UX Fail : Toyota Prius
One of the company cars I use from time to time is a Toyota Prius. The first time I drove one, I quickly realized how much I take for granted a interface design for a car. The Prius was so frustrating to me that it became the inspiration for featuring User Experience Fails on my blog. Keep reading to see more about my experience.
If it aint broke…
The Prius replaces the key with a key fob. Car manufacturers have been experimenting with replacing the key for several years. I personally think this is ridiculous. Why break a convention that has worked so well for so many years? This keyfob is bulky. I can understand the conventional key makes the car easier to steal, but lets not get carried away! Throw a chip in the key and you’re done. By biggest gripe with the keyfob came when trying to start the car. I’ve used some keyfobs where when you are within a close proximity to the car, you can push a button to start the car. It took me 5 minutes to realize I had to put the Prius keyfob into a random slot on the dashboard. Then, when I pushed the “power” button, it was difficult to know if the car is on or not. Since it’s electric, you dont hear the engine, and its difficult to distinguish whether or not the car is “on” or “running”.
And it gets worse
Other things I didn’t like: the gear shift knob. It is missing a key feature for any design: a visual indicator of the state in close proximity to the item switching the state. Most gear shifters physically rest in whatever gear you are in. On the Prius, after you move the lever into a particular spot it resets back to a resting space. The indication of what gear you are in is way up high in the dash near the windshield. The dash is long, so its further than it appears in the picture. Also, you don’t use the gear lever to put the vehicle in park. It is a separate button. My next headache was climate control. Most vehicles have physical knobs for this but the Prius drives everything through a touch screen interface. Seems cool in theory, but now I feel like I’m driving and texting every time I want to turn off the AC. It takes much greater mental effort and attention to control the settings using the touch screen than a physical knob you can feel for and turn without looking. I really think this is a safety concern, personally, especially since I dont feel the touch screen UI is very intuitive and the screen isn’t very receptive to the touch. At the end of the day, you have to put up with a lot of annoyances to get 50+ mpg. Not worth it to me.
