The Latest Car Safety Features That You Might Want

Last updated on July 19th, 2024 at 07:47 am

Every once in a while, a new vehicle safety feature comes along that changes the game. When seat belts first appeared, they saved many lives. They still save them every day.

These days, car safety improvements seem more frequent. That’s because new technology keeps coming out, seemingly more rapidly. You might see features advertised in car commercials that are astonishing.

We will talk about some of the best car safety features right now. You should make sure your next car has these.

Improved Airbags

Airbags aren’t new, but their construction keeps getting better. Frontal airbags saved 50,400 lives from 1987-2017, and they continue saving them during car crashes across the country.  

Today’s airbags have improved over previous ones. Scientists who study car crashes can see how airbags might injure people, so they keep working on them and making them better.

Today’s airbags have side curtain features that guard against flying glass and other debris. They also stay inflated longer than older models. That saves more lives in head-on collisions, side collisions, and rollover situations as well.

Blind Spot Alert Systems

Some cars come with blind spot alerts now as well. You know your car’s blind spot. It’s to the left side, at about the vehicle’s midpoint. If you look into the side view mirror, you can’t see a car that’s right beside you. That’s why you must quickly glance at that blind spot before changing lanes.

If you have a blind spot alert system, it will make a noise that lets you know you have a vehicle or some other object in your blind spot. That way, you will know you should not change lanes until it moves.

Some bind spot alerts have a light that appears on your side view mirror as well. That, along with the noise the car makes, can keep you and the driver beside you safe.

Automatic Braking

Some cars also have automatic braking now. If the vehicle detects another car or some other object in front of you, and the vehicle also detects that you can’t stop in time, it sounds a warning, and it starts braking for you.

If you’re not paying close attention, and a car stops suddenly in front of you, automatic braking might prevent an accident. You won’t hit a car’s rear bumper that stops if a child runs across the road or there’s a sudden traffic slowdown up ahead.

Rear Backup Cameras

Rear backup cameras have been around for a while as well. However, where car dealerships once considered them luxury items, now, a federal government mandate means you’ll find them in all new cars.  

You can use the backup camera when it automatically turns on as you’re backing up. You can hear a beeping noise as you back up, and with some models, you can hear that beeping noise outside the vehicle now as well.

That helps those around you know you’re backing up. You can look at the camera and spot any children running across, animals, vehicles, toys lying back there on the driveway that you could run over, etc.

These cameras help when you are pulling out of the driveway at home, but also when you are in a crowded parking lot. There’s no denying they save lives every day.

Lane Departure Alerts

You can also find some vehicles now that have lane departure alerts. This remarkable technology can detect when you drift out of your lane. The vehicle lets you know that by sounding an insistent noise you can’t ignore.

If your car has lane departure alerts, that means that it has cameras under the vehicle that watch the lanes and report back to you in real-time when you drift out of one. It’s astonishing thinking about a camera that reports back any lane departure at the exact moment that it’s happening.

You can sometimes find cars that have other safety features, like adaptive cruise control that slows your speed automatically if there’s a traffic slowdown ahead when you’re on the highway. Some vehicles make noises if you glance down and away from the road while driving. If your smartphone or something else distracts you, the car warns you that you must watch the road.

You can only wonder what new automotive tech might come along next. We might eventually get the flying cars that have appeared in science fiction books and movies for years. In the meantime, we can enjoy each new safety feature that appears.