I’m stuck on this personally. I love my manual, I have a tiny little Mazda 2 and I have driven that thing absolutely everywhere because I can control it better than any automatic I’ve ever driven. But I’ve been casually looking for a new car and I’d love to have an electric, but I don’t want to lose that level of control and everything I love about a manual.
What do you all think? What’s your take?
My car had always been a stick shift. I bought an electric car and am very happy.
As a consolation, EVs can be considered “manual”, they never shift gears of their own accord. They just only have one gear… So it’s a one speed manual transmission…
I went from a manual ‘08 wrangler to a’ 23 model 3 and I gotta tell you, I’m so much happier with it. Granted, I live in the city now and driving a stick shift in and out of parking lots daily was a major pain in the ass, but I still think I’d be happy back in the suburbs. Here’s my first thoughts:
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Electricity is wayyyyy cheaper than gas. Plus you can charge whenever you aren’t using the car if you have a garage.
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I know jeeps aren’t sporty cars but my model 3 feels 100x more responsive than a jeep. Consider that electricity starts working immediately. To start a manual you need to take your foot off the clutch, push in the gas, let that gas get to the engine, ignite, and then the car moves. Sure that process takes less than a second but it’s hard to overstate how fast electric cars can go immediately
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Electric cars are all inherently newer and have a lot of cool new features. Auto parking, self-driving, adaptive cruise control, voice activated commands, driver profiles, and more made it feel like I went from the stone age to the industrial revolution overnight
That’s not to say it’s all sunshine and roses. Some downsides:
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I’m definitely a worse driver now. Manuals keep all 4 limbs focused on driving and make it really hard to get distracted. This is kind of a wash because the self-driving feels way safer on the highway than a human driver
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Recharging is not as easy as refueling. As long as you plan ahead this isn’t an issue but you can’t lazily say “oh I’ll get gas in the morning on the way to work” and you have to spend longer on road trips. During my day to day I actually save time because I just plug in when I’m going to be home anyway. Plus some places have free charging
And lastly this is kind of medium:
- People can borrow my car. I like having a car my girlfriend can actually drive when it’s relevant but other people want to try to drive my car and sometimes it’s a little annoying
I don’t think we’re ready for everyone to go electric but if you’re the type to not drive everyday and live in an area with decent access to chargers I think it’s worth considering
Just to clarify, you don’t have to hit the gas, you can just let off the clutch
What a weird nitpicky thing to argue about. Sure you can start a manual by easing off the clutch properly but that’s obviously not what we’re talking about. We’re talking about the differences between driving manual and electric and that’s clearly the use-case people will have 95%+ of their driving time. What do you think you’re adding to this conversation?
He’s not arguing? Why so negative, that’s a good tip. I wish someone told me that when I was learning, I just sort of figured it out later.
They’re being pedantic when the main takeaway is “it’s more complicated” and this person is going “well, actually… You do X, not Y (in this chain of events that’s still more complicated than just pressing the gas pedal)”.
Is being pedantic a sin here? I see nothing to suggest that they disagree with the overall point, they just want to build a more complete picture.
I could just be overly optimistic about their intentions though
The conversation is people who already know how to drive stick and their opinion on electric. People just learning to use stick aren’t relevant and nitpicking over EXACTLY how a stick works isn’t relevant when the main topic is “how does it feel compared to an electric?”. “Oh, well the clutch can actually make you go just by releasing it and you’re able to crawl” is completely irrelevant and only stated to critique and sound superior. I can crawl too in my automatic car by letting off the brake. That’s not relevant here either.
Thank you. I wasn’t saying they were wrong, I was just asking what compelled them to say what they said. It doesn’t add to the conversation, it isn’t for anyone who would be reading this discussion, it just seemed to be a comment made to make them feel better about themselves for being superior to other internet nerds
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My car’s a stick, my wife’s is electric. One of the reasons I don’t really like automatics as I don’t like how it always felt the car wanted to “drive itself” as soon as I let off the brake, and the ability to still gear down it up for conditions.
My wife’s car pretty much covers most of that. It doesn’t go until I hit the gas.
The thing has a huge amount of torque and acceleration for a passenger vehicle, and engine braking actually recovers power on downhill.
It corners very nicely. The balance is more towards center than my car due to the battery weight in the bottom-middle.
If I have to give up my clutch, an electric is probably the best choice IMO
I just did this. Been driving manual in my personal car for 30 years. Someone crashed into my car and totalled it, and I took the opportunity to go electric. I won’t go back.
Electric has far, far more control because it’s controlling the motor millisecond to millisecond, and not trying to reign in explosions.
So quiet. So efficient. No loss of power. And now I’m saving $2k/year in fuel costs.
The thing with a manual is that they’re great when the road is twisting away in front of you and you can really engage with the experience, but let’s face it, most of the time you’re stuck in traffic with an aching left foot. I’ve also driven many different kinds of autos, some great and some truly terrible. Even the best automatics are in no way comparable to driving an EV.
Sure, sometimes I do miss the feel and engagement of a manual when the conditions are but I stick the EV into sports mode, which gives a decent approximation of engine braking, and use the instant torque that you only get with electric to make my own fun through the corners.
The rest of the time, when I am stuck in traffic or just going from A to B, it’s so relaxing and smooth and so much less stressful than anything else. I wouldn’t go back.
The only issue I can foresee is that unless you want an SUV your choice of EVs is very limited. I certainly can’t think of anything Mazda 2 sized.
