The manual transmission has clearly been on the decline for the last couple of decades, and today, it effectively only exists in enthusiast-oriented cars. Even sports cars and hot hatches aren’t necessarily safe for the stick. So, it’s certainly encouraging to see the CEO of Nissan’s performance sub-brand Nismo report rising demand for manual cars. As reassuring as it may be, though, we’re not expecting a big change in automotive transmission options.
2027 Nissan Z NismoNissan
We’ll Start With The Good News
The news about manual demand comes from Australian car news outlet CarExpert. A CarExpert reporter attended a Nismo event Down Under where Nismo CEO Yutaka Sanada said, “Customer demand for the three-pedal is coming back.” There’s concrete evidence for this, too, as the Nismo Z is finally getting a manual option after potential buyers asked for it. Sanada was careful, though, to note that the company would still develop Nismo models with both manual and automatic transmissions.
2027 Nissan Z NismoNissan
Here’s Why This Isn’t As Great As It Sounds
It’s great to hear that there are die-hard enthusiasts that still want to row their own gears, and that a division such as Nismo knows this. Unfortunately, any demand that Nismo is seeing is almost certainly a niche of a niche. For any particular Nissan, the Nismo variants only make up a small portion of that model’s respective sales. Many of those Nismos are just slightly sportier versions of family vehicles, and odds are even those aren’t getting lots of buyers demanding a manual. So for the models that are, like a Z, that’s a minuscule group of buyers.
Additionally, divisions such as Nismo still have to defer to the needs of the greater car company: Nissan. While Nismo obviously has room and budget to develop a variety of new parts for existing cars, it’s still somewhat dependent on what’s in the Nissan parts bin. A manual Nismo Z was pretty easy to implement because Nissan still offers a manual in the regular Z. As such, it wasn’t a massive cost to implement for a small portion of buyers, especially as a relatively high-priced model that could cover some of the cost of adding another transmission option.
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What you probably won’t see, though, will be something like a hypothetical Nismo Sentra with a manual. Nissan isn’t going to develop a new transmission and certify it for a handful of buyers of a small-volume trim level. Volkswagen gives us a perfect example of this. We just learned this week that the Jetta GLI would lose its manual transmission option, with VW citing reduced demand. The GLI was the last manual-equipped version of the Jetta in the U.S., let alone that version of the engine. Automakers can only offer a powertrain if they think it’s worthwhile.
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There could be some good news, though.
We’re Not Giving Up All Hope
While we’re not anticipating a bunch of new manual models, we don’t think they’re going away forever just yet. There’s clearly enough demand that as long as automakers still have a transmission they can use or easily adapt, they’ll offer them. The next Skyline, which will be offered in America as an Infiniti, will be getting a manual transmission, probably the same one as in the Z, since it’ll still be related to that platform. When Toyota and BMW reintroduced the Supra and Z4, they were automatic-only, like the Nismo Z. It was successful enough, and BMW had transmissions that could be adapted, so the automakers launched manual versions. So, what we’re saying is, keep your hopes realistic.
Source: CarExpert
