I am thinking of getting a brand new RF 2 litre exclusive line. All the you tube videos say it is a great car. However quite a few say that “over the shoulder” visibility is not great because of the “flying buttresses” that support the roof. This concerns me as obviously I want to overtake safely on the motorway. Normally this would not be a problem as the car had blind spot monitoring (bsm) in the past. However my Mazda dealer states that the 2023 exclusive line does not have bsm. He states this may be due to the global shortage of microchips. I find this slightly difficult to believe as the car has other tech such as lane departure warning which must rely on a chip of some sort. It does seem disappointing to me that a great car is lacking in essential tech such as bsm when other cars have this as standard. I wondered whether anyone on the Forum has recently bought a brand new rf within the last few months and whether it had bsm ? Thank you
but a little more older than a few months… 
My 2015 car has analogue bsm . Horns sound if I make a premature lane change …
But seriously - my daily driver , a Hyundai Kona SUV , has bsm and it is bloody brilliant . I can do without a lot of te car’s nannying bells and whistles - idiotic lane departure warnings especially, and I hate that every single thing you do , such as opening a door , results in yet another 'bong ’ from the dash but bsm is a boon in heavy motorway traffic .
Have a look here Build Your Mazda | Car Configurator | Mazda UK It shows as a ‘yes’ on the car I configured. I would check direct with Mazda Customer Services if it shows as a ‘yes’ when you configure your car and then take the result to the dealer to make it a specific condition of purchase that it has it.
I must be missing something here, but I can’t see BSM on that configurator.
No you are not missing something as I can not now see it either. I must be going round the bend as I replied in good faith having seen it.
O well back to the therapist for another session!!!
I dont know what BSM is, unless it is the orange flashing lights in the wing mirrors. If you get the wing mirrors well adjusted, and keep an eye on the internal mirror, you can see what is coming along in other motorway lanes.
The worst situation (for RHD) is turning right into a busy road. Then you must ensure that you dont anticipate the turn and that the car is at a right angle to the road you are entering, so that you can see the traffic coming from the left through the door windows.
David
It’s true they have dropped some extras for want of enough microprocessors, or at least true that I’ve read it somewhere.
Many years ago, after a near miss, I experimented for a few minutes to see just how much I could see using the door mirrors adjusted for the best view.
I came to the same conclusion as this bloke -
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kkQX2gkwJoE
Adjust the door mirrors so you can just NOT see the side of your own car, and you can see into what for most people is a blind spot. (When you really need to see the side of your car, usually when manoeuvring, just move your head a bit).
I’ve never actually had a car with BSM. I don’t think I’d be able to trust it if I had. Seeing is believing.
@david-p is right though - the really hard one to solve is turning right into a major road from an oblique angle with the hood up, or, presumably, a flying buttress in the way. Thank goodness I usually have the hood down.
This always seems a non-issue. No one makes a fuss about the same blind spot on the ST hood up!
Currently in France in my RF and no particular issues when checking if somebody overtaking, just need to dodge head a little for checking - exact same as for acute left or right junctions at home.
No BSM monitoring on AE30RF
I looked at the Austrian Mazda site, and cannot see BSM in the 2023 specs for the MX-5. Very odd that they would abandon it.
David