I think it’s pretty clear that we are currently living in an age of explosive taillight-related creativity and exploration. Taillight-focused clubs, bars, gyms, and bathhouses have never been more popular, and a lot of that has to do with this renaissance of taillight design. New technologies like LEDs and more advanced plastic-molding techniques and embedded taillight computers have all pushed the boundaries of what was once believed possible for taillights, and we’re starting to see that more and more.
But for what purpose? Are we advancing the taillightic arts, or are we simply making things needlessly complicated and ridiculous? It’s not easy to tell, when you’re in the middle of it all, and the best we can do, I think, is try and remember to take moments to pause and evaluate things and really think: are these taillights making my life better? After all, that’s all we can really ask of a taillight, right?
I started thinking about this when I saw this tweet:
What, and I can’t stress this enough, the actual fuck is this bullshit ?
???? pic.twitter.com/0dUjRTAbpw— Paul aka The “Yorkshire legend” (@YorkyLegend) February 9, 2026
Hmm. What are we looking at here? That’s a Leapmotor C10 – an (optionally) range-extended EV crossover from China that seems to be selling in Europe for very appealing prices. It’s not a bad-looking vehicle, a little generic maybe, but certainly looks up-to-date, and the lighting design is a big part of that.
In fact, the taillights on these seem to be award-winning:
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But that’s not what that fellow with the trousers-mouth was talking about in that tweet above. He was noticing that the Leapmotor C10’s wide, full-width taillight was moving back and forth as the car was sitting there, something that, of course, has been noticed by many others:
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That gentleman didn’t seem to react with the same sort of wrath and rage that Paul, the man who tweeted and the, I’m told, Yorkshire Legend, did. This guy seemed delighted, though I was surprised he didn’t make a direct reference to what I think most people think of when they see this sort of bouncing-red-eye thing, which is a Cylon Centurion from Battlestar Galactica:
Well, either that or the front of KITT, the sentient Trans Am from the ’80s TV series Knight Rider:
This guy makes the Knight Rider connection right away, of course:
Now, my big question here is one of context. Animated taillights are not new; they’ve been around, in mechanical, cam-operated form, since the 1960s, where they were used as more exciting turn indicators on cars like the Ford Thunderbird:
There are still a number of cars that use these sorts of animated turn signals today, and I’m a big fan of them. Indicating turns feels like a good context for animated taillights, as the direction of travel of the lights reinforces the basic message of the turn signal, which is a way to communicate an intent to turn in a given direction.
But when is the Leapmotor C10 showing this animation? In that initial tweet, I think the car is parked? It has a ladder on the roof and seems to be being used as a sort of work vehicle, and I think it’s on the shoulder? But I may be wrong; there are cars in front of and behind it, and the brakes are clearly on. So is it just in traffic? Does that animation just appear while driving?
Comprehensive reviews of the car’s lighting system don’t exactly make it clear; It does seem it’s not for turn signals – which are amber. It may be part of the brake light system, at least for the initial application of the brakes, as you can see in this video:
Maybe that would help draw attention to the car when braking? Or is it just more confusing? And it does animate when the car is parked, too. I tried looking through the C10’s owner’s manual to try and find the contexts and use cases for the animated taillight, but I couldn’t find anything specific, though I did find this evocative illustration that I’d like to think is used in a section titled How Not To Park:
So, I think the question is: how do we feel about animated taillights, overall? I think that as we move forward, animated taillights can definitely become a valued part of the Grand Taillight Vocabulary, but we need some parameters to follow:
- When stationary, go nuts. Animations when parked are fine, provided they don’t go on too long and become distracting. But for greeting, locking, whatever, I think these can be pretty open.
- When in motion, the animation must be used to convey a specific goal or action. For example, turn indication can be animated, provided it animates in a way that emphasizes the direction of the intended turn. Animations for braking should be a way to escalate beyond the normal brake lamp, and the animation should not favor one direction or the other. The goal should be to capture attention.
- Animations should not be used for normal running-light use, as that adds unnecessary visual noise that detracts from the impact of purpose-oriented animations and the overall ability of the taillight to communicate.
How’s that sound? I don’t want to stifle taillight creativity, but we have to remember that fundamentally, taillights are communication tools, and we don’t want to make them worse. I think these three rules give plenty of room for animated taillight expression while preserving the basic taillight functionality.
