2027 Chevrolet Silverado Adds 60-Plus Inches of Screens but Keeps Buttons

More display area usually means more information competing for a driver’s attention. General Motors is making the opposite case with the redesigned 2027 Chevrolet Silverado: The pickup offers more than 60 inches of combined screen space, yet its interface is intended to reduce menu hunting and minimize distraction. Crucially, GM has retained hard buttons and physical switches for frequently used functions including volume and climate settings.

The Silverado and its GMC Sierra 1500 sibling are expected to begin reaching customers in the coming weeks. Whether their new interface actually reduces distraction remains unresolved without real-world driving evaluation. For now, the important engineering choice is not the raw screen measurement but how GM has divided information and controls among the displays.

The more-than-60-inch figure counts all available screens across the Silverado’s redesigned instrument panel, including a display for the front-seat passenger. Some trim levels omit that passenger screen, so the full measurement does not describe every truck. The available head-up display, meanwhile, puts critical information closer to the driver’s forward line of sight.

GM says it evaluated menus, icons and interactions by asking whether each item helped the driver at that moment. Sebastian Bauer, GM’s head of human interface design, summarized the approach this way: We didn’t set out to add more screen. We actually set out to take everything away from the screen that didn’t need to be there.

That claim rests partly on predictability. A physical volume control or climate switch provides a fixed location and tactile feedback, while a touchscreen control can change position or disappear behind another page. Keeping those frequent adjustments off the display can reduce the need to navigate software layers, even though it does not establish that the complete interface is less distracting.

The design aligns with a broader return to dedicated controls for basic functions. Under its 2026 testing protocols, Euro NCAP rewards direct physical inputs for key driving controls rather than functions hidden in touchscreen menus. Its recent assessments found large differences in driving-control scores between vehicles with well-positioned buttons and those relying heavily on touchscreens.

A 2026 review covering 73 studies similarly found that touchscreens generally performed worse than physical controls or voice input on measures involving driving performance, visual attention and secondary tasks, although results varied by task. In one on-road climate-control comparison, 41% of glances toward touchscreen controls lasted longer than two seconds, versus 27% for physical controls. The research did not evaluate the new Silverado, and evidence specific to today’s largest displays remains limited.

Screen size alone is also an incomplete measure. Information density, control placement and the number of steps required to finish a task can be more consequential than diagonal inches. The federal government’s voluntary driver-distraction guidelines focus on eye-glance behavior and task demands, recommending that visual-manual tasks require glances away from the road of no more than two seconds at a time and 12 seconds in total.

GM’s layout attempts to distribute information by purpose. The instrument cluster provides five selectable views, including configurations for trailering, off-road driving and Super Cruise. The Super Cruise view can depict nearby vehicles and the system’s reasoning for an automatic lane change. The driver-assistance system also gains single-button activation on the steering wheel, reducing the interaction needed to engage it.

The central display handles navigation, media, smartphone connectivity and vehicle settings. Drivers can customize its arrangement, Google Maps is integrated, and gasoline-powered versions support Apple CarPlay and Android Auto. GM has also reduced at least one intrusive behavior: An incoming call now appears as a small icon instead of taking over the display as it does in current trucks.

The closely related Sierra uses much of the same interface strategy but gets one distinct mechanical feature. Its center screen can pivot to expose a concealed storage compartment; the Silverado’s display does not. That solution gives the screen a physical packaging function beyond showing software, although it also differentiates two otherwise related cabins.

The first customer trucks will put GM’s central proposition into practical use: A screen-heavy dashboard can remain manageable if common controls stay physical, information appears where it is needed and interruptions are restrained. More than 60 inches makes the new Silverado unusual, but the number of glances and taps required for an ordinary task will determine whether the redesign feels simpler from the driver’s seat.

By Thomas Caldwell — AMI’s senior editor for mechanical and mobility engineering, covering vehicle electronics, systems integration, electrification, chassis systems, propulsion, and safety policy.