Recently, a high-speed rear-end collision video circulating online has ignited heated debates among netizens. In the footage, a black new-energy SUV appears to lose control abruptly, crashing into the vehicle ahead before veering into the emergency lane, colliding with a guardrail, and skidding to a halt. During this harrowing sequence, the driver opens the cabin door and repeatedly attempts to brake and steer the vehicle. These self-rescue efforts have been widely lauded by netizens as 'textbook' emergency maneuvers.

While the driver's proactive door-opening action has drawn widespread praise, it has also thrust the safety hazards of hidden door handles back into the spotlight. Currently, hidden door handles have become a hallmark of perceived technological sophistication in new-energy vehicles on the market. As their adoption grows, their drawbacks have become increasingly evident, causing significant inconveniences for passengers. Issues such as difficulty in identification, cumbersome operation, freezing in winter, failure during power outages, and hand-pinching have drawn widespread criticism. More critically, they pose potential risks to escape and rescue efforts.

Incidents where hidden door handles fail to open due to power loss, obstructing rescue operations, are not rare. The aforementioned accident also underscores, to some extent, that in the minds of vehicle owners, hidden door handles have become one of the barriers to escape during accidents.

In recent years, sales of new-energy vehicles have continued to surge. By the end of June 2025, the number of new-energy vehicles in China reached 36.89 million, and concerns and opinions from vehicle owners and passengers regarding hidden door handles have been mounting.

Recently, the Department of Equipment Industry (DEI) under the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology publicly solicited opinions on the mandatory national standard Safety Technical Requirements for Automobile Door Handles (hereinafter referred to as the Requirements) and amendments to three other mandatory national standards.

The Requirements mandate that all vehicle doors must be equipped with a mechanical release function, enabling them to be opened manually even during power outages or after a collision. This directly halts the 'flashy design competition' in automotive design, prompting a return to the 'essence of safety and practicality.'

Industry Pain Points

Various types of hidden door handles, such as seesaw-style, fully extended, button-style, inward-pulling, fully concealed, and semi-concealed designs, have become the mainstream design trend in current new-energy vehicle models. However, in practical use, the so-called 'high technology' has not delivered sufficient convenience but has instead significantly increased inconveniences and safety hazards.

Crash tests conducted by institutions reveal that models equipped with electronic door handles have a success rate of only 67% in door ejection after side collisions, far lower than the 98% success rate of mechanical door handles. Additionally, according to statistics from consumer associations, complaints about hidden door handles pinching children's fingers surged by 132% year-on-year in 2024.

Wei Jianjun, Chairman of Great Wall Motors, discussed the topic of hidden door handles in a previous livestream. He believes that hidden door handles have several drawbacks, including being heavy, having poor sealing, and generating significant noise. 'Hidden door handles are all electrically driven. When there's a power outage or a collision, they can't be opened,' he said.

Furthermore, Wei Jianjun stated that the only advantage of hidden door handles is a potentially slight reduction in wind resistance, which is almost negligible.

According to data provided by automakers, a single hidden door handle can reduce wind resistance by 0.003Cd, and four handles together can reduce it by 0.012Cd. Converted to the CLTC-P standard operating conditions, this translates to an approximate increase of 5km-10km in comprehensive range. During a brand launch event, engineers demonstrated with precision instruments that when the vehicle speed reaches 126km/h, the four hidden door handles can save air resistance equivalent to the weight of two eggs. Some studies suggest that the optimization of the wind resistance coefficient by this design has extremely limited perceptibility for actual users, and its primary function remains aesthetic appeal.

In the face of frequent hazards, this 'aesthetic appeal' has deviated from the essence of safety, imposing additional learning costs and unnecessary troubles on drivers and passengers.

On social media platforms, complaints about hidden door handles are rampant. In cold weather, hidden door handles can freeze and become inoperable; 'not being able to find the door' also troubles many passengers, especially in adverse weather conditions; the risk of hand-pinching and increased cleaning difficulty are also concerns for vehicle owners. Experts also point out that compared to traditional door handles, hidden door handles incorporate more components, leading to higher manufacturing and maintenance costs.

Therefore, many netizens have welcomed the mandatory regulations from relevant authorities, exclaiming, 'Finally, the day has come.'

Safety Supervision

In response to the numerous issues with hidden door handles, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology has publicly solicited opinions on the mandatory national standard Safety Technical Requirements for Automobile Door Handles, aiming to comprehensively regulate the performance of door handle products and enhance their safety.

The Requirements explicitly state that 'the exterior door handle of each door, in any state, shall have a hand-operated space relative to the vehicle body surface, which shall be no less than 60mm×20mm×25mm,' meaning the operating space for opening the door by hand shall not be less than 30 cubic centimeters. In the eyes of industry insiders, this effectively prohibits fully concealed door handles.

Meanwhile, in response to the safety hazards posed by hidden door handles, the Requirements also specify several detailed rules. For example, regarding the safe opening of door handles after a power outage, each door (excluding the tailgate) shall be equipped with a mechanical exterior door handle and an interior door handle. When the locking device is in the locked state, after accidents such as the deployment of irreversible restraint devices or thermal events in the power battery, the non-collision side doors shall be able to be opened without the aid of tools using the mechanical door handle. If the vehicle is equipped with an electric interior door handle, it shall also be equipped with a mechanical interior door handle.

In response to the common complaint from consumers that 'mechanical interior door handles cannot be found in emergencies,' the Requirements clarify that interior door handles with mechanical release functions shall be easily identifiable by occupants inside the vehicle, including: the interior door handle shall be located in an unobstructed position, ensuring it is intuitively visible from the occupant's position; the interior door handle shall be installed on the door or no more than 30 centimeters from the door edge; if multiple mechanical interior door handles are installed on a single door, operating any one of them shall directly open the door.

From the draft for comments, it is evident that the competent authorities are not restricting innovation but rather providing clear safety boundaries for it. From the perspective of rescue and escape, the safety logic of automotive exterior door handles in accident scenarios such as collisions and vehicle fires is reinforced. Safety redundancy design requirements, such as mechanical or power-off protection, are added to ensure that the door system can be opened during power outages, collisions, and other accidents, facilitating rescue and escape activities and providing a basis for automotive R&D.

In fact, in May of this year, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology officially initiated the plan to develop and revise the mandatory national standard Safety Technical Requirements for Automobile Door Handles, proposing to strengthen the design specifications for automotive exterior door handles from a safety perspective. This revision plan aims to address the safety hazards exposed in the practical application of hidden door handles, such as insufficient strength, potential risks in control logic, power failure, hand-pinching, and difficulty in identification and operation.

Several high-level executives from automotive companies have also begun to publicly reflect on the design deficiencies of hidden door handles. He Xiaopeng, Chairman of XPeng Motors, once revealed, 'We are developing door handles that are easier to operate in extreme conditions, focusing on solving reliability issues in scenarios such as low-temperature freezing and electrical circuit failures.'

In fact, in recent years, unreasonable designs that have emerged or even become widespread in new-energy vehicles extend far beyond hidden door handles, including heavily criticized flat-bottomed steering wheels, screen-based gear shifting, touch-sensitive turn signal buttons, and cameras replacing rearview mirrors. The mandatory establishment of standards and regulations by competent authorities this time may be just the beginning.

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