You don’t have to buy the newest, most expensive car to get all of the cool safety features you are looking for. If you’re like me and prefer buying used cars, you may think that safety features aren’t that helpful, because that’s what I thought until I bought a Cayenne with all of the bells and whistles. While I would casually roll my eyes as my friends bragged about all of the safety features their new cars had, I didn’t realize how much of a difference this has made for car safety. In fact, before having a car with these features, I thought they were kind of gimmicky, but since using them, I feel more confident on the roads than ever.

Changing lanes is safer than ever

Between driving large SUVs and small sports cars, I’m used to having a pretty big range in visibility, but no matter what, I’m still always turning my head to figure out where other cars are on the road. Regardless of what car you drive, you have a blind spot that makes it hard to see what cars are next to us. This can be dangerous when changing lanes, but blind-spot assistance changes the game.

With blind spot assistance I can change lanes confidently even in the heaviest of traffic, or avoid a major accident. Blind spot assistance notifies drivers that there is a vehicle in their blindspot, and it can do this in several different ways. In my car, and many others, a non-distracting light appears inside the side-view mirrors to indicate the detection of a car. As the car gets closer the light gets brighter, and if I turn my turn signal on while a car is detected in my blindspot then the light flashes frantically.

Driving in traffic is less stressful

On our daily drive, we get stuck in traffic, around other cars, and around reckless and agitated drivers. It’s inevitable, and after sitting in stop-and-go traffic for what seems like an eternity. While we sometimes get annoyed, it’s just as easy to get distracted, and that’s why these safety features are changing the game, and make being stuck in traffic a little less stressful.

On more than a few occasions, I’ve been agitated with my automatic emergency braking, but I have to admit it’s probably saved me from a few fender benders as well. No matter how much you are paying attention to the road ahead, you likely can’t react as quickly as your car’s computer. This is what makes automatic transmissions typically faster than manuals — don’t come for me, it’s true even if we don’t like it.

These safety features might seem underrated, but once you’ve gotten used to having them they are hard to live without. These seemingly simple additions to our cars can save us from an accident, and that makes a huge difference. Don’t believe me? You’ll have to try them for yourself.