Ferrari Roma interior, tech and comfort
- Lots of new design features and tech
- Big screens dominate the dashboard
- Buttons swapped for touch-controls
The styling of the Roma’s interior divides the driver and passenger into two different pods – the latter even gets their own screen showing options like the speed and revs, audio, and car settings. Plus the trademark chequerplate in the footwell to brace themselves on.
While there are a few key references to previous Ferrari cabins, this new layout is quite a divergence from what has come before, but in a welcome way.
Infotainment and tech
The new infotainment suite (first seen in the SF90) includes a 16-inch curved driver’s display with three views – a minimalist one for sporty driving, a full map view for long trips, or a mixture of both with a characteristic big centre tacho. To the left of this is an 8.4-inch portrait touchscreen not entirely unlike the one in a McLaren.
Ferrari has always been good at giving the driver just the right amount of information and functions so you can concentrate entirely on the job of driving, but as time and technology has moved on, the button count has naturally increased.
As a car designer you can either strip this all away to leave a more focussed dashboard, or go wild with switches and dials to make it simple to use. The Roma attempts to do both.
That means loads of touch sensitive controls that are lit up when being used but invisible when not, to give you plenty of control over the car’s various functions without looking like an explosion in a button factory.
In fact the only physical cockpit controls are for the windows, gearbox, and launch control. Then on the wheel you get proper buttons for the lights, cruise control, wipers, and indicators. The gearbox is arranged to look a bit like an open-gated manual shift, which is a nice touch.
Even the engine start is a touch sensitive pad, as are those which you use to control the functions on the driver’s screen.
As such this leaves the wheel itself looking clean without sacrificing functionality. The only downside to this was a small amount of lag and lack of sensitivity in the touch controls, meaning they’re not as intuitive as we’d like.
The shift paddles are still massive and epic, though, so zero complaints there.
Comfort
- Very usable day-to-day
- Quiet on a long cruise
- Taller drivers found it cramped
In an area where the Roma obviously needs to perform well, the comfort levels of this corner-carving Ferrari sportscar are surprisingly high, all things considered.
Taller drivers on the Parkers team found the headroom a bit restricted, so that’s worth taking into account, plus the pedals have been offset slightly in the swap to right-hand drive. Neither of these add up to a particularly uncomfortable driving position, but can induce a bit of back or leg pain on a long drive. Those of a shorter stature found no problems at all.
The seats are quite hard but with adjustable bolsters you can get them into the right shape, and their firmness offers a good amount of support that means you don’t end up slouching.
In one of the more laid-back modes it’s easy to imagine taking the Roma on a long and taxing drive. The engine noise never really goes away but it’s muted enough on the motorway, and there’s less tyre and wind rush than expected, too. This isn’t ever going to be a Bentley Continental GT, but you won’t necessarily wince at the prospect of covering a longer journey in it.
Best of all the ride is comfy enough for all but the lumpiest of UK roads, and when you turn the Manettino dial up to the sportier modes, you’ve got the option of instantly slackening the suspension off by pressing it and activating Bumpy Road mode.
