When we say “top safety features for teens,” we’re not listing safety features explicitly engineered with teens in mind. Nope. Our list details the bare minimum safety features any car should have when your teen’s safety hangs in the balance.
Let’s face it: Most budgets don’t allow a teen’s first car to be new, decked out with all the latest advanced safety technologies. Many parents buy a new car and hand down the old “Wagon Queen Family Truckster” to their teens. Others hunt for used cars, searching for an affordable gem in good shape that won’t leave junior sulking in his room for weeks.
Safety requirements and popular features you need
We’ve divided our top safety features list into two sections. You can find some of the first five of our safety features on passenger vehicles dating back to the 1990s. The federal government now mandates them as standard equipment on all new cars. These safety features should be on a teen’s car, whether the automobile is new or used.
The second half of the list is safety features not mandated by federal regulations but popular on later-model vehicles. Parents with a budget for a new or late-model used car should seek out as many of these features as possible to help with safety.
Related: 7 must-have safety features for your next car
Your teen is not an accomplished driver
No matter whose statistics you consult, the bottom line is similar. For the number of miles they drive, no age group of drivers has more crash fatalities than teens. According to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS), the fatal crash rate per mile driven for teens ages 16 to 19 is roughly three times the rate for drivers 20 and older.
Plus: These are 2023’s safest new cars
Top 10 safety features for teens
Features 1-5 should be in every teen’s car. The remaining five are features you should look for in a vehicle for your teenager if it fits your budget.
1. Airbags
Airbags? Doesn’t every car have to have airbags? Yes. Beginning with the 1998 model year, the federal government mandated that every light passenger vehicle (cars, pickup trucks, and SUVs) have airbags. However, today, as in 1998, the law only calls for two airbags — one for each side of the front seat. Most new motor vehicles today have at least six airbags. In addition to the two in front, there are side-impact bags, usually stowed in the outer shell of each front seat. There are also two side-curtain airbags above the doors, protecting the head of the front- and rear-seat outboard passengers.
Also see: If you want a good, used compact car for under $20,000, look for one of these models
So, how many airbags should your teen’s car have? No one has put a number on how many airbags are required to make a car safe. Some cars, like the Nissan Sentra, Toyota Camry, and Chevrolet Malibu, have 10 airbags. Usually, the more, the better. At the very least, your teen’s car should provide the front and side curtain airbags. Moreover, the front airbags should be “dual-stage.” They are sometimes called “Smart” or Advanced.” Airbags deploy when a crash triggers sensors to fire an inflator inside it. It’s a mini-explosion of sorts.
Dual-stage systems have two inflators, each with a different power rating. Let’s say one fires at 70% and the other at 30%. In mild crashes, the system only fires the less powerful inflator. More severe impacts cause both inflators to fire in quick succession. Some dual-stage systems are sophisticated enough to fire the lower-rated inflator in crashes when a child occupies that seat.
2. Antilock brakes
Three legs of the same stool, antilock brakes, traction control, and stability control became mandatory on new cars in 2012. Antilock brake systems (ABS) facilitate shorter stopping distances and straight-line stops. They also help maintain steering control.
Simply put, locking up the brakes causes a vehicle to skid. When a skid begins, both braking power and steering are compromised. Before ABS, drivers avoided locking the brakes and skidding by rapidly pumping the brakes. ABS’s advantage is that it pumps the brakes for you and does so more quickly and effectively than a human can. Sensors in the wheels monitor the brakes, preventing lockup by engaging and then releasing the brakes. With every rapid-fire engagement of the brakes, the vehicle slows more.
Moreover, between engaging the brakes, the front wheels continue rolling. Therefore, you maintain steering control, allowing you to steer out of trouble.
3. Traction control
Traction control maximizes grip when you are accelerating the vehicle. It achieves this by utilizing ABS components to apply brake pressure to the drive wheel or wheels with a loss of grip, reducing wheel spin. In other words, the system ensures controlled, straight-line acceleration.
