When I picked up my new Civic, the salesman explained how to disable it, but I left it on.

The only times that I've been aware of it doing it's thing...have been in car washes. I've never noticed it working at a stop light after 17K miles.

So I leave it on.

It's been around for a long time. My '47 Dodge truck used to die every time I stopped at a stop sign - unless I took preventative measures. If you think the tragedy of of stop/start is inconvenient, try heal and toeing a truck with a non-synchro 3 speed to keep it from dying as you approach a stop sign. How I wished it would automatically restart itself.
Kids these days. They don't want to have to work for anything. :D:D

Model Ts and Fordson tractors used to do something similar. If the piston was at TDC with some gas in the cylinder all you had to do was bang on the hood and it would start - no computer required.

I think it would make a difference in pollution in stop and go traffic.
But that would also not be good for the car.
Pick your demons I guess.

Yeah, I expect that the motivation is in eking out the last 1/10th of combined mpg for CAFE standards. interesting.

With Volvo we were told the starter is upgraded. I was more concerned with the frequent loss of oil pressure. We were told when the car took the EPA fuel economy test without the start/stop enabled they were able to make the turn off long term.

For the record, I hate this stop/start feature. Another questionable bit of technology being forced upon us.

But on the other hand, it might cut down on the number of people who sit in their parked cars (on a nice day with no need for heat or A/C) playing with their phones, eating their lunch, picking their nose, etc. while the engine idles, wasting gas and unnecessarily adding more CO2 to the atmosphere.

This feature also speaks to the state of modern ICE engines. It wasn't all that long ago when vehicles sometimes wouldn't just start right up the way they do now.

Only the consumer is interested in the life of the car being long with low hassle. :-/

energy to source, transport, consolidate, assemble all materials at an manufacture point,
worker resources and plant overhead,
transport to sales holding point,
then on to new engine installation at the mechanics. time expense energy.
vs
engine that lasts twice as long

Not wasting gas I get, but "unnecessarily adding more CO2 to the atmosphere" ? What about unnecessarily adding more water vapor to the atmosphere? There is more water vapor added and water vapor does much more in affecting our planetary temperature than does CO2. And CO2 is responsible for all food and all vegetation on this planet. (along with water)

Read: don't fall for this "CO2 is evil pollution" crap. It's not. You are even making it, breathing it, right now. Grow operations even pump CO2 into their greenhouses to accelerate growth. It is a fundamental necessity of all life as we know it.

Rented manual Opal. Driving in twisty two-lane mountains southern France. Four passengers(ie heavy car). I push in the clutch to glide and feel the suspension. Power steering and power brakes both fail while approaching a downhill curve with a tour bus whipping out across both lanes.

My 2021 Rubicon has it along with the disable button, but as others have said you'll need to disable it after every start. I ended up purchasing a device that remembers the last setting. It just plugs into the obd port. $49.00 off Amazon. works great.

Also depending on the vehicle it may or may not use the starter. The newer Jeeps for example have e-torque which uses an additional 48 volt lithium battery pack and a belt starter generator for the auto start. It's hardly noticeable at all but I still don't like it and don't think the excessive starting is good for the motor long term.

4dtech dot com has devices that are easy to install (relatively) and mine works fine.
FLASH programmers or Start Stop Eliminators - once installed it takes of this problem.Very small circuit board with connectors that match up with OEM harness. Plug and play.

I HATE that feature.

As already mentioned, ease and permanence of disabling it are vehicle specific.

You guys have really educated me on this . Thank you

Our van has it. Doesnt bother me a bit.

Yeah, I hate that feature in new vehicles. I know the Kias that I drive at work all have this feature and you can turn it off with a button, but when you shut the engine off and restart it, the feature is back on again like a default and you have to turn it off again.

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I don’t have it on my beater VW GTI. But I would worry about premature engine wear on cars that do. In stop start traffic how long does it take for the engine oil to get to optimal operating temp with the auto off/on? For example my car takes ~ 18 minutes non stop driving to get to optimal oil temp, keeping it under 3k revs before I let loose. Using that yardstick some of these new cars with sub 30 minute, multi stop, commutes would never get the oil to optimal temp. Long term that spells trouble surely.

Our van does not use the feature until the fluids are at optimum temps and says so on the display when you stop.