It has many, many upsides. With the only true downside being the skill needed to operate.
Manual transmissions aren't going anywhere. Yes, the latest greatest $35,000 car that average Americans are buying will always be an automatic. But for trucks and cheaper cars they will always be the best choice.
I generally prefer manual for on-road driving but auto is a far better choice for 4wd technical trails and rock crawling. Trust me when I say you don't want to stall when navigating a tricky obstacle while hanging off the edge of a cliff.
I'm somewhat sure that unsychronized 12+ gear truck manuals and float shifting are somewhat of an Americanism, because Eurotrucks seem to basically all use automated manuals (AMTs).
As far as I can tell, the manual is no longer the cheap option in the US. I assume that's because it uses exotic equipment put into thousands of cars rather than the standard stuff put into millions of cars:
My experience in 2013 was manuals were bottom of the heap, bare bones cars and sport cars, nothing else in the sort of stuff I was looking at. I suspect the latter is what's driving up the cost.
The last time I bought a car was in 2012, and I had to wait for a manual to arrive on the lot. I haven't looked, so I don't know whether they're more readily available nowadays. I hear there's been a lot of change in dealer inventory in the last decade.
It has many, many upsides. With the only true downside being the skill needed to operate.
Manual transmissions aren't going anywhere. Yes, the latest greatest $35,000 car that average Americans are buying will always be an automatic. But for trucks and cheaper cars they will always be the best choice.