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In case anyone was wondering what the Apple Car would have looked like inside, it would have been roughly this.
As an Apple Car™ it makes sense, but as a Ferrari it's incredibly soulless and oversimplified. This Ive design aesthetic (Dieter Rams' aesthetic really) is fine on consumer electronics where you want the device to disappear and give way to the display, but on something as emotional as a vehicle (Ferrari especially), this design falls flat.
I do hope some of the design details work their way through the industry (e.g. using glass instead of gloss black plastic, convex glass to add depth to digital gauges), but I hope the rest of it stays as a one-off experiment demonstrating the hubris and one-dimensionality of a top designer.
Ferrari interiors have always been spartan and aimed at functionality.
This feels like a modern Ferrari F40 dashboard and I like it a lot.
It certainly looks like an Apple device. Ive's aesthetic is Apple's aesthetic, so if you hire Ive, that is what you are going to get.
I can see a car company who doesn't care about design stumbling into this outcome, but Ferrari doesn't seem like that kind of company. So the choice must have been intentional.
> but on something as emotional as a vehicle (Ferrari especially), this design falls flat.
Strongly disagree. To each their own...
Well, that’s the problem with product design — looking at it simply doesn’t suffice. It needs to be experienced in person.
Well, that’s not (yet) possible, but this video does a good job in the meantime:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=6Wv1btxCjVE&pp=ygUQTG92ZWZyb20...
Everything will undoubtedly feel nice/premium as a result of being metal and glass, but you spend more time looking at the entire interior than touching every part of it, so appearance is important.
I think the Aston Marting with the Apple Carplay Ultra[0] is a pretty good example of what an Apple Car would have looked like.
[0]: https://www.astonmartin.com/en-us/our-world/brand-stories/as...
So bland. An iPad put in a holder. I was not exactly hoping for, because I didn't really, but I dreamt of a much more radical design direction.
I first thought that too, but if you take the time to scroll down a bit, you'll see that the instruments are actually three separate screens, and at least the center one has a mechanical needle. Also, the central control panel has lots of physical switches (Musk would hate it) and even a round instrument in the top right corner with mechanical hands, which can be either a clock, a stopwatch or (for whatever reason) a compass. So definitely not an iPad put in a holder.
No not literally, but that is what it looks like.
It would have been much better imho to for instance have lots of tiny screens embedded in the dashboard/console alongside their respective buttons. Each "app" gets their own toggle and physical dials. That would have been expensive and cool and could have been made not-tacky. (Like some cars are, expensive and cool but also without any class whatsoever, they look like a teenage gaming room.)
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What is oversimplified specifically (given this is an electric car)
IMO if they just had materials with any sort of visual interest to them, this would be pretty beautiful.
Instead it feels like sitting inside an iPad which is an aesthetic already cheaply deployed at massive scale to motels, pharmacies, and shitty coffee shops.
This question's answer would require something more lecture length that dives into fundamentals of design with an equal amount of time spent on automotive design. No one has the time or care for something like that, so I'll try to give a high level answer.
Generally speaking, cars are not about simple designs/shapes. They, especially to enthusiasts, are viewed as something closer to art where care is taken to craft shapes and forms for both function and feel. This is amplified dramatically for Porsche, Ferrari, Lamborghini, etc..
Ive was clearly doing this design work for the Apple EV that never shipped. It followed Apple's historic design aesthetic (driven largely by him) of simplifying things as much as possible--using circles and squircles everywhere, removing as many unnecessary geometry as possible. That's fine for an Apple EV because that's their design aesthetic. That is, demonstrably, not Ferrari's design aesthetic. It's a jarring departure from decades of automotive design and, in my professional opinion, an exercise in hubris.
As we remember that design is largely subjective and that this is all my opinion, I will say that almost everything in the vehicle is overly simplified:
* Steering wheel: an attempt at modern retro, but they added two blobs (to keep the steering wheel simple) to house the dials and buttons instead of incorporating it in a sculpted, thoughtful way. Instead of putting the turn signals in those blobs (or elsewhere), they interrupted the simple steering wheel with a couple circles to act as the turn signals.
