These Car Design Details Really Annoy Our Readers

I love car design, but not every design is actually good. Worse than being outright bad and ugly, though, is when part of a car's design is annoying. Earlier this week I asked our readers to tell me about one particular car design detail that really annoys them, and boy did y'all deliver. Your answers ranged from broad to small and specific, with the connecting thread that they all just piss you off. 

I combed through the 200-plus answers and picked out my favorites, some of which I agree with and some of which I don't, and I have rounded them up for you here. I purposefully did not include the many people who mentioned touchscreens or the lack of buttons, because those conversations annoy me more than any of these design details. Sorry! (I was shocked how almost no one said split headlights, though.) There were a lot of other good answers that I didn't include here, so once you've scrolled through this story it's worth going back and read what all your fellow Jalops said.

Chrome accents in the interior where light can reflect into your eye. 2nd gen Prius start/stop button chrome ring, Chevy Bolt center console between the air vents and the screen, let the Sun shine in...and blind (well, annoy) the driver, perfection.

Chrome on upward facing interior surfaces. It doesn't happen often, but every once in while the trim around my TourX shifter reflects sunlight directly into my eyeballs.

Fellow TourX'er, yeah I put matte black vinyl around the shifter bezel. $5 at the craft store and a few mins of careful trimming.

Submitted by: towman, Deke, Chris Paveglio

A journalist friend of mine cut himself so badly on a piece of interior plastic on the Regal first drive that he almost needed stitches. I know that's not exactly related to bad chrome trim, but still.

This isn't really a thing anymore, but I used to hate it when cars only had exhaust on one side for the car. The lack of symmetry drove me nuts.

At least that's better than when there's also a cutout on the other side, but only one pipe.

Submitted by: Aintadamnthingfunny, CSX321

I'm gonna have to disagree with you here, I love an asymmetrical exhaust setup.

I absolutely loathe "plasti-metal" on the inside. 20 years ago, and I had this in the RSX, Acura had the brass ones to say there was "titanium-like trim" in the interior. It was hard, silver-ish plastic. Now it's "carbon fiber-like" trim. Translation, hollow feeling plastic that has a weave. And I remember Toyotas of that late-2000s era were the worst offenders with acres of hollow, hard plastic that they called "metal-like." Call it what it is – saving pennies on interiors by putting cheaper plastics that squeak, rattle, and show scratches easily. I'd rather have a fake soft(er) touch leather-like covering, or I really like the felt covering with the LED pattern in my doors. That at least shows some creativity.

Chrysler and it's affiliated brands were the worst at this. Their "metal" plastic trim was so bad...

The Chrysler Crossfire was a real offender here. Especially at that car's price, especially when style was supposed to be the car's biggest selling point.

Submitted by: Xavier96, DynamicPresence, Commentariat

Sometimes this can be successful, but a lot of the time it really doesn't work.

How center consoles have to fill in the footwells of vehicles. Most new/newer vehicles I get into, my right leg is pressed up again the console while sitting. After a while, my leg hurts as I'm trying to get comfortable without having to push the seat further back.

Being tall there are two comfort items that annoy me in most cars. First is where I rest my elbow, the base of the window, is almost always extremely uncomfortable for me. The second is my right knee tends to make contact with the side of the center console, and it amazes me how many vehicles put a seam and/or very hard materials right where my knee touches the trim.

arm rests should be designed for comfort of your knee resting against it. my left knee capsits just above the ledge of my door's arm rest, i can never find a comfy position. my last car also had low arm rests, before that was a magnum that had the perfect leg positions for relaxing and cruising.

Submitted by: Fiji ST, cintocrunch1, Poser Vexation

At least some companies put padding for your knee on the center console, like the Ioniq 5 N shown above.

I'm so sick of the flat fenders/quarters at the edge. Do they ALL need it??

Also, the "approach lights" that activate the reverse lights when the doors are unlocked. "Oh, a parking spot is opening up. Oh, not it's not. Just terrible design"

Submitted by: LoganExplosion

There are a few reasons for those flat edges: structural support, aerodynamics, better protection against dings. Sometimes they're a legit design element, too.

I'm with you on the reverse lights, GM is the worst about that.

Brake lights and turn signals in the lowest part of the rear bumper. High repair bills if you get a bump, and no one in a CUV can see them well.

