love with the talking AI on his smartphone. To be fair to the main character, the smartphone is voiced by Scarlett Johansson, and I’d be much happier talking with my car if it was also voiced by her husky tone.)
But no. I have to say something silly like “Hey, *insert brand name here*. I’m feeling cold.” And then the voice of a prison warden comes on and says it’ll put the temperature up.
Stop With The Silly Gimmicks
Automakers are constantly trying to come up with cool features that you can show your friends once, and then never use again. There are two examples I can think of now. BMW has gesture control, and to use it you twirl your finger around in front of the screen to turn the volume up. Why not just turn the volume up using the button on the dashboard or the steering wheel? The second is drowsiness detection. Yes, I’m tired. I’m an adult human being. That’s how we exist.
How Has The Problem Been Fixed?
J.D. Power doesn’t say how the problem was fixed, but we do have some personal experience we’ll get to later. What it does have is the feedback of nearly 100,000 purchasers and lessees of new 2024 model-year vehicles and their feedback after 90 days of ownership. This year the Multimedia Quality and Satisfaction Study showed a drastic departure from the norm.
Complaints are recorded and reworked into a metric that’s easy to understand. J.D. Power uses a problems per 100 vehicles (PP100) figure, and for the first time in three years, it has dropped below 25%. In 2020, the multimedia figure stood at 39.1 and increased to 43.7 PP100 at its highest. According to J.D. Power, the biggest improvements were made to “voice recognition, lack of USB ports, and inconsistent volume.”
“It is great to see OEMs and suppliers taking action on what were typically the biggest contributors to the increases in vehicle multimedia quality problems,” said Ashley Edgar, senior director of automotive benchmarking at J.D. Power.
“Previously long-standing issues have been addressed, and those updates can be seen in the problem decreases. Looking ahead, to continue decreasing problems, further optimization of Apple Car Play and Android Auto should remain a top priority.”
This is great to hear, especially considering that some infotainment systems have become so bad that they can ruin an entire car. For reference, see the pre-facelift Golf GTI. VW’s multimedia systems were so bad that it acknowledged the problem and went back to the drawing board. But let’s rather focus on the brands leading the charge in making multimedia great again.
The Brands Leading The Charge Aren’t Premium
The first thing you need to understand is that satisfaction is ranked differently. After talking to owners, an individual car is awarded a score out of 1,000. The first rankings are given for overall customer satisfaction in the four major car segments. In the midsize/large category, we have the Hyundai Santa Fe with 913, and in the small/compact category is the Mitsubishi Outlander with 907. In the midsize/large premium category, the Cadillac Escalade scored 935. In the small/compact premium category, the Cadillac CT4 scored 920. Caddy has always been seen as less than the Germans, and here it is schooling them in the most important interior feature.
Other brands that scored more than 900 include:
- Chevrolet
- Nissan
- Lexus
- Lincoln
- Kia
- Jaguar
- BMW
Which Companies Are Behind The Software And Hardware
As you might know, automakers tend to use third-party suppliers for multimedia solutions. It’s rare that a company does its own development, but Hyundai deserves special mention here. J.D Power ranked the suppliers, and these are the top three finishers:
- Hyundai Mobis
- Bosch
- Unknown
That “Unknown” is quite annoying, but it’s all related to Chevrolet. The Blazer, Camaro, and Traverse all scored 909 points, so whoever supplies GM is excellent at their jobs. There is more information available when it comes to navigation suppliers. The top suppliers in order are:
- Bosch for the Nissan Sentra – 954
- Telenav for the Cadillac Escalade – 946
- Google for the Honda Accord – 940
- Hyundai Autoever for the Kia Forte – 940
Once again, the sources for certain brands are not available, but other cars that scored 940 or above include Chevrolet, Buick, BMW, and Mercedes-Benz. Finally, the top speaker suppliers are:
- Alps Alpine Co in the Jeep Wagoneer – 947
- ASK/Harman in the Alfa Romeo Giulia – 947
- Alps Alpine Co/Panasonic in the Ram 1500 – 944
The best speakers where the supplier was not named are to be found in the Mercedes-Benz GLC, Porsche Macan, and the GMC Yukon.
Have We Noticed An Improvement?
Actually, yes. I was in Denver for three weeks last year, and it’s not a city I’m familiar with. BMW was kind enough to provide a 760i for a week, and it has so many features that it felt overwhelming at first. After unsuccessfully trying to set a destination in the navigation for what felt like hours, I finally broke one of my own cardinal rules and spoke to the car. “Hey, BMW. Can you take me to *whatever the name of my hotel was*?” Without hesitation, the car immediately found the best route and started the navigation. There was nothing left for me to do. I finally found a car with voice recognition that works, and I used it for everything apart from skipping songs and adjusting the volume. It was the closest thing to Siri and Alexa I’ve ever experienced in the automotive world that actually worked.
What Happens Next?
I’m thoroughly impressed that most of the cars named here are not extremely expensive. Bosch provided an overall multimedia experience that’s more satisfying than anything BMW and Mercedes-Benz could create. The fact that Google also scored highly in the navigation segment confirms what I’ve believed for a while now. Google built-in is one of the most intuitive multimedia systems available, and it can be updated over time with newer software. And you get it standard in a humble Honda Accord. It’s so good because it was created by the people tasked with making smartphones operate smoothly, and I’ve never come across an interface that’s better than my phone. Some automakers claim that their touchscreen interfaces are smartphone-like, but they just aren’t.
The good news is that Bosch and Google have already teamed up, but not in the automotive sphere. Bosch also sells a host of home appliances, most of which can connect to Google Assistant. If these two giants can come together and create a full suite of in-car multimedia solutions, it would likely dominate the automotive industry. If you have a base model, you get an eight-inch screen. If you have a luxury model, you also get an eight-inch, so it can be hidden behind a panel, Bentley style.
