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When inserting a car key into the ignition, I am able to do so quickly and easily, without having to carefully line up the key with the keyhole. I can do this despite the fact that the keyhole is usually behind the wheel, in a spot I can't even see. Most car ignitions seem to have a "funnel" around the keyhole to make things easier, guiding the key into the ignition.

House keys, on the other hand, are not quite so user-friendly, and require careful alignment of the key and keyhole. More than one attempt might be required if the key misses the keyhole by even a little bit. Attempting to insert the key even while looking at the lock isn't guaranteed to succeed on the first try, and it becomes downright difficult if it's dark out or the lock is otherwise obscured.

Is there a reason why these are designed differently? I'm not asking about cut-edge vs. grooved keys, or electronic chip access, but rather the actual process of inserting the key into the keyhole.

So far, comments have discussed the idea that since houses are a bigger investment, there's less competitive pressure to improve such a small component of the whole. Still, it seems to me that locks can be easily replaced, and that a lock with a similar "easy-insert" design wouldn't be particularly more expensive than a regular door lock. However, I have never seen a door lock of this type, which strikes me as odd. It seems to be better design, and not any more expensive, which is why I'm looking for a more compelling reason for its nonexistence.

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  • I'd be tempted to comment that cars are designed by designers who are trained in design. Unless an architect is involved, houses are generally just 'built'.
    – PhillipW
    Sep 5, 2017 at 17:06
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    @PhillipW I disagree. To say that "houses are generally just 'built'" seems to imply a complete lack of planning and design. I'd say that's pretty inaccurate.
    – maxathousand
    Sep 5, 2017 at 17:35
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    But, blind people often live in places with keyholes. And, sometimes it is dark. The issue comes down to why the car's UI was improved and the home's was not. As I said, it is because people buy cars based mostly on convenience (why else would you even own one?) and homes based mostly on location (with location being second, and location third), so convenience is not high on the list of selling points for something people rarely purchase anyhow. Cars were improved because it affected salability, houses were not because it didn't.
    – user67695
    Sep 5, 2017 at 18:21
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    We could probably list all sorts of theories...but few, if any, would be related to UX Design. As with all of these questions, the issue is likely history, habit, cost, etc.
    – DA01
    Sep 5, 2017 at 19:30
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    The simplest theory would be that you look at a door lock. You often (historically) couldn't easily see the car lock. The car needed to be even easier because of that.
    – DA01
    Sep 5, 2017 at 19:31

5 Answers 5

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Why are car keys and house keys different?

TL;DR - Functionality, space, size and technology

First of all, the question you have asked here is has very limited scope because:

  • You have only considered old lock-key system for the house keys
  • The problem of alignment isn't really with the actual lock, it's with the covering outside of it.
  • Not all lock-key systems are the same.

House lock-key mechanism

Latch lock view

Notice the hole in the center for the key? Once the key enters this, there's a gap that the key needs to travel before actually entering the part of the lock. The issue with alignment is because of this gap.

But this is only ONE of many different types of locks

The traditional one's with a ridge on the side have alignment issues as the keyhole has a moving protruding ridge. Can't say why but may have been a way of making it difficult for a burglar to break it (yeah, yeah, very bad UX I agree but the technology is also pretty old)

The new locks however (like the one shown below) do not have such issues and can be used without having to look at it

New age lock-key

Car key mechanism

I am not completely sure about car keys back in the day but from what I could find out, they used to be similar to house keys.

With passing of time, cars became fancy, added ton of electrical accessories and started using newer technology for ignition. All of this led to less space for everything which led to making everything smaller.

Car ignition diagram More detailed image on ignition

You have to understand that each key IS UNIQUE but there's a lot more to this keyhole than just unlock the car. The spring mechanism REQUIRES the key to be tightly/closely fitted into the slot.