I’ll see how these ideas fly at my local taillight bar soon. It’ll probably start a small riot, but that’s just how we live in The Red Glow, am I right?
Top graphic image: Universal Pictures
Jason… I used to have a favorite old 12”action figure when I was a kid in the early 80’s and I’ve never known or remembered what character it even was, but I remember how cool I thought it was.
It was this. The Cylon. I just went down an eBay rabbit hole to verify.
The eye would light up and you could move it back and forth with a lever on the back of its head.
What a trip. Thanks for helping me to solve that mystery!
As always, keep up the entertaining work.
Even when stationary, no. You don’t want someone confusing it for a turn signal because in their head, animation = signal.
*especially* when stationary.
Seems like a good way to get read ended because someone thought you were turning
Torchinsky’ Three Laws of Taillights.
Much as I would be amused by a 16 bit cat dancing between the taillights or other animations, that sounds like the sort of thing that should just be active when the vehicle is parked, not out driving on the roads.
Jason’s 3 guidelines with _Electrified05ViggenFeverDream’s modification of “The goal should be to enhance safety by capturing attention” make sense.
Must admit that Canopysaurus’s idea of a Forever Amber Lager craft brew sounds tasty! Think of the fun that could be had by coordinating between a home brewer and an Autopian meetup!
Animated light (tail lights and front driving lights also, they have those) rule in China is: While the car is parked or motionless they an animate with hearts, puppies, waving etc. But once the car starts to move it must function as a normal light.
Single bar tail lights without a divider remind me of a couple of bikes I could have easily run over in a construction zone.
Twin headlamps blinding me, on a pitch black road looked like full width car headlamps at some distance.
Instead they were side by side and the bikes were twenty feet away on a collision course.
Typical tail light journalism from Torch, full led bright.
Taillight bar , probably meh.
Taillight disco on the other hand, will express some enthusiasm.
I think the Leap’s version is too fast. I don’t really want to be driving behind something and have a red light catch my eye for a moment then disappear making me try to figure out what I’d seen. I’d be happier if it was slow (and also a thicker line).
I am not a fan of ongoing crap even at a full stop, at least not beyond one second. I may be stopped behind you at a light, but I still need to maintain awareness of pedestrians. And I don’t want the added mental overhead of actively trying to ignore your taillights, it’s not conducive to safety.
I like a good light show in the parking lot, but the truck-nuts knuckleheads where I live install aftermarket animated bars just under their tailgates and drive around with them on. This is super distracting. But these are the same guys that run always-on high intensity white LED bars at sedan driver height on the front bumper, so I reckon they’re not really concerned.
Jason’s rules are a good baseline.
What I find worse are those stupid animated cartoon eyeball lights people are putting behind their windshields and drive with them on such a dumb stupid distraction.
I was recently stopped behind a Cadillac crossover. I’m not sure which one, because I don’t care. Maybe it was an EV. It had TWO animated rear turn signals per side, one horizontal and one vertical. “Standard of the World”, my eye!
I was thinking about Jason at a stoplight here in Beijing on Monday. One car had an amazing animation display going on. I’ve seen that model with hearts or Chinese lanterns as brake light displays but this one had a (16bit? Not sure if the pixel count) playful cat jumping from one taillight to the other. I grabbed for my phone to record but by the time I was ready the light had turned green. Safety first! Also as the car started moving the tail lights returned to “normal”.
The taillight game here is China is on a whole other level and I’m glad to be in the thick of it.
I sit at my apartment window in the evenings looking down at the myriad of styles, trying to figure out which brand I’m looking at.
When I young, riding with my parents at night, I’d entertain myself by trying to guess the make and model of the cars in front of us by looking at the taillights.
We did that with all the lighting configurations…so we’d know if a cop was following us. The Plymouths of the time were easy to spot.
Not rare for marker lights to be located in different places, on switches.
Police or other.
There’s an unmarked highway patrol car here with blue LEDs embedded in much of the body surface.
True. But this was in the ’70’s and ’80’s. Things were simpler then.
The practice was known in the 30s.
Any police investigator should be aware of it, but more common for private investigation.
We had county cars in the 70s that were driven and highly modified by specific cops, capable of outrageous speed.
Those could have lighting mods, though I am personally unaware of any.
There was an undercover mustang here around 2000 that tried to bait people into racing them, for arrests.
I think that car tried to start something with my Ford, but I’m not street racing at triple digit speeds with anyone.
