What type of mirror is used as a rear-view mirror in motor vehicles because it provides an erect and diminished image with a wider field of view?

💡 Solution & Explanation

Convex mirrors are universally used as rear-view mirrors in motor vehicles because they always form virtual, erect, and diminished images, thereby providing drivers with a much wider field of view than flat mirrors. Concave mirrors tend to magnify images and invert them under most working distances, making them unsuitable for tracking wide traffic behind a vehicle. The physics of reflection dictates that outward-curving spherical surfaces diverge light rays to achieve this expansive coverage. Regular plane mirrors provide true-to-size reflections but suffer from a severely restricted field of view.