The Hyundai Kona and Buick Envista are the worst offenders.

Also, brake lights that are also red turn signals using the same bulb. I specifically will go out of my way to have separate, yellow turn signals. Looks cheap, isn't as safe.

I hate these, too. And the refreshed Chevy Bolt/EUV was probably the worst for me. Having the brake lights in the bumper, while also having regular lights where your brain says the brake lights should be (and used to be!) is confusing as heck. I wonder if those refreshed Bolts/EUVs get rear-ended at a higher rate than other vehicles.

All to save a few bucks on a controller.

Submitted by: Scoobie2, DynamicPresence

Yeah, this bothers me too.

Flat, glossy surfaces in the interior of a car. It's bad enough the sun is trying to blind me from above and others' headlights are trying to blind me from ahead and behind, but does the centre console screen ALSO need to try and blind me from below? It's just poor design.

Was about to submit piano black trim. Just stop. It doesn't look expensive or sophisticated. It just shows fingerprints and dust constantly.

Submitted by: TheSchrat, Michael Tonelli

Thankfully automakers are moving away from this.

Stop with the big wheels and skinny tires already! You spend all kinds of crazy money designing the car to be as comfortable as you can then you ruin the ride with big wheels and rubber bands for tires.Not to mention they don't last long and are very expensive to replace.

Submitted by: Bruno

Sorry, but I will always want the biggest wheels and skinniest tires. They just look better!

Buttons with somewhat related functions being in completely different places. Temp, fan, etc. controls underneath a screen and a defroster button 12" away lower in a separate center console panel. Driving a loaner Macan at the moment, and some of the ADAS features are on a steering wheel stalk, some on the awful piano black plastic center console below climate controls. Why???

non standardization of controls. i hav emy largest gripe with porsche and their random placement of buttons, especially those for driver aids. where is the blind spot monitoring button? – the door. the parking sensor shut off?- the roof. the lane keeping? – center console

I wish there was a set standard for which sides of the steering wheel house cruise and audio controls. Personal preference is to have audio on the left, cruise on the right. My right hand can use the audio controls in the center console, so having them on the left side of the wheel means either hand can do the same thing. A lot of carmakers have this orientation, but I've noticed lots of new Hyundai/Kia models are starting to use the opposite orientation.

Submitted by: carsten, adam f, chronicallyontime

I'm always baffled by the placement of some controls in cars.

Fake scoops on most new cars. The 10th gen Civic is the poster child for this. Occasionally there is a bona fide functional one, but most are simply to add a sporty look, although most fail at that task.

Fake scoops or vents. not such a big deal today but back when boomers were young, they were everywhere. Ford was especially bad which largely started with the original Mustang's fake rear brake cooling ducts. GM resisted for the most part but even they succumbed placing that hideous fake hood scoop on the second gen (MKII?) Camero starting in '78.

Submitted by: Scourge of Richland, David Carl Freiboth

Another one that I don't mind at all. For so many of the cars that have fake vents/intakes/scoops/what have you, they would look extremely strange without those things.

I hate cubbys in the dash and center console that are too small for phones, water bottles, wallets and other common items. Many cars I've had have these with no reasonable purpose I can figure out. My Tacoma has a weird little open compartment that is too small for anything useful but is fairly large and too deep for keeping a quarter. Its like they asked an intern to find something to put there.

Submitted by: nitsua

I was so confused by the new Bolt's dashboard. What am I supposed to put in here?

This is truly a microscopic pet-peeve but when I see it I can't un-see it and it bugs the crap out of me....

Exterior body color visible in the interior; usually around the pillars, windows, or door seams. It just screams "cheap" and either always comes with bad road noise or psychologically predispositions me to tune in to the road noise.

Submitted by: Keez

Sometimes automakers turn this into a design element (like in the Renault Twingo above), but most of the time I'm with you on this just looking cheap.

This is just me and I hope it's not taken in a negative light. We have automotive engineers and designers who work on the front end of a car to make it look the way it looks. The singature grill, the apperance of the headlights, the front bumper, all of it. Nine times out of ten they never take into account that a license plate has to be affixed to it. The license plate has been around for over a century by now, and still they never seem to factor that into the design.

Submitted by: Alf Enthusiast

I can confirm that every single car designer wishes front license plates (and rear ones, really) didn't exist.