Autonomous vehicles used to be a futuristic fantasy- but is quickly becoming a reality. With self driving taxis in available to the public in San Francisco and Phoenix- and soon to be hitting the streets of Los Angeles and Austin! All over the world today, people are driving Tesla cars- which have auto-pilot and self driving capabilities (although are intended for use by fully-attentive drivers who are ready to take over at any time). With this being said, autonomous vehicles will only become more capable as time goes on.
Before I get started imagining my own AV UI, I will analyse some existing examples to get my bearings on what I like and dislike about these dashboards. Pictured below is a Tesla UI showcasing a music/ podcasts and entertainment screen. The UI is uncluttered and simple, with large icons representing different playlists so that the driver can immediately see what they want to listen to with minimal distraction. There are simple and easy to understand icons on the bottom nav, allowing the driver/ passenger to navigate the cars features with ease.
When it comes to making a UI for a fully autonomous vehicle however, I do not need to worry about making the UI non-distracting for the driver. These safety measures will not need to be baked into my design process, i can instead put functionality and aesthetics to the frontline.
This multi-screen dashboard looks very futuristic, but also very overwhelming for a human-operated vehicle. This type of dashboard would be more suited to an AV, in which passengers have their hands and attention free from distraction.
Without the need to drive, passengers are free to watch movies, create art, work on projects, write, practice music and much more on their dashboards.
Autonomous vehicles will completely transform how we travel in private vehicles. The AV will become more like a space for which we can utilise our time and technology more efficiently. What we can do when travelling on a train will become the norm in our private vehicles, transforming the experience alltogether.