What You Should Look for in a Good Infotainment System

We can't think of a single automobile made today that doesn't have some kind of infotainment screen. Some are small (Subaru Forester, 6.5 inches), while others are enormous (Lincoln Nautilus, 48.0 inches), and everyone else falls somewhere in between. If you happen to own a car that's at least 15 years old, you might still have a vehicle without an infotainment screen, but even that's a stretch. You probably rely on physical buttons, knobs, and switches. While that's decidedly old-school, those controls are better to use while driving versus having to look away from the road to use a touchscreen.

So, when it comes to buying a new car (or a slightly used one), you'll have to figure out what kind of infotainment system works best for you. While some look fantastic, they might not be ideal for driving, reliability, or ease of use. We've driven hundreds of vehicles and can say that some are most assuredly better than others. Here are the things you should look for when shopping for a car with an infotainment system.

Easy Legibility

You may have thought screen size would be the most important factor in a good infotainment system, but it's not. You can have a giant screen, but if it's too complex and hard to figure out, it'll still be a pain to use when you're driving down the highway in a sea of fast-moving cars. Legibility is the most important feature, and you should not equate that with fancy graphics or numerous colors. Legibility means the icons, text, and menus are easy to read and decipher, minimizing the amount of time you need to spend looking at the screen instead of the road.

The Ford SYNC 3 system is a prime example. It looks almost monochromatic with its blue, black, and white screen, text, and icons. But it's all laid out cleanly and without much adornment. You can even look at the icons to see what function you need to choose without having to read the text. It opts for more universal symbols than proprietary ones, making them very easy to figure out quickly. Look for a system that has large, easy-to-understand icons, simple fonts, and a crisp layout. Legibility will go a long way if you look for it first rather than picking a dressed-up screen that's better to look at than it is to use.

Good Dash Placement

Things have changed significantly for screen dash location over the past few years. Many models had the infotainment screen set lower in the dash, embedded in the middle of the car's center stack. This set it in a place where your eyes would have to move to the right and down while driving, but now that most infotainment screens have been moved atop the dash, there's less eye movement required. You typically only have to move your eyes to the right to make contact with the infotainment screen, and that changes the game.

While good screen placement can't take the place of a highly legible system, it can aid matters by making the screen less distracting and frustrating to use. This also permits the driver to see things better peripherally while using the screen because he or she no longer has to look further down on the dash to operate the screen. Keep in mind that other factors can detract from the usefulness of good dash placement. If the screen is still too complex, not especially responsive, or too small to see the details clearly, no amount of ideal screen placement will make up for that.

Quick Responsiveness

You might think that with this much in-car tech, every system works as well as your Apple iPhone or Android smartphone. Not true at all. Not all car touchscreens work equally, and that can make things unsafe while operating them. Responsiveness means how quickly your car's infotainment screen activates the function when depressed. If there's too much lag when you depress a screen function, that means you're waiting that much longer for things to work and your eyes are away from the road for longer. It also adds to the stress because you're not getting the reaction from the system in a timely fashion.

Look for a system that's quick to respond to inputs. Do you want a navigation map to pop up quickly while you're trying to figure out where you are and where you're headed? That map should come up very quickly. But that's not always the case. A recent study showed that many car infotainment systems have such slow reaction times that they're worse than driver reaction times under the influence of alcohol and cannabis use. When you test drive your next potential vehicle, try using the touchscreen to test its responsiveness. It could make all the difference when it comes to safe driving.

Apple CarPlay and Android Auto Compatibility

Most cars these days have this feature, and that means the look and functionality of the infotainment screen mimics your smartphone, reducing the steepness of the learning curve. You use your smartphone constantly, so if your car's infotainment system looks and works the same way, the familiarity should make things very quick, indeed. Many automakers used to eschew the compatibility and didn't include it in their cars (ahem, Toyota) because they wanted their proprietary system OS to take center stage. Then, carmakers figured out that customers demanded it. Make sure your car has this kind of smartphone compatibility.