Cruise control has been around for decades, but how does it work? That depends on whether it's old-school cruise control or its modern, adaptive counterpart.

It's important to understand how your car works to avoid wasting unnecessary fuel. Using cruise control can improve your MPG, but only under certain conditions.

Adaptive cruise control senses the distance between your car and others on the road, adjusting speed to maintain safe following distance, but general cruise control doesn't mean self-driving just yet.