And where are you from? And how old? Not “do you” but just if you know how.
I’m in the US, mid 30s and can (and do) drive a manual transmission.
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In Germany nearly everyone can drive manual. Used to be that if you didn’t learn how to drive manual in driving school, you weren’t allowed to drive manual with your license.
Prettty sure that’s still the case. I talked to a young person two weeks ago who said she’s not allowed to drive a manual transmission car.
Yes, but it used to be that you had to do the majority of lessons in a manual, now it’s reduced, you can get B197 with a few hours of manual. And then you can drive both.
Same in Sweden. Most people get a license for manual and then buy an automatic.
Still the case, got my B197 driving license last week in Bavaria. You have 10 lessons with manual as part of your education, then the rest + exam on automatic. B197 allows to drive both, B allows automatic only.
Not entirely accurate, B allows both manual and automatic, you get B by doing everything including the exam in a manual car, B78 is automatic only and B197 allows you to drive manual and automatic as well but as you described with only 10 manual lessons.
Thanks for clarification!
It’s like that in Australia.
31,Sweden
Yes, and I prefer a manual car to an automatic. It keeps me a lot more dialed in while driving.
35, living in Europe, I had to re-learn manual. I had only automatics in Latin America. It is certainly more fun and I feel I’m actually driving.
Where in Latin-America?
I can, not well, but I can. damn hill starts.
Not sure how common it is now but some cars had a “hill holder” feature that would hold the brake for you when starting on a hill. Makes that whole process much, much easier.
Just pull the parking brake and accelerate until you feel the car slightly raising and then drop the parking brake.
Eventually you get a feeling for it and drop the parking brake before it’s “fighting” the accelerator.
This might sound trivial to some, but I know several people that never use the parking brake in these situations and instead do a manic race with their feet and the car drops a couple meters back and they over accelerate to compensate.
The parking brake method is how I learned. But I grew up here, where you are always on a hill and always in stop and go traffic. So I eventually just give up on stick shift.
Yes, this is how I do it. I also do this when reversing out of parking spaces. Because my car’s reverse requires pushing down on the stick and is close to 1st, I’ve saved myself from driving into polls a few times.
Yeah, I learned the parking brake method.
A couple meters, you say? Sounds like a great way to trash your transmission.
It drives (pun intended) me nuts, but they don’t listen to reason. And the worst of all, is that they got their license in a hilly town and say they weren’t taught that. While I learned in a flatter place and was taught this.
This is the way. Drove a tiny 4cyl manual in SF for way to long
Older diesels had a handy feature for it too, in the way of a hand throttle.
Hands down one of the worst “feature” of new vehicles IMO. If you need help on a hill, either use the parking brake like everyone else, learn to drive better, or just drive an auto.
Imagine gatekeeping manual transmissions.
yeah i hate fucking driving test examiners, gatekeeping cars.
Just hang in there! It’s not that bad once you get the hang of using the handbrake. It helps when you have the same car while you’re learning.
23, US. Yes, but I find them pointless for daily driver cars. Modern automatics are more fuel efficient and just make more sense because they’re much easier to operate and less annoying in stop and go traffic.
They’re great for off-roading and racing, but outside of those use cases automatics are just better.
5-speeds are definitely a pain in the ass in stop and go traffic, but the benefits of driving a manual transmission goes beyond use cases. For example, manual transmissions will always be cheaper to repair and easier to diagnose than automatic ones. Similarly, basic 4-cylinder engines will always be easier to diagnose and repair than the highly complicated CVT engines in all the new automatic cars.
Note too that a 5-speed Honda civic made 20 years ago will easily get 45 mpg, simply because by the time you get to third gear, the car is light enough that you can just ride the clutch for the next 1,000 feet. My 05 manual civic ex gets around 40 mpg combined easily, and I’ll never have to worry about potentially paying a third of the car’s out the door price if the engine ever decides to self destruct. I know we’re discussing transmission and not engines, but since you brought up the newer fuel efficient automatics, it seems worth noting.
It’s all preference at the end of the day, though. I personally like how connected to the car you feel with manual transmissions, use cases/utility arguments aside. I also kinda wonder if manual drivers are less likely to crash, since it’s difficult if not impossible to be on your phone while driving.
Any spirited drive is better with a manual.
That’s true of course, but most people don’t drive in “spirited” way.
I mostly agree except I drive older vehicles out of warranty. Manuals last longer and are cheaper to fix so depending on what vehicle I’m buying I may look specifically for a manual if it’s a known “weak spot” for that particular vehicle.
honestly i don’t understand what makes them better for racing. can the auto not be tuned differently to prioritize speed and acceleration over fuel efficiency?
Automatic gearboxes can’t predict the road ahead, they can only react to the current RPM and speed.
Edit: just realised this posted on a completely different comment to the one I was replying to
It’s not just about speed and acceleration. It’s also about control. Racing drivers face an infinite number of different conditions out on the track and it would be impossible to tune the transmission in such a way that it does exactly what the driver wants 100% of the time. And it really has to be perfect. 99.9% isn’t good enough because the other 0.1% can wreck the car if it does something unexpected while driving at the limit.