There's more to all of this than what I have said but this is the bare-bone answer to the question

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  • As an example, I recently rekeyed a 2001 Honda Civic, it had 4-5 tumbers, I specifically forget but let's be optimistic and say its 5. There are less than 10 tumbler variations for that lock. This means there is a max of ~10^5 (100,000) lock combinations (depending on implementation). I can't find cited Civic sales numbers for that year but most of them indicate ~200,000. So the keys are not unique. House keys are even less unique, most lock designs only support around 1000 key possibilities (which is why bump keys are so effective).
    – finleyarcher
    Mar 9, 2018 at 20:14
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While I don't have any scholar study on this, but I believe that there are a number of reasons that converge to form a psychological matrix.

Technically speaking, there are no real reasons not to use the same type of keys for cars and houses. As a matter of fact, old cars used "house like" keys.

As for the reasons that converge to build this psychological matrix... well, you mention one of them:

Car: Accesibility and ease of use

When you get into your car, you expect to simply use your key and the engine will start. You can't go under the wheel to see where to place your key, so it has to work in any position you insert the key (warning: there are exceptions). Security is not provided by the physical aspects of the key, but the electronic parts. Moreover, locks and keyholes only "read" one side of the key, so even in older cars with 2-sided keys, the "teeth" are identical to allow for this behavior.

enter image description hereenter image description here

House: Security concerns

Now, when we think in our home, most users will ignore technology advances and will prefer the old analogical security they have known for centuries. Physical security is tangible and less prone to be "hacked". So, a key that is easy to put in any way and still work will scare more users! Keys have to be complex, with many teeth, double sided, magnetized and anything you could think of. Ease of use is not a concern, only that your lock is unbreakable. This is why physical solutions outperform electronic solutions in user's preferences. For every electronic solution (electronic keys, proximity keys, trasponders, etc) there must be like 10000x physical keys. Think about this: on most people's mind, a big man is stronger and more reliable than (say) Alan Turing. So users will choose the big man over the scientist 99 of 100 times when it comes to security. Even though Alan Turing was a big part of winning a war!

Simply put: users want to see, FEEL the strength, the physical sensation of security, they won't care much for virtual security.

See images of home security setups and the barriers users think necessary to protect their homes:

Classic:

enter image description here

Modern: (sorry, wanted to add more images to illustrate this but can't upload anything, will try later)

Costs/Difficulty relationship

Finally, when it comes to less sophisticated keys and locks, most people will be able to install a decent lock on any door without the need for great knowledge on the subject, just a screwdriver and not much more than that. You'll do this for (say) a room inside your house, or something not very important. So you have this cost relationship: 

room (small cost) --> cheap key, easy to use

car (higher cost) --> more expensive key, easy to use

house (highest cost) --> generally speaking, most expensive keys that are harder to use and install, complicated physical systems

In short

Car keys are meant for fast and easy use. House keys are meant for security.

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  • "Security is not provided by the physical aspects of the key, but the electronic parts." What about cars without electronic locks, where you need to use the key on the door to unlock it?
    – Alan
    Sep 5, 2017 at 20:37
  • the OP is talking about the ignition key. Security in a car hardly depends on a key, car thieves will rarely use the keylock (if ever). Instead they will just use different methods, going from more sophisticated ones to just a stone in the glass. So as you can see, a key won't make much of a difference. However, getting inside a car doesn't mean necessarily that the car will be stolen, the user just broke in
    – Devin
    Sep 5, 2017 at 20:42
  • The key to turn on the engine is the same as to unlock the door. While the OP is asking about the ignition, almost all aspects of the question apply to the door as well. This use case is similar to that of a house: a tool to allow access.
    – Alan
    Sep 5, 2017 at 20:46
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    Many car keys are now of a much more secure (uncopyable, unpickable) design than house keys. This is because cars tend to get stolen a lot more often than houses do. And, it is easier to hide a car or reuse the parts after you have stolen it than it is with a house. This is true despite major parts of the car having the VIN inscribed, whereas parts of a house do not have the HIN inscribed (because there is not a HIN, because houses are not mass-produced in factories). Hmm. Now I don't see how security really has anything to do with the issue. Do you? Money, though, is usually the answer.
    – user67695
    Oct 6, 2017 at 16:54
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    @Boat the keyhole was placed on the side of the steering column to physically lock it so that it could not be turned... Lo, these many years ago. So, even if the engine could be started by hot-wiring, the wheel still would not turn. Thus, the keyhole had to be in a place the was inconvenient to see. Once users thought that is where it belonged, it had to stay there, even if better options evolved. For a long time, the fuel filler opening was smack in the middle, hidden by the license plate. But, that was dangerous in a crash, so it had to be relocated. Trunk keyholes also had to be moved.
    – user67695
    Mar 9, 2018 at 16:35
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The keys to modern house locks can only be inserted in one orientation. Turning the key often moves more than just the main locking latch, e.g. it may also move additional locking bolts above, below or around the door. Also, many house keys rotate 180 degrees or more to unlock the door. There are more valuables in your house than in your car so security is higher, plus they provide safety to you and your family while you are sleeping.

