Europeans Can Now Option Lexus ES with Digital Side-view Mirrors

By Brett Foote - March 4, 2020

Already in Japan, exciting new digital door mirror tech lands on European Lexus ES sedans starting in March.

Sometimes, the advancement of technology happens so fast that the laws regulating it can’t keep up. Case in point – digital side-view mirror technology. Japan went to the trouble of changing their laws to allow it a few years ago. As a result, Lexus was the first automaker to offer digital side mirrors on a mass-production vehicle in 2018. Now, finally, Europe is following suit. Lexus has announced that customers in that part of the world will be able to buy digital side-mirror equipped ES sedans starting this month.

Unfortunately, U.S. laws still prohibit this exciting new tech. And that’s a shame, really. There’s a lot to like about digital side mirrors, much of it safety-related. As the name implies, this technology replaces traditional door mirrors with compact, external, high-resolution cameras linked to in-car monitors. The result is an expanded view of the areas behind and beside the vehicle while turning and reversing. And it’s enough to virtually eliminate blind spots altogether.

Even better, you won’t get cramps in your neck constantly swiveling your head all over the place. Two five-inch color monitors are positioned at the base of the front pillars, closely aligned to the door mirror height. So they fall within the driver’s intuitive line of sight. This means the driver doesn’t have to significantly change the way they check side mirrors when turning or reversing. Even better, the exterior camera housings are quite slim and aerodynamic, which reduces wind noise inside the cabin.

The units themselves have built-in heaters to avoid freezing or misting and are located so they are not as likely to be obscured by raindrops or snow. If necessary, the driver can activate what Lexus calls the “demister” using a dashboard switch to ensure a clear view. The system also has a luminescence sensor, which automatically reduces glare from the headlights of vehicles behind you during night-time driving.

Lexus has a couple of other nifty tricks up its sleeve with these new mirrors. When the driver signals a lane change or puts the car in reverse, the monitors automatically show an extended view of the area alongside and behind the car. An icon in the corner of the screen alerts the driver to the change in aspect. When the turn, lane-change, or parking is completed, the system automatically returns to its standard setting. The driver can also switch to extended view manually, or turn the function off altogether.

The Digital Side-view Monitor system also helps the driver position the car safely when parking or driving, automatically adding reference guidelines to the images. Lines on the screen indicate various distances between the car and objects around it. This works much like modern rear-view camera systems, but they’re always active while driving or parking.

Lexus is rolling out its digital side-view mirror feature on the ES sedan in the United Kingdom, Germany, Spain, and Poland beginning in March. The rest of Europe will follow by the end of 2020. As for those of us here in the U.S., well, we’ll just have to wait for the law to catch up before we too can opt for the door mirrors of the future.

Photos: Lexus