Tech and car companies are ditching touch screens and bringing back physical buttons to their products.
Despite a surge of touch screens being incorporated into devices for years, some of the world’s biggest tech companies are going back to basics.
Many that converted to the touch screen may have had their transformation perceived as their assimilation into modern technology.
Experts, however, have hinted the embrace of touch screens was more cost related than any other factor.
Companies such as BMW and Volkswagen are taking to implementing buttons instead of having touch screens that divert the driver’s attention
Tesla are one of the main manufacturers that continue to have full controls through the touchscreen interface, which experts have said are a ‘major distraction’
Chief executive for Copper, Sam Calisch, sad: ‘Now that touch screens are the cheapest option, they’re being deployed everywhere, even in places they don’t belong,’ reported the Wall Street Journal.
The touch screen, while holding many versatile uses, does often find itself in places where it can easily malfunction such as induction stoves with touch-based controls.
The design change to touch screens, also brought on the ‘sleek’ designs we see with high-tech items such as with Apple.
Apple is well known for their sleek design; the iPhone has multiple buttons that are almost as flat as the phone’s side
Touchscreen stovetops saw users found the process difficult after the touch buttons malfunctioned, often from pots that boiled over
This also brought on its own issues even when buttons were present on a device, they were often as flat and unobtrusive as possible. Meaning while they were again cheaper to produce, these buttons often didn’t recognize well-enough that it was being pressed or became easily stuck.
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This switch, however, wasn’t driven only from malfunction errors but also safety concerns. Touch screens in cars, while versatile, require much more attention than buttons and knobs.
Cars such as Tesla’s adopted a complete touch screen experience, with all controls functioning through the screen interface.
An abundance of customer complaints, according to the WSJ, has driven companies to reconsider their designs.
The European New Car Assessment Program even declared, for a vehicle to be rated at the highest five-star level of safety, it must be equipped with buttons.
Their director of strategic development, Matthew Avery, told The Verge: ‘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.’
Companies like Volkswagen have said they are bringing back physical controls to features such as climate control following customer complaints.
In 2022 a New York Times opinion piece by Jay Capsian Kang, Touch Screens in Cars Solve a Problem We Didn’t Have, said: ‘I can think of no better way of describing the frustration of the modern consumer than buying a car with a feature that makes you less safe, doesn’t improve your driving experience in any meaningful way, saves the manufacturer money and gets sold to you as some necessary advance in connectivity.’
BMW are also working with physical controls for their MINI’s, with a goal of complete control without the driver having to take their eyes off the road.
Their head of product and marketing at MINI USA, Patrick McKenna, has said these features include a scroll wheel on the steering wheel and access to controls through a voice assistant.
The new ‘action’ button and camera controls are Apple moving away from ‘do-it-all’ touch screens. Their new controls are intended to improve user experience with controls on the side of the phone
Apple switched their touch bar back to functional keys on MacBook Pro’s in 2021
Among these companies switching back to old-fashioned features is Apple, who in their latest iPhone 16 release declared a new ‘action’ button as well as a touch bar for camera controls.
Apple also gave their MacBook Pro’s back old physical function keys in 2021, after upgrading to a touch bar, reported the WSJ.
The company said the physical keys ‘brought back the familiar, tactical feel of mechanical keys that pro users love.’