A car's ignition lock is typically on the side of the steering column where it is not very easy to see when seated in the car, and this is why the ignition key is designed to be inserted in any orientation, i.e. if you cannot see the lock then make it simple to insert the key without checking you have key oriented like a house lock. Also, to start the ignition, the key only needs to turn a few degrees (aprox 30-45 degrees) to make the electrical connections that fire up the engine. Most criminals can break into your car easily and can defeat most car security feature.

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  • House locks are less secure that automotive locks.
    – finleyarcher
    Mar 9, 2018 at 20:15
  • Why do you think that is true?
    – SteveD
    Mar 12, 2018 at 9:47
  • Looking at locks in the same range of cost. House locks have less tumblers, don't use double sided tumblers, and rarely use designs to make the lock pick resistant. You can see my answer for more of the basis of my statement. If you want to learn first-hand, you can order a lockpicking kit off of the internet for $5-30 and practice picking your own house/apartment lock and have it figured out within the hour. Whereas your average lockpicking 'professional' lacks the skill or tools to pick a car lock. (this only applies to modern car locks 2000+)
    – finleyarcher
    Mar 12, 2018 at 20:36
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There is so much wrong lock-related information in a lot of these answers. You're asking a security question from a UX perspective in UX and got UX answers.

House locks are designed to be operated in a well lit area with clear view of the lock. Car locks are designed to be operated poorly lit areas with possibly obstructed views of the lock/ignition.

House

House key lock designs stopped evolving when it became easier to break a window then break a lock. That's why the modern $15 house key lock looks the same as a century ago. Now the driver for house lock innovation is convenience, so we see pin pad locks and other keyless solutions. This raises the difficulty to compromise the lock (for now), but no one is breaking into a house using a compromised lock anyways. A brick through a window is faster and cheaper.

This is why when you goto a home improvement store you see x number of manufacturers selling y number of different finishes of the same lock. People are shopping on price, color, and convenience, not security or ease of use.

Automotive

On the automotive side, once manufacturing made it effectively the same price for automotive companies to deploy locks with two sets of tumblers (it's not really two sets, but a clever use of a single tumber) it made it incredibly difficult for your average locksmith to pick a car lock. This meant that your average low skill thief could no longer gain entrance into the car without breaking the window. So what did thieves do, they started using screwdrivers and custom-sized flat blades, hammer them into the locks, and break the locks. So then automotive manufacturers added alarms and electronics. In the early days, the alarms and sensors and key interfaces for controlling them were obnoxious and poorly implemented. It became a selling point to have car security you didn't have to see.

Selling What Sells

This is all background info to get back to answering your question. Car key/lock combos are designed around ease-of-use because it's a selling point, automotive consumers want easy to use security they don't have to look at. Whereas your average homeowner cares more about having a matching finish because they get their piece of mind security from a one-sided deadbolt.

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Because there is a financial incentive to improve the design of car keys, which is not true for house keys. Aspects of this incentive are:

  • People buy cars more frequently than houses
  • Cars can be purchased anywhere, but houses do not move
  • The cost of locks on a house is very much smaller a part of the total cost than locks on a car
  • cars are broken in to more often than houses
  • cars are stolen way more often than houses
  • People expect car technology to be improved over time
  • There are more car manufacturers and competition over a larger location area than for houses

Really, there are many reasons. Just think it through, you can probably expand this answer with your own. This is true in general.

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