Modern, high end race cars are automatics. Low end or lighter cars will be manual.
No, they’re sequential manuals*. Unless you’re talking about drag racing, where automatics are common.
*Edit: Or they can also be sequential semi-automatics if you want to be extra pedantic. But personally I’d classify a transmission based on whether the driver has to select the desired gear, or if the computer selects the appropriate gear without driver input, because that’s the thing that matters in the end.
Okay that makes some sense to me.
Follow-up question: why don’t modern commuter cars use the paddle shifters? Why keep the cumbersome clutch-and-stick system?
It’s cheap and reliable.
Yes.
In Europe you basically have to be handicapped to not learn to drive manual. Most people get the manual driving license because it allows you to drive both, whereas the automatic one doesn’t.
Manual transmission was and often still is cheaper, often cheaper to repair, often more reliable, often uses less fuel, and in cheap and less powerful cars the combination is often better. Because there are so many manual cars here, including at rental places, it’s a no brainer to learn to drive manual.
This being said, that’s changing. Also, less and less young people are getting a driving license due to affordability and cars no longer being the status symbol they once were.
That’s changing though, I see many people taking their driving lessons in EVs, which in turn means they’ll only be able to drive automatics. I guess that won’t bother them too much as they’ll probably only want to drive EVs anyway, or else they would’ve chosen to take their lessons in a regular manual like most people
More likely that it’s often their parents’ car, I suspect. Depending on where you live, practising in your own car can save thousands in driving school fees.
But for the non-Europeans reading, the thing is that with the manual license you get to choose. You can drive both. Automatic license, you can never drive a manual.
Rental companies are almost certain to replace their cars with EVs sooner rather than later. But if you want to rent a bigger van, those’ll likely be ICE for a while longer. A van like that can easily do hundreds of thousands of kms. That’s a lot for a van that does the occasional move.
New automatics have lower fuel usage than manuals.
Manuals suck so hard, they gave me one when my car broke down, and my brother in christ there is almost no benefit to it.
I can choose my own gears on my dual-clutch automatic too, and it’s better in every way to the manual.
You have to be licensed to drive manual? Never heard of that in North America. Honestly I never heard it being a problem or unsafe or that it ever caused an accident. Seems like another level of regulation that serves little purpose.
My car has a manual transmission. I learned to drive on a manual transmission. I prefer it. When I drive a car with automatic transmission, I step on its nonexistent clutch.
I still instinctively press the non-clutch when I have to slam on the brakes
And when you’re in an automatic and you reach for the phantom gear shift. At least once every time i drive one.
31, Germany, I can’t drive at all. City kid.
Of course, 28, French. 99,99% of people here drive manual (or at least know how to).
Yes. Europe. We pretty much all do. Automatics are becoming a bit more common in recent years, but 90% of cars here are still manual. Especially the old beat-up cars we learn to drive on are all manual. And if by chance you learned on an automatic, and pass your driver’s test on automatic, it says so on your driver’s licence and I think you’re not actually allowed to drive/rent manual cars.
That’s how it is in Sweden. I learned on a manual specifically so I wouldn’t be limited to automatics.
Early 50s, USA - you bet! And I could also roll up a window, light a cigarette from the lighter, set an AM station by pulling the tuner knob and pushing the desired station button, and burn my ass on a hot vinyl bench seat! Good times!
Yes, but only on motorcycles. That’s because there’s no such thing as an automatic motorcycle[1][2][3][4][5], so you have to learn manual if you want to ride one. Unfortunately this skill doesn’t transfer well to manual driving because on bikes you operate the clutch with your hand and the shift with your foot. I’m not terribly worried about that, though… I’ve literally never even been on the inside of a manual drive car before!
For context: I’m mid-20s from the American south.
No, electrics don’t count. ↩︎
No, semi-autos don’t count. ↩︎
No, three-wheelers don’t count. ↩︎
No, the 2006 Yamaha bikes don’t count because that line was a sales failure. ↩︎
Ok, fine. Honda’s DCT bikes do count, but holy shit are they expensive! ↩︎
I don’t think I could ride a dct anyway. It feels like you would need superhuman throttle control. Maybe honda inveted some magic for that too?
This thread is an amusing display of sample bias. Only people that want to respond yes and brag about it bothering to respond.
In reality only about 2/3rds of people in the US can drive stick and almost no one owns manual cars.
I’ve never driven a manual car. I’ve had people be like “You can’t drive manual?!” and then I would respond “So are you going to teach me?” The answer is always No, of course not, not in their car (assuming they even owned a manual, which none do anymore). My parents had manual cars but sold them 10+ years before having me.
I understand how a clutch works. It wouldn’t be difficult to learn. But what reason or motivation is there to learn when almost no cars are manual? They total something like 2% of new car sales. If you’re buying something like a 718 GT4 RS or a 911 GT3 RS for maximum driving engagement that’s great, but those cars are priced for the 1% of the 1%.
