Road Glare to Drop a Notch?
Audi is preparing two SUV models for the American market with the automaker’s adaptive LED headlights. Its technology is designed to reduce brightness for other drivers, a growing complaint among U.S. motorists.
Diagram describes how Audi's headlight technology reduces glare for other motorists while optimizing the driver's visibility.
Audi
Audi says it’s bringing technology to U.S. roads that reduces annoying and potentially dangerous headlight glare for drivers.
The German automaker will introduce the 2027 Q9 and SQ9 SUVs sporting the kind of lighting technology it said has been used in Europe for a decade.
The digital matrix LED headlights give drivers a longer-range field of view while cutting glare for other drivers they meet on the road. The lights also reduce glare from reflective signs, Audi said.
A recent AAA survey found that six out of 10 U.S. drivers are bothered by vehicles’ headlight glare, 73% of them saying the problem has gotten worse in the past 10 years, the same period that Europe has had glare-reduction technology on its roads. AAA pointed to the taller vehicles that have proliferated on U.S. roads in recent years, along with new headlight technologies, as reasons for the issue.
Audi said adaptive automotive lighting has helped reduce glare on nighttime European roads since 2013 but that it didn’t qualify for use in the U.S. due to transportation department standards here.
Federal rule changes in 2022 opened up the possibility of U.S. adoption, though Audi says other automakers haven’t yet met the standards. The automaker developed a headlight system that passed U.S. regulators’ requirements, opening up the technology for vehicles sold here.
Instead of a single unit of high-beam headlights that can be turned off and on, Audi said its system “continuously shapes the light pattern in real time, keeping more usable light on the road while reducing glare for other road users.”
The system employs front-facing cameras to detect oncoming traffic and other vehicles ahead, selectively masking light around them while giving the Audi driver maximum illumination in all other areas.
Audi of America Vice President Product Planning Filip Brabec said the technology is the latest in the company’s auto lighting innovations, including daytime running lights, which he said Audi pioneered.
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