I’ll admit—the 2023 Acura Integra hasn’t grown on me yet. Calling it the second generation stick-shift ILX is something of a personal past time. That being said, any illusion that enthusiasts weren’t talking with their wallets has gone out the window. The new Integra is priced right, the Civic it’s based on has some special sauce according to our very own editor in chief, and now we know that over seventy percent—not seven, not 17, but over 70 percent of reservations have been optioned with a stick shift. That is a big deal.
It’s a big deal for a few reasons. The first is that, as we all know, manual take rates for normal cars, especially inexpensive ones, have been plummeting hard. To see a car suddenly have more people interested in the stick than the automatic is certainly significant. The second thing is that the original Integra, built between 1986 and 2001, only had a manual take rate of 50 percent. Both of these stats come courtesy of Acura spokesperson Andrew Quillin on Twitter, by the way.
Now, this can likely be attributed to a mix of factors. The automatic may have been a more popular option if it wasn’t a CVT. Yes, if you aren’t aware, the new Integra’s automatic doesn’t have traditional gears. That’s pretty disappointing for a seemingly purpose-built compact enthusiast’s car, but it is what it is. The fact the manual is getting a higher take rate might be a combination of a large number of enthusiast buyers, and the fact that these sorts of discerning customers have a general distaste for CVTs.
Keep in mind that reservations opened just seven days ago. It’s unclear how many people have put their name down for an Integra, and the total mix when all of the reservations run out has yet to be seen. Just the same, Acura has not stated how many reservations have been made.
I honestly struggle to care about the context of the data, though. As it becomes clearer that the opportunities to buy new stick shift cars are eventually going to run out, I’m happy to see what is a renaissance of manual enthusiasm. Cadillac, Porsche, Toyota, Nissan, and other automakers seem to believe that there is still a considerable enthusiast segment of the market that is worth building stick cars for. Acura, as well as the others I mentioned, are leading the charge to keep rowing-your-own relevant.
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