Yeahhhhh, it’s such a pittance that everything is so big. I saw a Mazda 3 ev I think? And there’s a VW golf EV but only in the UK I think, and that’s way too much of a hassle
There’s the Mazda MX-30 if that’s what you mean? But it’s yet another SUV.
There are some options now that I think about it, but whether any of them are available in your country is another matter.
Renault Zoe - probably what I’d choose if I wanted something Mazda 2-esque.
Homda E - Really expensive for the limited range. Maybe good deals to be had second hand?
VW ID3 - Golf sized. Possibly your best bet in terms of availability.
Fiat 500e - Or the nutty Abarth 500e with its fake (and very loud) engine noise.
Mini electric - Anything but mini.
MG4 - Very popular in the UK. Cheap, decent range, albeit a little ugly.
In the UK there’s also the Vauxhall Corsa E. Might be available elsewhere under the Opel brand?
I think that’s about it. It’s such a shame that the EV market is still very much dominated by SUVs.
I would drive an electric every day.
I’m excited for the idea of having a self driving car some day so I can wave goodbye to so much stress in my life.
I drive a Manual and a CVT.
I believe 1 pedal driving (take your foot off the gas and it applies the brakes) might be an interesting option for you.
1 pedal driving is one of my favorite things about my EV. I’ve always thought automatic transmissions are kind of silly for one reason: “What do you mean I can’t just not press the go pedal and have it not go? Why do I have to specifically press the stop pedal for it to not go? Why isn’t not pressing the go pedal enough for it to not go? Doesn’t anyone else see how silly this is?”
I own a '94 Miata and a KIA EV6, and I drive my electric vehicle far more than my stick shift. It’s a different kind of fun, having so much power instantly and it’s an incredibly smooth & quiet ride. The maintenance and fuel costs are far cheaper too.
It’s gotten to the point where I’m not driving my Miata enough to keep the battery charged and the fuel fresh. I still love driving it though, nothing quite like a weekend drive with the top down…but it’s not my #1 choice to drive anymore.
I have an EV and a truck with a manual. I love them both.
Every time I swap back to my EV I’m shocked (no pun intended) by how immediate the response from the accelerator is. There’s no delay for air to flow, revs to build, nothing… Just instant, push you back into the seat torque.
That being said, I also fully expect my Toyota to outlast my Tesla lol
Where I’m from most people drive manuals, then I moved to Aus and autos were more popular but I stuck with manuals mostly as I wasn’t a fan of the clunkiness in autos. EVs are completely different to automatics, they drive so smoothly and they’re great. I say that as a life-long manual driver.
Yes. In fact we did. PHEV, but still electric part of the time.
Love the hell out of it. Being able to cruise around town for weeks and use zero gas. We charge at home, so no $$ charging subscription.
For context I’m a Gearhead. Built muscle cars myself and with friends, work on my own vehicles as much as possible, love the sound of muscle and high-rev exotics…and I have no problem with electric cars. People in my hobby group tend to be bass-ackwards and stubborn, they dislike change. I find their whining about electric cars to be louder than a straight cut gearbox. Hell with that. EV power and performance is astonishing, we just gotta get the charging and range sorted out. We’ll still have gas-powered muscle and exotics, but they’ll be specialty cars and not daily drivers.
Times change. Move forward, don’t cling to the past like painting a brand-new Porsche GT3 RS in a 55 year old ‘68 Gulf livery. SMH.
Had an ex-friend of mine say electric cars would never have the torque of ICE. That sounds exactly backward to me. FFS, don’t we drive warships with electric engines (in some cases)?
I know nothing about cars, but I’ve fiddled with DC motors since I was a child. Torque seems off the chain to me. Apply power, get scary force, instantly.
Am I misunderstanding something?
They write multi-page articles extolling the virtues of performance in ICE cars.
EV outperform ICE in many performance metrics, especially torque. Suddenly ICE fans: “Performance doesn’t matter!”
It’s just missing that sound. There’s no doubt about, or getting around, that.
I don’t love manual, I just hate automatics (at least in small cars). Automatics in my experience shift gears when you least want it, giving you unexpected changes in acceleration.
As electric cars are not geared, they should just give you an expected output continuously.
We call them manuals here. I’ve only had one automatic and it was awful. But it was a cheaper car than I normally drive. I prefer manuals as I have more control over the car.
Electric is very different to an automatic combustion engine. I’m absolutely fine with electric.
I would convert a manual transmission car to electric, and hook the electric motor up to the input shaft on the transmission just to be perverse.
Many people do just that. There are whole companies that will sell you adapters to allow you to do this. You can even go without a clutch to save a lot of rotating weight if you don’t mind having to finesse the pedal a bit when shifting.
EVs are not like combustion engine automatic transmissions. You can actually control power pretty accurately, which is the weakness of automatic transmissions. I prefer manual (assuming I don’t get stuck in traffic) but EVs are fun to drive tbh
Recently had an electric Fiat 500 as a replacement while my car (Mazda 3) was in service and I absolutely loved how it drives. Nice consistent acceleration, immediate reaction to the throttle. Much better than the automatic transmission cars I drove before. 3 problems though:
- range (duh): I often need to drive for 280km in one go, vast majority of EVs can’t do that reliably (with AC and going 130km/h). If you can survive a day on one charge it is awesome though: plug it overnight and you’re ready to go in the morning
- the price of the car (it felt waaay too simple and plastic-y inside compared to 30K euro price I googled)
- big brother software on the headunit, although there is no escape from it with any new car these days
