For a piece of tech that literally watches your every blink, Subaru’s DriverFocus® Driver Monitoring System is getting something few driver-assist features ever achieve: real-world approval. According to a fresh survey from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, nearly nine out of ten Subaru owners with the system report they use it most or all the time when driving. More impressively, 70 percent of them say they want the same feature on their next vehicle.
That’s not a small sample, either—almost 3,500 owners participated, and the numbers paint a picture of an assistive technology that’s finding its footing in daily driving culture. When it first appeared in 2019, some drivers and enthusiasts rolled their eyes at the thought of a camera watching them adjust their mirrors or fiddle with playlists. Yet here we are, with nearly two-thirds of respondents crediting DriverFocus® with keeping them sharper behind the wheel and helping them avoid distractions that might otherwise lead to bent fenders—or worse.
The mechanics of it are straightforward but clever: a driver-facing camera and infrared sensors keep an eye on your eyes, tracking where your attention drifts. Look down at your navigation screen or daydream too long, and the system throws a flag—visual and audio alerts to snap you back to reality. If you’re showing signs of drowsiness, it can even lower your music volume so the warning cuts through. This sort of tech is no longer confined to futuristic concept cars; it’s available on everything from the Outback and Forester to the WRX, Legacy, Crosstrek, Ascent, and the all-electric Solterra.
Subaru has sold over 715,000 vehicles equipped with DriverFocus® since the system’s debut, often pairing it with its broader EyeSight® safety suite. Together, they form a safety net designed to curb one of the deadliest but least talked-about crash factors: inattention. In 2023 alone, IIHS notes that distraction or drowsiness played a role in nearly 4,000 fatal crashes—a figure the safety group says is almost certainly an undercount.
Jeff Walters, President and COO of Subaru of America, calls DriverFocus® a core part of Subaru’s mission to push active safety forward. “Safety is at the heart of every Subaru,” Walters said, “and we’re proud to offer technologies like DriverFocus® and EyeSight® that continue to raise the bar for the industry.”
Beyond keeping you alert, the system has a convenience side: it can recognize multiple drivers and automatically adjust seats, mirrors, climate settings, and other preferences when you slide behind the wheel. It’s a small detail that makes shared cars less of a chore, and in a household with multiple drivers, that alone might be worth its keep.
For driving enthusiasts—yes, even those who prefer a manual gearbox—the larger takeaway is that this isn’t an intrusive nanny so much as a co-driver keeping tabs when your attention wavers. In an era where cars are increasingly festooned with screens, touch sliders, and always-connected features, a subtle nudge to look up and drive might just be the thing that lets you enjoy your machine longer. Whether you’re carving a mountain pass or slogging through late-night traffic, avoiding that momentary lapse is still the ultimate performance upgrade.