It was the 80’s and 90’s for me, but in rural Michigan there weren’t a huge variation of cars. Mostly trucks and K-cars are what I remember most.
iM L7 according to a quick google.
Can y’all tell what this is??? : r/namethatcar
That’s an adorable animation (I write with a cat sleeping on my lap) but that’s not the car I saw. It was more of an 3 row cross over type and the animation was on the sides, not in the middle like that. Surprised I haven’t noticed that one before. The car I’ve seen but never that particular animation. Nice detective work nonetheless!
I’ve got you. It’s whatever an AITO 8 is. (Below is a youtube link)
Kot w lampie w aucie od Huawei – co na to diagnosta? AITO 8 #samochodyelektryczne #huawei #aitom9
You are right. I just saw one parked in front of my apartment today. AITO M9 was the model I think.
I agree with your proposed rules and with the modification suggested by _Electrified05ViggenFeverDream. Animation gratia Animation (apologies to MGM) should be banned when the car is in motion. Any animation while the car is moving or temporarily stopped should have a specific and clearly understood message for the other motorists around you and that message needs to do something to increase safety. For example: the brake lights on some cars that indicate how much force you are applying to the pedal.
I’ve long been a proponent of the following:
Of course, this should all be subject to research-based testing to ensure that there are no unintended consequences, such as increasing the incidence of road rage.
I think my comments on other people’s driving are best left to the interior of my vehicle, for the safety and longevity of all concerned.
Agreed. When I spout off about some other driver’s idiocy, I’m either cussing up a stream of paint-blistering invectives or I’m so mad I temporarily channel the spirit of the dad in A Christmas Story. Broadcasting that outside will only provoke either a road rage incident or the arrival of paramedics seeking to treat my cerebrovascular stroke.
In general these are good rules, but I do think we need to modify Part 2, specifically the last sentence: “The goal should be to capture attention.”
The goal should be to enhance safety by capturing attention. Simply being attention-grabbing doesn’t imply it’s actually safer – one example is the increasing brightness of ambulances/fire trucks/police vehicles may actually be detrimental to safety while easily being far more attention grabbing. Another example might be cycling, where a solid front or rear light is counterintuitively often safer as it allows drivers or others to better judge distance, even if a flashing light draws attention.
Research should be done on this, and in the meantime, given the way I’ve seen the aftermarket implement additional animations in lights that are easily more distracting and sometimes sketchy feeling in rainy conditions, etc. (making it hard to judge distance or being hard to adjust eyes to at night), I’m tempted to lean more conservative on this.
Strobes are banned in Germany, and correctly.
It’s Tailights Tuesday at Torch’s Tailights Taproom! Today’s special is Asian Animation. And don’t forget our Forever Amber Lager craft brewed on site in our custom Volksvats. Come on in and get lit.
I’ve seen a few aftermarket versions on the road already and they’re quite distracting. I’m down for no animations when in motion; catching a glimpse out of the corner of your eye makes you mistakenly think someone’s hitting their brakes, and if you tend to view traffic as a system, this isn’t good.
This is frakked up. I don’t want no stinkin’ toaster lights.
The automakers likely wouldn’t even pony up a few bucks to hire Katee Sackhoff or Dirk Benedict as spokespersons.
the fact that no one can explain what it represents means it’s a failure. it’s not consistent. Sometimes the strobe is on when in Park or stopped for a period of time, other times when the driver opens the door or maybe when putting in Drive. or is it going to the beat of the music playing?
keep the animations for startup/shutdown and turn signals
Hmm, guess I’m used to more of a challenging round of Spot the Looney.
This scanner taillight animation is popular in China. I see it all the time browsing AliExpress for lolz on formerly cheap car parts.
Did the Swallow Side Car have taillights? I’d love to see a SwallowTailLight.
https://handh.blob.core.windows.net/stock/20059041-52.jpg?v=63832018744207
Sorry, but I’m never stepping foot in a Taillight-focused Bathhouse. NEVER
Don’t drop the soap.
you must be a headlight person
I hear it’s free for anyone driving a Probe.
“I’m gonna high mount your stop light.”
Seriously though, if I did go to a taillight bathouse, it would really signal a different direction for me.
Come on guys those were the old bathhouses. They’ve really cleaned them up since! I’ve hardly ever, basically never had a bad experience at my favorite, The Fogged Over Aftermarket Altezza. ( I’ve told them the name is terrible but they won’t budge one word.)