4. Stability control
Stability control takes full advantage of ABS to maintain the vehicle’s course. Several sensors monitor various car behaviors. For example, a steering-wheel sensor keeps track of the direction the driver intends to go. A yaw sensor notes how much a car is tilting when steering through a turn and any indication of the car’s traction breaking loose, creating side-to-side spin. When sensing a loss of traction initiating yaw, they signal the ABS to apply brake pressure to the appropriate wheels required to return the vehicle to its intended course.
ABS, traction control, and stability control are essential crash avoidance technologies. Many vehicles already had them before the federal government mandated the functionality. If your teen winds up with an automobile built before 2012, make sure it provides ABS, traction control, and stability control.
5. Rearview camera
Also called a backup camera, a rearview camera shows the area behind a vehicle when in reverse gear. The center display or infotainment touchscreen shows the camera’s view. However, some early models located the image display on a section of the rearview mirror. Rearview cameras help drivers see pedestrians, cyclists, pets, and obstructions behind them when backing up. In 2008, the federal government passed the regulation mandating rearview cameras for all new cars sold after May 2014.
Also see: The best automotive technologies to look for when buying a new car
6. Forward collision warning
Nearly every new model has some form of forward collision warning (FCW) available as standard or optional. Often, it is paired with an emergency braking system. Using a combination of radar, cameras, and sometimes even lasers, the system scans the road ahead. It alerts the driver when their car closes too quickly on the vehicle ahead. The system will issue a warning that is audible, haptic, or visual (or some combination of the three). When automatic emergency braking is also a feature, the system will brake the vehicle if the driver is slow to respond to the warning.
7. Blind-spot monitoring
Using radar sensors located on the rear bumper or cameras, blind-spot monitoring (BSM) alerts the driver when a vehicle approaches from the rear on either side of the car. Drivers can easily lose these approaching vehicles in the blind spots along a car’s flanks. If the vehicle is so equipped, the visual alerts appear on the outboard rearview mirrors, the A-pillars, or the head-up display.
8. Rear cross-traffic alert
Using the same sensors and cameras as BSM, rear cross-traffic alert (RCTA) monitors traffic crossing behind your vehicle when backing up. It’s handy when backing out of a driveway onto a busy street or out of a parking spot in a crowded parking lot. Some systems are sophisticated enough to detect pedestrians and cyclists. Some RCTA systems include reverse emergency braking that automatically stops your car if it sees oncoming cross traffic.
9. Lane-departure warning
Lane-departure warning or LDW employs a front-mounted camera to monitor your vehicle’s position within its lane relative to the center and side lane markings. It makes an audible and sometimes a visual alert if your car drifts near or over the lane markings when the turn signal is not engaged. Being distracted for only a few seconds can allow a vehicle to drift into another lane.
10. Lane-keeping assist
Using a front-pointed camera, lane-keeping assist, or LKA, helps a driver remain within the boundaries of their lane. When it detects the vehicle approaching an outer lane marker, it uses the ABS or the steering system to nudge the car back toward the center. Engaging the appropriate turn signal disengages LKA until the lane change is complete.
Read: How to use telematics to monitor your teen’s driving
Why you need emergency crash notification in the car
Although it’s not a system or specific safety feature for teens, we have one more suggestion regarding safety. Telematics with emergency notifications has been around since General Motors
GM,
launched OnStar in 1996. Since then, other carmakers and smartphones have developed similar services. It’s useful for several reasons. For example, the value for your teen is notifying first responders in case of an accident. Moreover, they provide a push-button emergency notification for other situations. Often, such services are by subscription. For instance, the OnStar Protection Plan, with an automatic crash response and crisis assistance, costs an estimated $360 annually. The cost includes stolen vehicle assistance, remote vehicle access, and more.
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Smartphone apps provide crash notifications like the iPhone 14 and later and various Apple
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Watch models.
This story originally ran on Autotrader.com.
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