“You know how hot it is down in Florida?”
For some people, the color black is something of a uniform. It’s chic, slimming, and hides most stains.
Wear a long-sleeved black top on a hot, sunny day and you’ll experience one of the shade’s only drawbacks: it’s hotter than lighter colors.
But is that true for vehicles as well?.
When a couple walked into the Indiana dealership, they were looking for a fun car for their Florida adventures. Something rugged, cool, and built to handle sun, sand, and swamp.
Ryan (@ryanflipswhips) said that when the couple arrived at the Michiana Chrysler Dodge Jeep Ram Fiat dealership, they were clear: “They wanted a Jeep Wrangler Sahara, 2026.”
And they wanted it in Henry Ford’s preferred color, black.
“I told them: ‘hey, I got a blue one in stock and a white one in stock but I don’t have a black one,” he says. So he started asking them questions about their plans. When they shared that they were heading to Florida, he offered a bit of logical-sounding advice.
Florida, which had the hottest August on record this year, is not for people who are sensitive to heat. Nor, Ryan argued, is it a place you want to drive a dark vehicle.
“You don’t want black, you know how hot it is down in Florida? You have to have a blue Jeep Wrangler if you’re going to be down there. Or even a white one. The sun is going to hit the black paint and you’re going to be burning up,” he said.
His customers said they never really considered what the environment would be like. So then he applied a little peer pressure. “Jeep Wranglers are known to have these bright colors. You want a bright color. You want like a bright blue color,” he said.
Do Black Cars Really Get Hotter?
People who live in hot climates like Florida, Arizona, Texas, and elsewhere know that darker vehicles tend to feel hotter. Science agrees.
“Autotrader left a black car and a white car in the Georgia summer sun for a few hours. The black car’s interior was a startling 17 degrees hotter than the white car’s interior. The researchers turned on the air conditioners in the vehicles, and the black car took longer to cool down,” reports Porsche of Melbourne.
Another test run by Consumer Reports found that the interiors of vehicles in lighter and darker cars don’t seem to affect the temperature as dramatically as the exterior color does.
“The darker car did get a little bit hotter, but only by a few degrees. And that was only after an hour,” it reported.
“And It’s Crazy Hard To Keep Clean”
Color theory and maintenance quickly come to the forefront of the chat. The first comment addresses the issues of heat and cleanliness: “Yes, black is crazy hot and hard to keep clean…” wrote ztephent.
Witchkitty94 suggested, “If I were in Florida…I’d do Bikini Pearl or Tuscadara Pink…maybe even Punkin’ (reminds me of sunsets).”
Then bkm822 said, “White attracts bugs too much. Black is too hard to keep [clean].”
Motor1 reached out to Ryan via email and with a TikTok direct message. We will update this if he gets back to us.
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