* Digital instrument cluster: it's an iPad that connects to the base of the steering wheel. Wasted space in the top corners. Convex glass is a really nice touch however. Gauges are strange to me (gas gauge for an EV, left dial is confusing at first glance, G-force gauge unnecessarily busy), but that can always be changed later so not worth waxing on about.
* The key: a small iPhone 4. It's not terrible, but it's rather uninspired and boring. Ferraris aren't supposed to be boring.
* Dashboard interface: another iPad, but with a Mac Pro handle on it. Might be very nice for moving it, but how often are you going to do that? Does it stick out far enough to act as a wrist-rest as mentioned in their video? The mechanical switches are a nice touch if the display/UI keeps up. The clock/compass/stopwatch in the top right is neat, but almost antithetical to the rest of the design--it's added complexity for the sake of complexity. I still like it though.
* Vents: these make sense to be simplified. I've never loved the number of flaps in most vehicles, but if you have kids you might have issues with toys/food getting lost inside if there's no mesh behind it.
* Seats are nice, but if you removed the Ferrari emblem would you know it's a Ferrari? Is there enough bolstering for spirited driving?
The shapes, iconography, etc. are all carried over from Apple devices. Cars, even in EV form, are not iPads and iPhones. Cars, particularly those like Ferraris, are supposed to be designed, sculpted, given character and flare in order to evoke emotion.
Rivian and Porsche, in my opinion, have designed beautiful EVs (inside and out). They have a design aesthetic that's unique to them and in the case of Porsche stays true to the brand. The Ferrari Luce looks like Ferrari hired Ive to take whatever work he did for Apple and copy paste it over to them. If this was announced as an Ive + Kia/Hyundai/Honda/Lexus/etc. collaboration would it look any more or less out of place? No, because it's been simplified to the point that it doesn't even look designed any more. It almost feels "default" in a way.
This is all just my opinion as someone that's been doing product engineering and industrial design for a long time and happens to love cars--take it with a grain of salt.
+1 to everything you say here, but unfortunately I doubt this will sway anyone who doesn't have similar feelings upon just looking at the thing with their own two eyes.
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Porsche is the only car company that has nailed interior EV design - IMO.
Their interiors look high-end, functional and not just a minimalist big computer screen.
https://www.caranddriver.com/photos/g46528574/2024-porsche-m...
Lexus CT200h is one of the best interiors ever designed. The design language was tactile: every single button or control had a different action or feel.
https://cdn-fastly.thetruthaboutcars.com/media/2022/07/20/94...
There’s a roughly 7 inch above the vents that flips up whenever the car is off, but using the screen is optional. The screen is up near the road, and it’s very safe to use. There’s a small joystick to move the cursor.
Screen up:
https://preview.redd.it/after-about-a-year-of-ownership-post...
CT also has a stateless “springy gear selector” which works the same way as a manual gear selector, but after selecting the gear it springs back, so it’s stateless. It also has tactile blocking for gears you can’t enter yet. It felt extremely satisfying.
CT got a 10/10 from me, like a small aircraft cockpit. Enough knobs and computers to be exciting, but not OTT. Made a hybrid micro hatchback feel exciting.
CT200h is the nearly perfect hybrid, IMHO, interior included. Thumbs up emoji!
It still looks like a big computer screen, I'm afraid. Although, making it seamless with the dash is a step up, you're right. That tiny paddle gear shift looks horrendous, though.
I would really like to have analog features back, buttons and all that, in an EV.
The new Cayenne interior is terrible. Macan is good.
Rivian is the only excellent one.
Rivians don't even have a physical vent control (to aim the vents). That alone disqualifies it from anything close to "excellent". And that's before mentioning all the missing physical buttons that should've been there.
Touch screen buttons, especially the ones on the far edge of the center screen, are harder to accurately hit for most people. More physical buttons = better = more premium.
looks like a weird mix of nothing, pointless clock, that screen on the right, that only creates discomfort. The big screen that is big only for the trend.
