5 ms·

Apparently non-retractable door handles have only a very minor impact on drag/efficiency: https://arstechnica.com/cars/2025/09/flush-door-handles-are-the-car-in

Apparently non-retractable door handles have only a very minor impact on drag/efficiency: https://arstechnica.com/cars/2025/09/flush-door-handles-are-the-car-industrys-latest-safety-problem/ https://arstechnica.com/cars/2025/09/flush-door-handles-are-... So, yes, I think you're right that they are largely just a gimmick.

ptmcc 1y ago
If manufacturers in general were serious about improving efficiency they'd stop putting huge heavy wheels on everything, instead of chasing fractions of a percent with overcomplicated and failure-prone door handles. Side bonus, smaller wheels with taller sidewall tires are more comfortable, less prone to damage, and the tires are cheaper and easier to replace, too!
- rale00 1y ago
  Alloy wheels are pretty light, and the weight mostly affects acceleration. At speed, most of your power is going to fight drag, so aerodynamics make a much bigger difference in efficiency.
Someone1234 1y ago
Agreed. Plus the choices were never electrically actuated Vs. standard, plenty of vehicles before Tesla had flush fully mechanical doorhandles that reduced the drag coefficient. Tesla did it to be different, futuristic, and to show off. Then plenty of other electric vehicle manufacturers copied. Even ignoring the safety issues, these things had reliability problems since almost inception and could be frozen shut in the winter. Between the door handles, removing the turn signal stalk, removing the wiper stalk, non-round non-drive-by-wire wheel, and now putting the shifter in the ceiling, Tesla has made a lot of unforced errors to try to stand out.
- triceratops 1y ago
  > now putting the shifter in the ceiling They what?! And people are still buying these things? This is the most valuable automaker in the world?
  - nemomarx 1y ago
    their profits are pretty normal, the stock is clearly more stock in musk himself than in the car company
  - mebizzle 1y ago
    Because you don't need to use that shifter regularly; you shift gears on the screen in that car and they have capacitive buttons near the caution lights on the ceiling as a redundant backup.
    - triceratops 1y ago
      > you shift gears on the screen in that car You're not helping bro. I'm literally crying right now what even is this car?
      - pengaru 1y ago
        Musk has stated in various ways on different occasions that all driver input is error. When that frames how you imagine drivers of your vehicles interfacing with them, all sorts of stupid shit starts looking like a good idea.
kstrauser 1y ago
If you're driving in a competitive, sanctioned high-speed race, sure, fine. Save every bit of drag possible. At highway speeds in a normal-person shaped vehicle, they cannot possibly make a measurable difference.
- dylan604 1y ago
  Wouldn't that depend on the accuracy of the tool doing the measuring?
  - kstrauser 1y ago
    Not really. Stand in front of a car, squint, and observe the size of its silhouette. Now move slightly so that you can see the outline of the door handle, and consider its relative size compared to the rest of the car. This isn't a perfect comparison. You could design car handles that look like little parachutes attached to something with the drag profile of a dolphin, but that's not a likely situation. In general, the area of the rest of the car is going to be many thousands of times that of the door handle. Given the difficulties in measuring, let alone modeling, turbulent air flow, it would be hard to detect a door handle's drag compared to the rest of the car. I guess you could attach a meter to the door handle itself to detect how much drag it experiences from its own perspective, and that'd be pretty accurate. My hunch is it'd be an insignificant rounding error compared to the rest of the system.
    - dingaling 1y ago
      It's not solely about size, it's about disruption of laminar flow which causes much more drag than the parasitic drag if the handle alone.
      - kstrauser 1y ago
        For sure, and hence the "little parachutes" bit. But most door handles are pretty streamlined compared to wheel wells, the wheels themselves, and decorative curves on normal vehicles built for routine transport instead of racing.
Grazester 1y ago
Nissan GT-R manual flush handles. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UK0MxfPE4N0&pp=ygUWbmlzc2FuIGd0ciBkb29yIGhhbmRsZQ%3D%3D https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UK0MxfPE4N0&pp=ygUWbmlzc2FuI...
- mrguyorama 1y ago
  Honestly that's just as stupid. It would have similar problems in Winter, very little benefit, and has the same "How do you do it" problem
  - Grazester 1y ago
    It however has no problem in the winter.
mikestew 1y ago
Top-trim Ioniq 5 has flush door handles for aerodynamic efficiency. Which is more than cancelled out by the stupid 20-inch wheels. Flush door handles are the pop-up headlights of this decade: questionable aerodynamic benefit, reliability issues, and let's be honest, only done to look cool. (Granted, they're damned nice wheels. When people compliment the car in a parking lot, they usually talk about the wheels.)

