i-ACTIV AWD

Confidence ignited by intuition

Mazda’s predictive i-ACTIV AWD is an on-demand system featuring sensors that check road conditions 200 times every second. Built to sense, and respond to these conditions, i-ACTIV AWD helps to ensure a more confident drive.

Sensing conditions

Driver intent

The i-ACTIV AWD system uses numerous sensors to determine the driver’s intentions. Is the driver intending to accelerate? How sharply is the steering wheel turned? How much pressure is on the brakes? These and other considerations are taken into account, and determine how the system reacts in order to achieve optimum control.

Road conditions

i-ACTIV AWD constantly monitors exterior temperature, wiper operation, the amount of torque required to turn the front wheels and the load on the engine. As a result, the system knows if it’s snowing or raining, if the road is slippery, if the driver is on a hill or attempting to turn. This enables the i-ACTIV AWD system to accurately predict when slippage will occur.

Slip protection

i-ACTIV AWD is designed to send just enough torque to the rear wheels to prevent slippage from occurring. By doing this, it provides the traction associated with all-wheel drive, while minimizing the impact on fuel consumption.

Calculation

An ideal split of torque between the front and rear wheels is achieved through the i-ACTIV AWD command module’s innovative 200-times-per-second calculations, allowing for quick and responsive reactions that ensure a better, controlled drive.

Response

Direction from the command module lets the i-ACTIV AWD system apply the required torque to the wheels to deliver an exceptionally stable driving experience with better control over acceleration, turns, breaking and slippage.

Uncompromised fuel efficiency

i-ACTIV AWD was designed to deliver exceptional responsiveness and to challenge the convention that an AWD vehicle must be inefficient. In order to deliver the benefits of AWD and excellent fuel efficiency they set out to reduce the weight of the AWD components and to minimize frictional losses.

Reducing frictional losses

Engineers even studied the way the oil moves through the gears in order to enhance the efficiency of the system.

Weight reduction

In creating i-ACTIV AWD, engineers carefully scrutinized the design and materials used for every component. The result of these efforts is a 43% weight reduction compared to the previous generation system.

Experience it yourself

Discover all the benefits of i‑ACTIV AWD, available in our CX‑3, CX‑5 and 2016 CX‑9 models.