In tesla ( trend setter for this) big screen is functional, and it can show you multi media, when you charge you watch netflix.
this screen is not capable of multi media....
Porsche and Rivian (with a nod to Rivian) imo.
We have a different idea of "high-end" and "functional" considering how much of the interior controls are just capacitive surfaces.
I think Ferraris have gotten especially ugly in the last few generations. I generally like Jony Ive designs. But this is a mismatch. A whole new kind of not-right-is-ugly for Ferrari.
Elements of it are precious and well designed. But it doesn't feel like a car interior.
Oh. I have the exact opposite feeling. I'm not into cars but I love this.
This is the kind of design I'd expect from Ive: it is designed to look nice. Ease-of-use is another story.
There's a lack of consistency on the wheel controls that make this look more like a UX showcase rather than a usable interface.
Case in point:
- A bunch of rotary knob that perform the same function: to select. But, they all look different and use different ways to represent the selection.
- Some have a lighted indicator, some have a notch, and some are completely ambiguous.
- The 2, 1, *, 0 switch has a hole in it to indicate the currently selected option.
- The plastic surrounding this is is mere millimeters of thickness and I would expect it to break off within a decade.
The handle and palm rest, in particular, stick out to me as a step up for anything with a touch screen. Giving you a place to anchor your hand while a finger does something is very nice. That the display can articulate is also nice, though it does add a potential weak point (how long until this gets loosey-goosey and moves around during hard g-forces?).
That doesn't look good. I'm very surprised that a brand like them release such a cheap-ass version.
It's a Ferrari EV.. I can imagine the company wanting to treat the project like a proverbial stepchild, while keeping the soul for the fossil-fueled machines..
yeah, seems EV is a hard market to enter. Porsche seems that have had a hard time entering it too (see numbers, am no expert)
After the 993, Porsche was a different company. Not exactly cheap-ass, but maybe something less than their often aircraft-quality mechanicals and spartan but hand-made quality interior.
I thought it was a joke.
It looks like something from Fisher Price.
But I'm clearly not the target audience.
haha me neither
I thought I was going to look at a car when I clicked that link. I scrolled the last 80% of the way out of morbid curiosity. This secondary quest was not disappointing: no car photos. So weird. Perhaps this is a complaint about the title.
But since it's all about the interface, I must say, the idea of a sports car with a touch screen is still rather terrifying.
It's a 4-door, 4-seater. Sporty?
Fortunately, there are many physical buttons. In the video, you can see that their functions vary depending on what is displayed on the screen. I think this is a brilliant solution that combines the best of the physical and virtual worlds.
I found this video review to be much more informative and compelling.
I find the thin steering wheels sumptuous.
Discussion (51 points, 77 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46944978
Is there a market for a $400,000+ electric sports car? For me, the excitement of a Ferrari, Lamborghini, etc is the engine and the sound.
They've been going to turbos in all but their flagships so they generally don't sound all that exciting anyway. Lambo literally draped their styling over a VW/Porsche parts-bin crossover SUV and all the influencers flocked to it. The person who appreciates the high-rpm wail of old timey, power-dense engines is not the same person who drops half a million on a car anymore.
Tesla Roadster took a bunch of preorders at $50-250k down almost a decade ago, More recently, Taycan did reasonable-ish volume at $100-200k/unit. There (at least once was) a market for such things. Its definitely not the same market as ICE super/hypercars, but there are some that might enjoy a silent, luxurious car with a sub-2 0-60 as a complement to other cars in the garage.
It will have simulated gear changes if that helps at all...
To be honest, it may help for the modern Ferrari driver. It doesn't help for those who appreciate the Ferraris from the '90s and before.
> Ferraris from the '90s and before
That was potentially 36 years ago. 36 years from 1990 would have been 1954.
What changed in technology from 1954->1990, vs change in technology from 1990-2026? Quite a lot.