ptmcc 1y ago

If manufacturers in general were serious about improving efficiency they'd stop putting huge heavy wheels on everything, instead of chasing fractions of a percent with overcomplicated and failure-prone door handles. Side bonus, smaller wheels with taller sidewall tires are more comfortable, less prone to damage, and the tires are cheaper and easier to replace, too!

rale00 1y ago
Alloy wheels are pretty light, and the weight mostly affects acceleration. At speed, most of your power is going to fight drag, so aerodynamics make a much bigger difference in efficiency.

Someone1234 1y ago

Agreed. Plus the choices were never electrically actuated Vs. standard, plenty of vehicles before Tesla had flush fully mechanical doorhandles that reduced the drag coefficient. Tesla did it to be different, futuristic, and to show off. Then plenty of other electric vehicle manufacturers copied. Even ignoring the safety issues, these things had reliability problems since almost inception and could be frozen shut in the winter. Between the door handles, removing the turn signal stalk, removing the wiper stalk, non-round non-drive-by-wire wheel, and now putting the shifter in the ceiling, Tesla has made a lot of unforced errors to try to stand out.

triceratops 1y ago
> now putting the shifter in the ceiling They what?! And people are still buying these things? This is the most valuable automaker in the world?
- nemomarx 1y ago
  their profits are pretty normal, the stock is clearly more stock in musk himself than in the car company
- mebizzle 1y ago
  Because you don't need to use that shifter regularly; you shift gears on the screen in that car and they have capacitive buttons near the caution lights on the ceiling as a redundant backup.
  - triceratops 1y ago
    > you shift gears on the screen in that car You're not helping bro. I'm literally crying right now what even is this car?
    - pengaru 1y ago
      Musk has stated in various ways on different occasions that all driver input is error. When that frames how you imagine drivers of your vehicles interfacing with them, all sorts of stupid shit starts looking like a good idea.

kstrauser 1y ago

If you're driving in a competitive, sanctioned high-speed race, sure, fine. Save every bit of drag possible. At highway speeds in a normal-person shaped vehicle, they cannot possibly make a measurable difference.

dylan604 1y ago
Wouldn't that depend on the accuracy of the tool doing the measuring?
- kstrauser 1y ago
  Not really. Stand in front of a car, squint, and observe the size of its silhouette. Now move slightly so that you can see the outline of the door handle, and consider its relative size compared to the rest of the car. This isn't a perfect comparison. You could design car handles that look like little parachutes attached to something with the drag profile of a dolphin, but that's not a likely situation. In general, the area of the rest of the car is going to be many thousands of times that of the door handle. Given the difficulties in measuring, let alone modeling, turbulent air flow, it would be hard to detect a door handle's drag compared to the rest of the car. I guess you could attach a meter to the door handle itself to detect how much drag it experiences from its own perspective, and that'd be pretty accurate. My hunch is it'd be an insignificant rounding error compared to the rest of the system.
  - dingaling 1y ago
    It's not solely about size, it's about disruption of laminar flow which causes much more drag than the parasitic drag if the handle alone.
    - kstrauser 1y ago
      For sure, and hence the "little parachutes" bit. But most door handles are pretty streamlined compared to wheel wells, the wheels themselves, and decorative curves on normal vehicles built for routine transport instead of racing.

Grazester 1y ago

Nissan GT-R manual flush handles. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UK0MxfPE4N0&pp=ygUWbmlzc2FuIGd0ciBkb29yIGhhbmRsZQ%3D%3D https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UK0MxfPE4N0&pp=ygUWbmlzc2FuI...

mrguyorama 1y ago
Honestly that's just as stupid. It would have similar problems in Winter, very little benefit, and has the same "How do you do it" problem
- Grazester 1y ago
  It however has no problem in the winter.

mikestew 1y ago

Top-trim Ioniq 5 has flush door handles for aerodynamic efficiency. Which is more than cancelled out by the stupid 20-inch wheels. Flush door handles are the pop-up headlights of this decade: questionable aerodynamic benefit, reliability issues, and let's be honest, only done to look cool. (Granted, they're damned nice wheels. When people compliment the car in a parking lot, they usually talk about the wheels.)