In 2024, only one new-model vehicle — the Dacia Spring — came equipped with a manually operated handbrake, marking a turning point in automotive design.
According to CarGurus’s 2024 Manual Handbrake Report, the age of manual handbrakes has nearly reached its end, and going with it is the craft of trimming their handles.
Only 8% of new cars on sale today are ordered with a manual handbrake, the report says. Last year it was 9%. In fact, there hasn’t been a major manufacturer to offer only a manual handbrake across its entire range of vehicles since 2022, the report says.
Taking the place of manual handbrakes is the electronically operated parking brake, which is now standard equipment on 538 of the 587 new models currently on sale.
In short, the future looks grim for the manual handbrake.
“Our research over the past seven years suggests that the days of the manual handbrake are numbered,” CarGurus’ report concludes. “Within the coming years we predict a continued decline in cars available to buy new with this once-standard feature. The manual handbrake’s demise is likely to be accelerated with the growth in electric vehicles being offered, all of which bar the Dacia Spring use electronic parking brakes.”
“With the impending 2035 ban on the sale of petrol and diesel cars we can expect that date to mark the end of the traditional manual handbrake,” CarGurus adds.
Of course, we’ll still trim older vehicles’ handbrakes. But there will come a day when they too stop coming into our shops.
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