The selling point of electric sports cars is more "the acceleration is amazing" and less "it makes a loud noise".
e.g.
> a 0–100 km/h (62 mph) acceleration time of 2.36 seconds, and a quarter mile (402 m) drag race time of 9.78 seconds. ... unofficially the fastest production car in the world
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yangwang_U9
> Model S Plaid Takes 2.07 Seconds to Accelerate from 0-100 mph
Physical controls! This is the opposite of Flat UI. I hope others copy this car as opposed to Tesla.
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Photo collection: https://bookmarker.cc/bora/ferrari-luce
The skeuomorphism is a curious choice. I think if I were going for a radical electric car UI I'd use bar graphs from left to right and things like that. Then again, maybe they don't want to alienate their customers.
so OpenAI[0] designed a Ferrari?
OpenAI bought io, not LoveFrom.
This looks like the controls for a very stylish Italian delivery van. Not an exotic sports car.
Is the exterior of the car not public yet? Why is the only detail about the control cluster?
Ferrari is announcing the car in three steps: first they announce the electric powertrain details, next they announced the interior details and lastly they'll announce what it'll actually look like.
Um, where is the car? All the images are of (parts of) the interior, and the captioning is bizarre. Ooohh! It has a steering wheel! (And it's a input! Who knew?)
They only shared the interior, not exterior.
Funny how I want to say bad things about a car I'll never afford.
Anyway, whether it's a Ferrari or other, I'm always disappointed by touchscreen in cars.
And as I said it before, it always seems and afterthought and just put there because someone forgot about it.
I'm guess I'm getting old but when I'm driving I usually look at the road and couldn't car less about a nice touchscreen.
Once you get used to a nice huge GPS you won't want to go back.
Finally, the return of silver, rose gold, and space gray.
How much is this?
FYI, the Wikipedia article has a little more data on this vehicle as an EV: 4 motors, 1,113 horsepower, an 880 V platform, 122 kWh of battery, range 330 miles (531.1 km).
Not clear yet on the exact charge speed or launch date. Or what the 0-100km/h time is, but expect a low number, of course. That number has to be eye-catching.
Problem is that in an EV world the raw figures are really not going to be that impressive. Plenty of Chinese EVs have 1000+hp at far lower cost, and likely as good or better acceleration that whatever Ferrari can deliver, since EVs seem to be reaching a point where the limit on acceleration is the tires rather than the motor. So don't think Ferrari can deliver anything truly eye catching in those terms. Differentiation needs to come in other domains.
Very functional.
The tablet interface looks cheap and low-budget. When you spend that much on a car you don't want the interior to look like a Model S.
The interior of my Mazda looks more high-end than this... Yikes, Ferrari.
Not only cheap, but boring in a car which wasn't supposed to be boring.
In many other cars that look would have been sleek.
This is not a car for tech bros with no culture, no traditions, and no past. This is a Ferrari.
> This is not a car for tech bros with no culture, no traditions, and no past.
Weird, because that's exactly what it looks like.
Sorta meh imo. Looks like a more skeletal version of a kia I was in recently
This looks awesome
Did they remove the turn signal stalk? Just like Tesla did?
Ferrari removed the stalk over 15 years ago.
> First Electric Ferrari
This is big. Ferrari, as a brand, is the top cult of internal combustion engine.
For them to release an EV is like Apple releasing an Windows computer or Android phone.
Soon, the last holdout of big oil will be the American government.
I love it, first ferarri that i have said "I want one". I have been an ev driver for over a decade and have no regrets, it has improved my life. The mental health benefits of driving an almost silent vehicle are completely over looked, the addiction to a vibrating noisy gas engine we find quite frankly bizarre in 2026, it is old technology, outdated, and becoming lost in history and thank you to the lithium cell.
yikes this looks awful, unless this is the new mass market Ferrari that's going to start at $30,000
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I think I would be looking for that very real, confident and perfectly even vibration a Ferrari has at idle; the valve train song, an extra octave in the exhaust.
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