I highly recommend Mazda if this is something you care about. I had a 2016 Mazda 3, and now I have a 2022 Mazda 3. The infotainment is all controlled though a physical knob and buttons, the climate control is all physical buttons. I am not sure if the screen is even a touch screen... I don't think it is, but I have never attempted to touch it since I was so used to using the physical knob system in my old 2016. The physical buttons are why I picked my current 3 turbo up over the WRX I also tested. The WRX and the other Subaru's I checked out all annoyed me with forcing use of the touch screen snd buttons to change the climate settings. I hope Mazda never changes that aspect of their cars. Not sure if the other models also do this, but I don't see why they would.

My 2023 Mazda has a touch screen but you never actually have to touch it. In fact, they put it far enough away that it is difficult to touch while driving and disable the touch when the car is moving. There are knobs and buttons in-between the front seats that control it. Also none of the important stuff is controlled through the infotainment system, it is just settings, satnav, and radio (or Android Auto/carplay). Not having to interact with a touch surface while driving is one of my favorite features of my car, and there are a lot of other things that I love about it too.

Part of me is annoyed that I didn't get a Mazda 3 when I got my car back in 2023, I got a 2021 Seat Leon FR PHEV Hatchback.

I like the Leon, but it has so much touch controls.

The worst is the controls for the fog lights, heated rear window and defrost.

They are all located on a small touch panel to the right of the steering wheel, it is also angled down making it harder to see.

So if I am driving and the windows start to fog up I need to take my eyes off the road and aim my finger to touch the correct button without touching any other controls as I might be blinding other drivers.

It is a terrible design.

The AC and battery management screens are all under different submenus on the infotainment screen.

The rest of the car is great though, and so far i have not seen any ads on the screen.

Mazda has been flying under the radar doing things right for a long time, in my experience.

I'm currently driving a 2012 Mazda3 that we bought new 13 years ago. It has been completely reliable while our 2013 Honda has needed some repairs. It is fuel efficient (40mg hwy), and it is still fun to drive. In the automatic transmission's manual-shift mode the shift lever goes in the correct direction for driving dynamics (pull back to upshift, forward to downshift). In the normal automatic drive mode it seems to use an accelerometer to downshift when braking downhill.

My very first car was a mazda MX-6 from the late 80s with a 5-speed manual transmission. I bought it with 180,000 miles as a cheap junk "first car" and drove it for another 40,000 miles over the next few years. It needed some repairs, of course, but it was fun to drive and did a great job getting me around the state while I was in the late college to early independent adult years.

Now I'm middle aged and my drive to work is just a few miles via quiet twisty country road. I think I'm gonna get an MX-5 Miata next. 6-speed and soft top. That sounds nice.

For years I thought a fast dual motor EV sport sedan would be my next vehicle (whatever the non-Tesla model 3 performance equivalent would be) but a roadster would probably make it more fun to get up and leave the house. Plus so much cheaper and, given the small amount of miles I drive, probably more environmentally friendly. It would definitely generate a lot less microplastic pollution form the weight difference alone.

I haven’t replaced a head unit in years, but I’m not surprised the proprietary systems require custom components for replacement. I can’t count the amount of head units I’ve replaced with my own ‘custom’ wire harness to save the $15 it cost for the Metra adapter. Lol