Manual Corvette Numbers Drop 10 Percent in 2016

Well, it looks like the manual Corvette craze might be losing steam.

According to a report by Road & Track, only 23 percent of all ‘Vettes made in 2016 are equipped with a manual transmissions.

That’s a total of only 9,249 C7s out of the 40,689 built for the year, which is down 10 percent compared to 2015 manual Corvette productions. But it really shouldn’t come as a surprise, given the overall trend in the industry, where the percentage of manual transmissions in all new cars sits between 5 and 7 percent.

Then there’s the fact that this age of high-tech engineering is yielding some pretty impressive automatic transmissions.

That said, there’s still a glimmering light of hope for diehard Corvette performance buffs, which indicates that the manual Corvette is far from dead. Of all the Corvette variants in 2016, the most popular manual model was the Z06 coupe with a total of 3,556 models built. And the general consensus is that the new Grand Sport will also drive more manual models, which I’m sure is welcome news for many Corvette purists.

Chime in with your thoughts on the forum. >>

Via [Road & Track]