As One of the Jury members in the Irish car Of The Year Awards in association with Continental Tyres I get to drive pretty much every new car that comes to the market each year. This gives me a great insight into what is happening in terms of developments, technologies and of course new models.
Over the period of a year myself and my colleagues in the MMAI ( Motoring Media Association Of Ireland) will road test new models at home and at international launches abroad in an effort to bring you the loyal reader the most up-to-date information on new cars.
Towards the end of each year and just before we vote on the Irish Car Of The Year Awards we then have a “Refresher” day where we can re-visit the models driven over the year, update our notes and get a final assessment of each car.
I do not have enough space here to detail my views on each and every car in the competition this year but some interesting facts emerged.
Across the board electronics is where a huge change is taking place in cars.
I think particularly with EV’s its becoming harder for manufacturers to make their car stand out as most EV’s drive very similarly. After all its a battery and either one or two electric motors driving either two or four wheels. As a result they all feel pretty similar to drive. So car manufacturers have been throwing more and more in the way of gadgets and apps to differentiate their car from the opposition. Not all of it is welcome I must add with some very annoying and distracting digital features in many cars now.
From Infra Red technologies to “see in the dark” technologies to cameras that read signposts such as Speed limits and other warnings, Satellite Navigation that is now so advanced that it can be linked into the cars auto gearbox and active suspension and predict what gear the car should be in or how the suspension should react based on the terrain ahead. So for example from the Sat Nav database the car knows there is a tight corner ahead and then a downhill slope so it downshifts at exactly the right time before the corner, and then again before going down the hill!
Collision prevention electronics are now commonplace. Using a type of radar the car scans the road ahead. If an obstacle is seen and it calculates a possible impact there is an audible and visual warning signal, and finally if the driver ignores both the car applies the brakes to a stop and activates the hazard warning lights.
Should the worst happen, cars can now automatically transmit their location in the even of a crash and using the data from the on-board sensors such as how many seat belts were fastened at the time of the crash it can send emergency services to the exact location of the car with information such as it has 3 occupants and it rolled over!
Another innovation is remote parking where using a button on your key fob you can be standing outside the car and get it to self park. Handy I suppose if you don’t like parking in tight spaces. Cars now boast a myriad of apps from Spotify to the capability for passengers to watch Netflix while you drive. We have apps that allow you set a warm up and defrost time for your car so that its warm and defrosted for that winter early morning start to work. Cars are really becoming more like entertainment centres digitally connected to the world around them.
Finally to the Irish Car Of The Year Awards 2026 in which many cars boast some or all of the above mentioned technologies.
This year there are 46 new models all competing for the grand title of Continental Tyres Irish Car Of The Year 2026. There are also sub categories, namely Small/Compact car of the year, Medium Large Car, Small compact SUV, Medium SUV, large SUV/MPV, Performance car of the year and Luxury car of the year. Electric cars now dominate that mix of course and interestingly so are some of the new Chinese brands such as Xpeng and BYD.
The winners will be announced at an awards ceremony held on Friday November 14th which is attended by the motoring press and the management from the Irish Motor Industry. Last years winner was the Renault Scenic E-Tech EV, lets see what model will take the overall title of Continental Tyres Irish Car Of the Year 2026.