BMW Updates Connected App With Car Keys Support

Now I just need a BMW made after yesterday.... :rolleyes:

https://www.cnet.com/roadshow/news/bmw-vehicle-as-a-platform/

Happy I moved away from BMW.

Excited to use this, in maybe 10 years.

You know if you'd bought a Tesla it would have had this feature years ago, and that the Tesla would still be getting new features today?

Why on earth would someone purchase a car that wasn't a Tesla? We make fun of Android phones all the time on these forums for how they generally receive updates for about a year, then they rapidly age as they never get another update after that. Buying a non-Tesla is worse than that - a non-Tesla was generally last updated months-years before you bought it. It was worse than a Tesla when you bought it, and while the Tesla only gets better, everything else gets worse.

Sell your BMW now before you have to pay someone to get rid of it.

Yep, I'm just glad Tesla's have Carplay. /s

You know if you'd bought a Tesla it would have had this feature years ago, and that the Tesla would still be getting new features today?

Why on earth would someone purchase a car that wasn't a Tesla? We make fun of Android phones all the time on these forums for how they generally receive updates for about a year, then they rapidly age as they never get another update after that. Buying a non-Tesla is worse than that - a non-Tesla was generally last updated months-years before you bought it. It was worse than a Tesla when you bought it, and while the Tesla only gets better, everything else gets worse.

Sell your BMW now before you have to pay someone to get rid of it.

You wouldn't have had this feature yesterday in a Tesla as Tesla still doesn't support this. Tesla has a proprietary system that is similar, but it doesn't support Apple CarKey and, at minimum, requires a powered on phone to work whereas Apple's implementation will work for at least 5 hours after the phone has lost power. Additionally, it isn't yet known if the Apple implementation is more reliable as Tesla's implementation isn't without its quirks.

People would buy a car that isn't a Tesla simply because we're not all optimizing for the same thing nor do we all care for the same things. What's best or worse for any one of us will vary quite a lot. When I was shopping for my latest car I took a good solid look at Tesla and it didn't make sense for me in my situation. Instead I ordered a BMW 5 series PHEV. I'll list what put me off Tesla, but my negatives are reflective of my optimizations and realities... Of course YMMV.


* Tesla has serious build quality issues. Where you're expected to perform an extremely detailed pre-purchase inspection to spot everything from panel gaps to poor paint application. Including insanity such as spotting transportation damage. Not something I expect to be concerned about on a $50K+ car.
* Tesla navigation leaves a lot to be desired. It is not an un-common complaint that the system will direct drivers to inoperable super chargers on road trips ('https://www.reddit.com/r/teslamotors/comments/f45v8t/bad_advice_by_tesla_supercharger_not_working/') that may seriously impede on your ability to complete a road trip.
* Tesla service can be a real crap shoot. Both in terms of reliability and availability. Dealership service can also be a crap shoot, but I have 10+ BMW dealers within 50 miles of my house.
* Privacy is a major requirement for me. Tesla collects a large volume of information ('https://www.tesla.com/about/legal#from-vehicle') from their cars and give you very limited options to limit or control that information. BMW on the other hand allows me a lot of control over data collected, the ability to request all collected data, and if I am feeling very paranoid I can disable the LTE connection in the car entirely.
* Tesla lacks many features I consider basic on cars at this price point. Simple things like FM Radio, AM Radio, SiriusXM, and CarPlay to name a few on the entertainment side. It also lacks HUD, Blind Spot Monitoring on the mirror, a standard Instrument Cluster to name a few on the safety side.
* Tesla also lacks an interior build quality that feels aligned to its price segment and it also doesn't feel like a car that will feel as solid and refined years into ownership.
* Lastly, Tesla seems focused heavily on turning the driver into a passenger and I enjoy driving.

Competition is good for all of us and Tesla isn't the right choice for everyone nor is BMW.

Love the concept - hate BMW.

I hope other manufacturers follow and don’t waste money designing poor copycat systems.

Other car manufacturers are finally getting the hint with CarPlay over their own poor systems.

Leave the tech to the tech firms.