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Keep It Simple, Stupid: How Well Does the 2019 Audi Q3 Single-Screen Setup Work?

audi q3 2019 03 angle  exterior  front  orange jpg 2019 Audi Q3 | Cars.com photo by Mike Hanley

A number of changes greeted the stateside rollout of the redesigned 2019 Audi Q3. The German marque’s second-generation subcompact SUV grows in overall length and width on the outside and passenger and cargo room have increased inside. Other changes include a new digital instrument cluster, and a 1-mpg decrease in fuel economy is offset by the recommended use of regular gas over premium.

None of this is particularly controversial or even interesting in such a crowded class, but one thing that does stand out is the Q3’s center touchscreen. Paired with easy-to-use air conditioning controls below the screen, the new Q3’s dashboard interface is relatively simple — and a defining element of the SUV.

Related: 2019 Audi Q3 First Drive: Elevating Entry-Level Luxury

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Does a simple setup entail a simple time? Not necessarily. Read on for more details regarding the new Q3’s center screen — and whether this “defining” element is a good thing or a bad one.

How It’s Different

Typically, a luxury brand’s strategy involves coaxing you into its lineup with a smaller, less expensive offering that mimics the performance and amenities of its larger, pricier products. Hitherto, the Q3 was no different: Like Audi’s larger Q5 and Q7 SUVs, the first-generation Q3 had a multimedia screen atop the dashboard. But Audi is now taking the Q3’s larger siblings in a dual-touchscreen direction that ditches the brand’s former knob-based control system. You can see the new approach in the updated Q7 and all-electric e-tron.

Not so here. The 2019 Q3 instead consolidates infotainment and navigation options on a single 10.1-inch touchscreen that’s on the dash between vents above and the climate controls below. (Q3s without navigation get a smaller 8.8-inch touchscreen.) Below the climate controls, meanwhile, is the push-button start and a physical volume and tuning knob for the multimedia system. A row of buttons for performance and safety features completes the center control panel.

audi q3 2019 09 cockpit shot  interior jpg 2019 Audi Q3 | Cars.com photo by Mike Hanley

What’s to Like?

The short answer: There are more buttons, and if nothing else, we stand for buttons around here. The second, lower touchscreen in the new Q7 and e-tron promise plenty of dust- and smudge-induced frustration. With physical buttons and knobs for the Q3’s climate controls, Audi has made the interface clear and intuitive.

The screen’s menu layout is also generally easy to read. In some multimedia systems, the font choice can be aesthetically pleasing but impractical in day-to-day driving. Audi’s all-caps approach on the menu homepage is especially helpful in that regard.

What Needs Improvement

While it’s good that the Q3 has only one center screen, there’s still room to simplify how it functions. There are a ton of options and controls, but many of the most crucial are buried several menu pages deep. For example, a Scan Smart Favorites button for audio is readily available after hitting the Settings icon on the tuning menu, but digging through pages just to find critical Pre Sense safety options is like parsing out “Ducks, Newburyport”: By the time you figure out what’s happening, you barely know where you are or how you got there. That much time with your eyes away from the road isn’t just obnoxious, it’s dangerous.

audi q3 2019 16 center stack display  front row  interior jpg 2019 Audi Q3 | Cars.com photo by Mike Hanley

Menu behavior is also subtly inconsistent. If you’re listening to a station and hit the Settings icon, then hit the back arrow, it takes you back two menus instead of one. If you hit the More button, meanwhile, up comes a set of icons and you can just X out of it.

The screen is also too slow both swiping and tapping, and it didn’t always register our taps, either. Additionally, we encountered some trouble with wireless Apple CarPlay not appearing. Though the system communicated with an iPhone 8 Plus, CarPlay never came up. Maybe we did something wrong, but if so, it should have said what.

The most glaringly illogical ergonomic decision, however, is summed up by Executive Editor Joe Wiesenfelder: “Why does the volume multi-knob have to be on the passenger side?” The knob’s placement on the far right of the console looks like an afterthought; divorced from the screen it controls, the knob seems like an irrelevant outlier at best and a nuisance for a driver who actually wants to use it at worst. It also doesn’t need to do as much as it does; it was too easy to accidentally change the station by clicking to the left or right when adjusting the volume. Move it closer to the driver and at least even with the climate controls, if not above them. As an alternative, there are redundant steering wheel controls.

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Was It Worth the Risk?

The single-screen setup won’t alienate longtime Audi users and also shouldn’t detract shoppers new to the brand. Its ease of use is offset somewhat by overly complex menu pages and minor (but not uncommon) tech issues. On a whole, the single multimedia screen is a promising step to the side with room for improvement, neither a massive leap forward nor a regrettable step back.

audi q3 2019 11 front row  interior  steering wheel jpg 2019 Audi Q3 | Cars.com photo by Mike Hanley

Cars.com’s Editorial department is your source for automotive news and reviews. In line with Cars.com’s long-standing ethics policy, editors and reviewers don’t accept gifts or free trips from automakers. The Editorial department is independent of Cars.com’s advertising, sales and sponsored content departments.

Patrick Masterson
Patrick Masterson is Chief Copy Editor at Cars.com. He joined the automotive industry in 2016 as a lifelong car enthusiast and has achieved the rare feat of applying his journalism and media arts degrees as a writer, fact-checker, proofreader and editor his entire professional career. He lives by an in-house version of the AP stylebook and knows where semicolons can go.
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