Even if you had a fun car, which I do, the drive to work is stop-and-go, roads are full, even the fun country backroads are filled with traffic on weekends, forests are burned down, gas is eye-watteringly expensive if you have a slightly performant vehicle. The time to have fun driving cars was 40 years ago.
While I have noticed that Americans do like to brag about driving manual, it should be noted that outside the US being able to drive manual isn’t bragworthy in the slightest. You’re just part of 99% of drivers. From boy racers to grandma.
Hell, my driving school even taught a guy with down’s syndrome to drive manual. It took longer, but he passed all the tests, so off he went. Apparently it wasn’t even a close thing, and the driving test is quite stringent here in the EU. There’s no need to make fun of people with down’s syndrome, but if they can manage to drive manual with practice anyone without a disability can too.
It’s not difficult. It just takes practice. If your parents drive a manual, which is likely in the EU, you can practice in their car. If your parents have an auto, which is likely in the US, you can’t practice shifting gears so why bother?
Agree that fun driving is essentially over, but I don’t think automatic cars are as common outside North America.
In Europe ~80% of cars have manual transmission, mainly due to the (in the past) better fuel efficiency.
Modern automatic cars have often slightly better fuel efficiency, but they cost quite a bit more to buy and maintain, and very nearly everyone knows how to drive stick, so people usually don’t bother.
Edit: As we stop having fun driving cars, should we finally also say goodbye to race biking, and fun motorcycling, once and for all?
Disagree that fun driving is over. Have you driven a tesla?
I agree with you that electrics are fun, but driving around a manual shitbox can be a lot of fun, too!
I don’t really agree with the OC that fun driving is “over,” but different strokes for different folks! (For the record, I haven’t found a powered vehicle that I don’t enjoy to some extent)
I got a manual for a few reasons, but the big one in my mind was fewer moving parts, and something that I can actually maintain myself. I’ve actually rebuilt a transmission before, and while it’s not the easiest thing to do, I already have the tooling required to pull a transmission and disassemble it.
I’m not redlining my 2002 v6 pickup truck so it’s not a performance thing. It’s just something I like. I like the engagement even if it’s a pain in the ass sometimes.
I changed “lifetime” transmission oil in my MT after 100k miles & it came out looking the same as the new stuff going in.
On the flip side, every AT I have owned had some nasty looking fluid coming out after ~40k miles (?… it has been a while, so I don’t remember the exact service interval)
Damn thats some sobering real talk. I don’t know how to drive manual, and frankly you make a strong point about how little point there would be to try
How can you brag about being able to drive a manual car? It’s a basic life skill that almost everyone has (at least here in Europe). It would be like bragging you’re able to tie your shoe laces. My 70 year old mom drives a manual.
It used to be the other way around: since manual is the norm here, the only people who drove an automatic were those with some kind of physical or mental disability. If you drove an automatic people would assume something was wrong with you. Nowadays this stigma no longer exists and manual transmissions are becoming more accepted, but still uncommon outside of EVs.
Is that even allowed? Here you either do your driving test in a manual, in which case you already know how to drive one, or you do your test in an automatic and you aren’t allowed to drive a manual. You’d have to take lessons (with a licensed instructor) and do a new driving exam.
Driving an automatic when you’re not used to it can also be quite scary as half the controls you need to operate the car are missing. Took me a while to get over the feeling of not being able to stop the car, it feels super weird to just keep the brake pressed until it stops without it stalling.
In the USA licenses are not contingent upon manual vs. automatic. No one checks what car you drive. So you would have to learn somewhere - someone around you has to own a manual car in order for you to learn how to drive one, and here simply no one does. No one in my entire extended family, none of my friends, none of my coworkers I’m friendly with, none of the 50+ cars I have any tangential access to are manual. So even if I wanted to learn, what are my options? Buy an entire car just to learn? Services like Turo won’t let you rent one unless you can drive one already.
We have Driver’s Education in high school but it involves no actual driving - there are separate paid/private courses you can take that might involve defensive driving or learning stick. I did one on controlling skids on wet or snowy pavement and demonstrating e.g. turning under braking with and without ABS. But nothing about manual.
I would expect the driving school to have a manual. That’s how it works here. It doesn’t matter what car your family or friends own, you can’t take driving lessons in an unmodified car anyway. You need a car with dual controls and a licensed instructor.
why would someone brag about driving manual? it’s the standard in most countries.
I’m 237 years old, a retired phosphate miner in Nauru. I learned to drive on manual transmissions but now refuse to drive anything not powered by a turbo-encabulator, with the exception of Starfleet shuttlecraft. I also hate questions that encourage people to give away personal or census data without considering that is what’s happening.
Your stripper name is City Where You We’re Born + Can You Drive Stick Shift + The Last 4 Of Your SSN.
Damn they got me again
Germany, 25, yup
UAE, mid 20s and I know how to drive a manual but went with an automatic.