What is a Minimalistic Automotive HMI in 2024?! A Grenadier review

About the car itself and purpose

Ineos Grenadier is an off-road vehicle designed with durability and capability in mind. It's often touted for its ruggedness and utilitarian features, aimed at those who need a reliable vehicle for challenging terrains. The Grenadier draws inspiration from classic off-roaders but incorporates modern technology and known industry partners to meet current performance and safety standards. It's developed by Ineos Automotive, a division of the British multinational chemical company Ineos.

Why is a step back still inspiring?

The Grenadier's interior features an interesting design, it feels like a cockpit of an airliner –?a center console full of switchgear and a panel on the roof, suitable for glove-wearing users. Look up for the former 'no smoking' sign, which is converted in 'Passenger Airbag'. This is such a cool reference and wink.

It avoids a touchscreen-dominated interface, offering a rotary controller for the infotainment system in the center console. Even though is kind of a Defender successor, it can't come without center screen. But, while everyone in the industry integrated more and more in the operating system, Ineos is moving backwards. No games, no streaming, no navigation, you heard right.

Physical buttons are king

The screen in the car is not the hero, the physical buttons are. You can click, press, switch and turn physical buttons and it feels amazing, I have to admit. They come with good icons and are place in a contextual way. In fact, the car has more switches than functions. You can equip the car e.g. with external light bars and you have the switch already in the roof section. So you will not destroy the look with an aftermarket solution.

No instrument cluster

If you expect an old school car, you expect an speedometer. Ineos is consistent (or saves costs) and just offers that center screen. No HUD, no cluster, just the mandatory warning lights behind the steering wheel.

Bring your own food – Apple CarPlay and Android Auto

Here comes the twist, you can use Android Auto and wireless Apple CarPlay. So you actually have everything you need to navigate traffic, listen to your own music or stay connected for phone calls or messages. You just need to bring your phone.

Off-road settings still require knowledge of how, when or what

Some settings and adjustments are tailored for the actual user group, off-roader and overlander. There is a dedicated 'OFFROAD' menu section in the infotainment and it gives the driver the desired informations in challenging terrain. Conditions of the all-wheel drive system, temperature of heavily stressed components (like gearbox or differential) and so on. From here it would get nerdy …

Moving on to my highlights:

• The aircraft style is emotions and a good interpretation of older interior.

• Being serious and shipping a production car with an opposite (HMI) approach than the whole industry, is a bold move and I respect that.
• From a visual point of view, the layout (e.g. grouping buttons) and visual elements like hatched areas is carefully considered.

• The UI contains details, like specific characters (e.g. the German ?) and the wording is a very natural (no bad German translations in my case).

• With some research, I discovered customizable areas for some elements on head unit - this is a big plus.

What I didn't like about the HMI.

• The rear view camera has a very outdated quality and the view is reduced in size (in an unnecessary window frame).

• The labeling of buttons and interface is using too many capital letters, this reduces the readability.

• The performance of touch screen is outdated, the components are maybe more durable, but definitely not user friendly.
• The HMI is always in dark mode, I wished for a light mode or brighter interface for some cases.

• The gear selector screams 'BMW' to me. This is not entirely bad, but it breaks my brand experience with Ineos – although I know it's a BMW engine and ZF gear box. But you touch that component every time and it's not 'Ineos'.

• Another personal note, but not about the HMI. Not everything needs to be old school. I think vegan leather would suit the car better than actual leather, I just don't see the point.

I know it's actually not that car for the people, who want a minimalistic HMI. The target group for this type of car has a very different focus and the HMI is maybe not even in the top 10 of reasons to purchase the car.

But I enjoyed my short test drive and gained a different perspective. I got an additional answer for the question: How much HMI is needed? and How many buttons are useful? And The answer is: Yes. ;)