Did you know Volvo was the first car to incorporate seat belts? Advanced safety features come standard in many cars now. Some are even required by law. One way to make a car safer is to choose its exterior color wisely.
When looking to purchase a new vehicle, do you ask how safe its color is? This seems like a far out question but, as of late, studies are circulating about what happens when vehicle safety and car color collide. From a scientific standpoint, there is not enough research to back up these studies yet. Regardless, all research points to silver as the safest car color.
Car Color Safety Studies
- Daimer Benz found that lighter car colors are more conspicuous than darker shades. This has to do with the way light colors draw attention from other drivers when on the road.
- The University of California claims color influences how well individuals can judge distance between vehicles. Bright cars seem closer while dark colors appear further away. Light car colors are most accurate.
- The University of Auckland in New Zealand made a connection between how the color of cars correlate with “rates of injury causing accidents.”
Silver is the Safest Car Color
Silver cars rank highest on the list of safe car colors, but light color cars are safer than darker vehicles. Lighter colors reflect more light than darker colors do. This means white and silver cars are easier to see from farther distances. They are more visible on the road.
The Role of Color Psychology
Did you know other vehicle colors on the road may impact how you react while driving?
Because colors can encourage a wide range of emotions and spur on energies that range between aggressive or calm, it makes sense that colors of surrounding cars may enhance our moods to some degree.
While no one is certain if car color is the newest safety feature, studies show darker color cars are involved in more accidents that lighter color cars. From this research, we can draw the conclusion that it is easier to notice light cars than darker ones.
How important is vehicle safety to you? Would you choose to drive a white or silver car based on this information? What is your favorite car color and why?
Read more Segmation blog posts about Car Colors:
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The Color Popularity Contest: Cars, Weddings, Sports Teams, and Much More
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Outside The Lines 
This is quite interesting to me. I will be buying a car in the next year, and the one color I know I won’t choose is silver. I think they are really hard to see on the road — they blend in with everything, as if they are wearing some sort of vehicular camouflage. If the driver doesn’t turn on the headlights when it rains? They are invisible. And if it is in the parking lot, I cannot find mine from amongst the 12 bazillion other silver cars. I had one once. Never again. Nope. Never.
I never thought about this but it makes a lot of sense.