What is the difference between cruise control and adaptive cruise control?
2 Answers
The differences between cruise control and adaptive cruise control: 1. Different functions: Cruise control can only rely on the owner's manual operation in emergency situations; Adaptive cruise control can maintain the vehicle's longitudinal driving, and when there is a collision risk, the vehicle will alert the driver and actively intervene with braking. 2. Different applicable road conditions: Cruise control is suitable for good road conditions, such as highways and roads with few vehicles; Adaptive cruise control is suitable for highway conditions and can also be used in urban road conditions. Cars are equipped with cruise speed control buttons, which can be seen on the steering wheel. The owner can use these buttons to control the distance from the vehicle in front. If the owner needs to rest, they should place their foot on the edge to the right of the accelerator pedal, so that even if the accelerator is mistakenly pressed, it is not easy to achieve instant acceleration at such high speeds, making it relatively safe.
Cruise control is about setting a fixed speed for the car to maintain on its own. If you set it to 120 km/h, it will keep that speed, but it doesn’t detect vehicles ahead. If the car in front slows down, you have to brake manually, or it could be dangerous. Adaptive cruise control is much smarter. It uses a radar or camera to constantly scan the road ahead. Once you set the speed and following distance, it automatically adjusts the speed based on the car in front: slowing down when the leading car decelerates and accelerating back to your preset speed when the road clears. The best part is that in traffic jams, some advanced systems can even come to a complete stop and resume driving without needing you to press the accelerator. Nowadays, most new cars come with adaptive cruise control, making long drives much more comfortable—just remember to keep your hands on the steering wheel.
