Ferrari Roma – interior and tech
A cabin that feels truly special and is more practical than you might think is marred somewhat by a difficult control interface
The Ferrari Roma’s boot isn’t huge for a GT, being reasonably long and wide but rather low, though the backrests of the teeny rear seats fold down, Porsche 911 style, in the hard-top car for a sort of parcel shelf and load-through. If you’re interested, there’s 272 litres of capacity that expands to 345 litres with the seat backs lowered.
In the Roma Spider convertible the boot is compromised further by the pressing need to fold a roof into it but there is still space for a couple of soft bags with the roof stowed. Capacity with the roof up is 255 litres, only 17-litres down on the coupe.
The divider between the luggage area and the cab that forms the rear seat backs can be flipped-up to form a wind deflector but even without this the low seating provides decent shelter - especially with the windows raised. Operating the roof takes 13 seconds in total and the opening or closing procedure can be performed at speeds of up to 40mph.
From behind the wheel the Portofino is an oddly roomy car, but dropping into the Ferrari Roma is like lowering yourself into the bath, the individual driver and passenger cockpit areas giving a close, low, intimate feel. The rear seat behind the front passenger is usable by children or possibly small adults - assuming a compromise on legroom can be negotiated. A small child might also be able to get behind a very small driver at a squeeze but most owners will sensibly use the +2 seating as extra luggage space.
The most contentious part of the Roma will probably prove to be its switchgear. Largely this is shared with the SF90 hybrid supercar and includes a wide, TFT screen with a central tacho and different screens either side, and many touch-sensitive switch pads, some of which revert to black when not in use. The Roma also gets a tablet-like central touchscreen wedged into the cleavage of the dashboard.
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If you want to be able to find things, or change screens, or simply adjust the temperature or audio volume once you’re driving it’s best to spend a few minutes working out how to do this before you get going. Even then, certain functions may elude you. This level of electronic sophistication probably feels appropriate in a 1000bhp hybrid but in a relatively simple front-engined, rear-drive GT, it feels like overkill.
Ferrari’s admirable concept is that all the car’s key controls should be accessible without the driver being forced to remove their hands from the steering wheel. It’s refreshing to a point in the age of giant, distracting touchscreens with impregnable menu systems but it necessitates a Swiss army knife of a steering wheel with all manner of knobs, buttons and rotary controllers - some of which work better than others.
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Perhaps the Roma’s greatest crime is that the start-stop button is no longer a physical control. Instead, you prod a lifeless touch sensitive panel under the central bulge of the steering wheel - it’s an opportunity missed for a brand so obviously adept at building drama into its products. At least the Manettino switch itself, possibly the greatest single piece of switchgear in any road car, remains a tactile metal flipper in the F1 vein.
Trawling through menus on the international launch we found that you can add solid colour to the tacho face and this helps, bringing the tacho to the fore and adding definition. But for a while we also kept locking photographer Aston out and had to lean over and open his door because we couldn’t find the central locking button. By chance, we find it is roof-mounted (yes, really) and touch-sensitive, and while there’s a loud confirmation click for certain button pushes, there isn’t one for unlocking the doors, so you don’t know if you have. And while we’re on the doors, there’s no internal latch; instead you press a button on the door pull…
