Tesla’s New ‘Driver Drowsiness Warning’ Detects Yawns and Closed Eyes

Tesla’s new feature is geared towards improving road safety by making sure drivers don’t fall asleep at the wheel. The tool is called Driver Drowsiness Warning and was initially spotted in the automaker’s software earlier this year by hackers.

Driver Drowsiness Warning is built to look for certain facial characteristics that suggest tiredness, such as yawns and extended periods of blinking, using the camera in the vehicle’s interior cabin. If the tool determines the driver is asleep or at risk of falling asleep, an alert will pop up on the touchscreen monitor and an alarm will sound.

Tesla says the alert will go away “once the patterns of drowsiness have been removed” or once the driver slows down.

The feature only goes into effect when the car is faster than 40 miles per hour (65 km/h) and has been driving for over ten minutes. It also can only be triggered when Autopilot is turned off.

Users can opt to turn off Driver Drowsiness Warning, though the system will automatically enable the feature at the beginning of each drive.

In other automotive news, Nissan shared a first look at its luxury EV van concept: the”Hyper Tourer.”