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We’re used to new hybrid and battery technology coming out recently. It’s where the industry is heading with increasing regulations, so to see a brand-new engine layout in 2026 is a special moment. That’s what legendary German manufacturer RUF gave us at the Goodwood Festival of Speed earlier this year with a flat-eight engine. It’s a layout that’s never been put into a road car before. Reports are now surfacing about a possible eight-cylinder supercar from Porsche within the next few years, and CarBuzz caught up with a member of the RUF family recently to hear about the challenges with…

A few tricks provide a seamless Google Maps experience in your car with CarPlay. Chinnapong/Shutterstock Apple Maps has improved a lot since its troubled launch, but many people still prefer Google Maps. That could be because of the traffic data, better business listings or just out of habit. The good news is that you can use Google Maps in Apple CarPlay just like any other supported app.  Apple has always been restrictive when it comes to changing the iPhone’s default apps. In the EU and Japan, local regulations allow you to choose your favorite navigation app as…

Automakers spend billions trying to predict the next big thing, and sometimes, that’s a dangerous game. As machines such as the Mercedes R-Class and the Porsche Mission X show us below, ambitious projects aiming to spark industry trends are sometimes stifled by poor timing, botched rollouts, or buyers who aren’t impressed. 1997 Plymouth / Chrysler Prowler The Retro Roadster That Never Reached Its Full Potential One of the ultimate 1990s poster cars, the Plymouth Prowler had a messy, chaotic launch that can get new products off to a dreadful start. First launched for 1997, the Prowler initially featured a 3.5‑liter…

The Drive 🤝 your inbox. Every weekday The Daily Brief wraps up the biggest stories and our exclusive reporting on the auto industry and car culture. In the early 2000s, Mercedes-Benz was a study in contrasts. The automaker was going all-in on AMG performance models, stuffing big naturally-aspirated V8s anywhere they would fit. But it was also continuing to move downmarket with small front-wheel-drive hatchbacks. One incredible build brought these two worlds together. In 2009, trainees at Mercedes’ assembly plant in Rastatt, Germany, turned a B-Class hatch into a snarling V8 monster using the engine and drivetrain from the contemporary…

For the last few weeks, we’ve been running a sidebar survey about whether our Electrek readers who should be held responsible when AI fails, and people get hurt. After nearly 3,000 responses, here’s what you told us. In case you missed the survey, the question read, “A number of fatal Tesla accidents are making headlines while Waymo racks up thousands of parking tickets, and the sheer volume of autonomous taxis means those numbers will keep climbing – but when an AI-driven taxi fails, who should be responsible?” The survey coincided with both the re-unveiling of the Tesla Cybercab earlier this month in Austin,…

According to Howard-Jones, the agents were likely tasked with retrieving publicly available data related to the Productive Capacities Index (PCI) through the UNCTADstat API. However, the agents did not appear to have direct API access and were limited in their ability to pull data from UNCTADstat because of restrictions on their HTTP tools.The agents eventually worked out a way to bypass their limitations and start pulling data from the site, but still encountered some errors. At this point, the AI went from creative to deceptive. Believing that the errors were due to its requests being caught by a nonexistent filter,…

In a world of delicate supply chains and just-in-time manufacturing, disruptions tend to have a major impact on automakers’ production output. The recent chip shortage is perhaps the most notable example of this, but even smaller, more localized bottlenecks can still cause big problems for manufacturers. So much so that industry experts have started questioning whether just-in-time practices are actually the way to go. And that leads us to Ford’s current predicament. Last year, the company was faced with a severe aluminum shortage following multiple fires at its supplier’s plant. It didn’t even have the chance to fully recover after…

The new form factor offers convenience at a premium. Ra2studio/Getty Images Book-style foldable phones feature enough screen real estate to rival compact tablets, and at this point, it’s reasonable to wonder if the former should replace the latter. For instance, the latest iPad Mini features an 8.3-inch screen, only 0.3 inches larger than the Pixel 11 Pro Fold and Galaxy Z Fold 8 Ultra. At 7.6 inches, the iPhone Duo is slightly smaller, but the difference is minor. Most people aren’t carrying a compact tablet around, but if an 8-inch device folds down to a typical smartphone size,…

In the 1970s, moose were enough of a problem for drivers in Sweden that someone devised a test to see how cars dealt with evading a sudden, massive obstacle. The test, now standardized, is performed at 45 mph on a dry road surface using cones to force the vehicle into the oncoming lane, and back again. Thus, the “moose test” was born. But to better understand what happens when a vehicle fails to evade that obstacle, the Swedish National Road and Transport Research Institute developed a moose crash test dummy. Considering Volvo’s legacy of vehicle safety, it should come as…

The Drive 🤝 your inbox. Every weekday The Daily Brief wraps up the biggest stories and our exclusive reporting on the auto industry and car culture. The push for autonomous driving has a strong profit motivation. From taxis to trucking, corporate executives dream of the day that they’ll be able to replace professional drivers with sensors and code to save money and increase vehicle uptime. Now, that mentality appears to be moving off the street and into the warehouse. General Motors is now trying to patent an autonomous forklift, potentially putting certified operators out of work. A patent application from…