The CVT Is Just as Fast — So Why Do 83% of WRX Buyers Still Pick the Manual?

About 83–86% of WRX buyers choose the six-speed manual, even though the optional CVT matches it in instrumented testing — because for WRX buyers the gearbox is not a performance option, it is the point of the car. CarBuzz crunched the numbers on October 13, and the WRX's manual take rate is now one of the highest of any car sold in America, in a market where manuals account for roughly 0.7% of all new-car sales.

Start with the part that should, on paper, kill the manual. Per Car and Driver testing cited by CarBuzz, the WRX's CVT is within two-tenths of a second of the manual in both 0–60 mph and the quarter mile — a virtual tie. The automatic does not punish you, it costs about $1,000 more than the manual rather than less, and it makes the WRX an easier daily in traffic. By every spreadsheet measure, the two-pedal car is the rational buy. And roughly five out of six WRX buyers ignore it completely.

The numbers, in context

CarBuzz, citing Motor1 data, puts the WRX's manual take rate at 83% in its headline figure and around 86% in recent years — either way, in a different universe from the industry. Manuals were 0.7% of total US new-car sales in 2024. Among performance cars, the Subaru BRZ is the only nameplate clearly ahead, at about 90%. The Hyundai Elantra N sits at 25%, the BMW M2 around 50%, and Volkswagen dropped the manual from the Golf GTI and Golf R entirely for 2025 — which leaves the WRX and the Toyota GR Corolla as the manual, all-wheel-drive holdouts in this class. Scarcity is part of the story: as the manual disappears everywhere else, the buyers who care concentrate on the cars that still offer one.

Why the WRX is different

The WRX was built around the manual from its 2002 US debut, and the whole driving experience still feels designed around shifting your own gears — the gearing keeps boost within easy reach on the highway, and the car's reputation was made by drivers, instructors, and rally fans who treat three pedals as non-negotiable. There is also a simpler factor CarBuzz points at: the alternative is a CVT. Rival cars pair their manuals with sophisticated dual-clutch automatics; the WRX's automatic is a CVT, however well tuned, and for an enthusiast cross-shopping on feel, that makes the manual the easy choice. Add the end-of-an-era effect — everyone in this hobby knows the manual, turbo, AWD sedan is an endangered format — and demand feeds on itself.

Subaru is answering: the STI's gearbox is coming back

The most encouraging part of this story is that Subaru appears to be listening. As MotorTrend and Carscoops reported from the Fuji 24 Hours in Japan, Subaru is preparing three new manual models by 2027 — and the WRX sedan in that trio revives the TY85 six-speed, the heavier-duty gearbox from the previous-generation WRX STI, which Subaru had stopped producing when the STI ended in 2021. A stronger gearbox does not confirm a new STI, but it is exactly the hardware a more powerful WRX would need, and everyone reporting on it has noticed. The same trio includes a five-door hatchback — the production version of the Performance-B STI Concept — and a sharper BRZ. Context for the hatch: when Subaru offered a limited manual WRX STI Sport in Japan earlier this year, it reportedly drew 9,000 applications for 600 cars.

One honest caveat: those three models were announced in Japan, and no source has yet confirmed US sales. What is confirmed on our side of the Pacific is the demand — 83–86% of American WRX buyers already row their own, and the sold-out-in-spirit Japanese limited run suggests Subaru now has the data to justify building more manuals, not fewer.

Own a manual VB? Make the shifts count

The stock VB shifter loosens up with miles, as CarBuzz's own long-term notes admit — and the cheapest fix is a shifter stop. The Perrin Shifter Stop ($38.25, listed for 2018–2026 WRX without a short shifter) tightens the 1–2 and 5–6 gates for less than a tank of premium. It is the fitting footnote to this story: the manual is not surviving on nostalgia. It is surviving because owners keep choosing it, improving it, and showing up for it — 600 cars, 9,000 applications, and five out of six WRXs at a time.