China will ban hidden door handles on all cars sold in the country, becoming the first country in the world to target the feature. The feature was popularized by Tesla, but has long raised concerns about safety risks.
Hidden door handles are a feature of Tesla cars, and the ban comes as Elon Musk’s company reports declining global sales and struggling with intense competition in China, its second-largest market.
On the outside, the electric door handle is placed flush with the side of the door, requiring the user to press down on the handle to release the lever. The rider presses a button from inside to open the door again.
Tesla is the company best known for this type of door handle, but other Chinese electric car makers have adopted similar designs, including some models from giants Xiaomi and Aion.
The new policy, which does not name any particular company, requires all cars sold in China to have mechanical release features on both the interior and exterior door handles.
In a statement released on Monday, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology cited “the inconvenience of operating external door handles and their failure to open after an accident” and set out specific requirements for how these handles should function.
The outside door handle must have enough hand space to operate the mechanical release from any angle. It also said interior handles must be “clearly visible from the corresponding occupant position.”
The new rules will take effect on January 1, 2027.
CNN has reached out to Xiaomi, Aion, and Tesla for comment on the new regulations.
This feature has previously been the subject of intense scrutiny in China and elsewhere.
Last September, Tesla announced that it was considering redesigning the way it opens car doors in emergencies after several incidents where rescuers were unable to open the doors of burning vehicles and passengers were reportedly killed or seriously injured.
According to an investigation by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, other Tesla owners have also reported having to break their car windows themselves after seating their children in the car, leaving them unable to get back in the car.
A Bloomberg investigation found that there have been 140 incidents in which people were trapped in Teslas due to problems with the door handles, several of which resulted in severe injuries.
Tesla cars are equipped with manual door releases inside the car in case the regular handle fails.
A similar problem is occurring in China. Xiaomi’s stock price fell last year after a fatal accident involving one of its sedans killed three people in March. Local media and government-affiliated news outlets reported that there were problems unlocking the car’s doors.
Since then, the Chinese government has tightened rules regarding the marketing and testing of driver assistance features.
