In Germany nearly everyone can drive manual. Used to be that if you didn’t learn how to drive manual in driving school, you weren’t allowed to drive manual with your license.

I’m from Europe, I was taught on manual transmission and drove with it for 10 years. But I switched to automatic (actually not on purpose, I didn’t notice the car I was buying had it), and now vastly prefer it.

31,Sweden

Yes, and I prefer a manual car to an automatic. It keeps me a lot more dialed in while driving.

I can, not well, but I can. damn hill starts.

23, US. Yes, but I find them pointless for daily driver cars. Modern automatics are more fuel efficient and just make more sense because they’re much easier to operate and less annoying in stop and go traffic.

They’re great for off-roading and racing, but outside of those use cases automatics are just better.

My car has a manual transmission. I learned to drive on a manual transmission. I prefer it. When I drive a car with automatic transmission, I step on its nonexistent clutch.

Yes.

In Europe you basically have to be handicapped to not learn to drive manual. Most people get the manual driving license because it allows you to drive both, whereas the automatic one doesn’t.

Manual transmission was and often still is cheaper, often cheaper to repair, often more reliable, often uses less fuel, and in cheap and less powerful cars the combination is often better. Because there are so many manual cars here, including at rental places, it’s a no brainer to learn to drive manual.

This being said, that’s changing. Also, less and less young people are getting a driving license due to affordability and cars no longer being the status symbol they once were.

31, Germany, I can’t drive at all. City kid.

Yes. Europe. We pretty much all do. Automatics are becoming a bit more common in recent years, but 90% of cars here are still manual. Especially the old beat-up cars we learn to drive on are all manual. And if by chance you learned on an automatic, and pass your driver’s test on automatic, it says so on your driver’s licence and I think you’re not actually allowed to drive/rent manual cars.

Of course, 28, French. 99,99% of people here drive manual (or at least know how to).

Early 50s, USA - you bet! And I could also roll up a window, light a cigarette from the lighter, set an AM station by pulling the tuner knob and pushing the desired station button, and burn my ass on a hot vinyl bench seat! Good times!

I’m pretty sure North America is the only part of the world where automatic is the default.

I’m American and learned on a manual, which I drove for a decade and a half. But I’m one of the few people I know my age who can drive a stick.

Plenty of Boomers can drive stick though.

Yes, but only on motorcycles. That’s because there’s no such thing as an automatic motorcycle^{[1][2][3][4][5]}, so you have to learn manual if you want to ride one. Unfortunately this skill doesn’t transfer well to manual driving because on bikes you operate the clutch with your hand and the shift with your foot. I’m not terribly worried about that, though… I’ve literally never even been on the inside of a manual drive car before!

For context: I’m mid-20s from the American south.

Germany, 25, yup

Mid 30s Aussie living the the US. Yes I can drive a manual, yes I do drive a manual and yes I think it should be mandatory for 100% of learning drivers regardless of whether they plan to daily drive an automatic or manual when licensed.

The quality of driving here is considerably worse here than what I’ve experienced in Australia or Europe and I’m convinced requiring people to drive in a machine that forces them to consider the next ~100m leads to higher quality, more mindful drivers.