I picked up a new 2025 BMW last weekend and am furious with the amount of subscriptions they want me to pay for after spending almost 100k on a car... I almost want to undo the deal because it's so intrusive even after turning off notifications on both the app and in car they still pop. I think this is my last BMW if they don't rectify this. my 2022 didn't have any of this garbage, every option that I paid for worked without a sub.. it's infuriating.
>The good news is that automakers don’t seem to be making tons of headway with subscriptions. Kelley Blue Book noted that, despite the industry viewing payment plans on features as extremely profitable, it's having serious trouble normalizing them. The outlet stated that most people are already burnt out on subscriptions going toward other services that have nothing to do with automobiles, adding that drivers were likewise unwilling to opt into monthly or yearly fees for equipment they already expect to be on their vehicle. The last issue was that car prices have only increased in recent years and people simply had less disposable income in general.
Very good, now, we just need law to ban these bullshit subscriptions.
If people want to pay the subscriptions then why stop them? Same goes for micro transactions. Don't like the subscription then either don't buy the car or pay the one-time fee at purchase instead.
But there is a reason BMW and Mercedes do this, from their research they believe subscriptions will be successful, and just like micro transactions I am sure consumers will continue to prove them right.
There are people who will go "see I am saving so much money by not renewing my A/C subscription in the winters"
Micro transactions and subscription services for hardware you already own are predatory and anti-consumer. Just because a few people might want it doesn't mean it should be allowed.
Conversely of you A/C subscription example, why wouldn't a company raise the cost of your A/C every summer? You wouldn't sell your car just to avoid that cost so you're stuck with it.
Being grown adults doesn't mean anything.
> Just because a few people might want it doesn't mean it should be allowed.
If it was a minority they wouldn't be bringing it back
> Conversely of you A/C subscription example, why wouldn't a company raise the cost of your A/C every summer? You wouldn't sell your car just to avoid that cost so you're stuck with it.
Not my problem. I am against buying any car with subscription options for builtin features. Didn't say it actually saves any money. But if others are willing to do it and dig their own graves, who am I to say no
> Being grown adults doesn't mean anything
Why? In the case of mtx is beacuse kids are quite guilable and similar features prey on their underdeveloped minds. No issue with older folks gambling.
these are fully formed adult minds, they are well capable of making descisions, and if they decide to continue buying such vehicles then thats on them.
What you don't seem to see through your smugness is it is not just on them. If enough people do pay for that nonsense then that will be the model going forward. People choosing to gamble at a gas station doesn't force me to gamble the next time I fill up. And if the base rate is already higher than last year's model that came with all the features than I'm not saving any real money by turning them down in a subscription model.
If the majority of people would like to gamble at a gas station, I can't be mad that the gas firm is going in that direction, and same for cars.
If mercedes & BMW align with their customers, then why should the government intervene?
Your take is unpopular for a reason, though. Just throwing up your hands and saying "whelp, capitalism is what it is, why restrict anybody from doing anything?" is an extremely pessimistic take at best, and downright hostile at worst.
Capitalism has had its measure of success in bringing good to the world, but it has also shown time and again that, if left unchecked, it will devour any and every good thing in pursuit of profit. Imposing certain restrictions on unfettered greed is hardly something to argue against, and frankly everybody here thinks it's weird that you are doing that.
"Just let the people buy what they want!" says the food industry. Woops! There's a national obesity/health crisis! Too bad there weren't restrictions or that may have been alleviated or avoided!
I'm not saying why restrict anybody from doing anything, emissions & safety regulations are absolutely needed, I'd put those at the same level as food regulations.
But a subscription service does not physically hurt you nor does it physically hurt others, and if mercedes/bmw/etc. find that given the choice between a static one-time purchase & a recurring subscription, people opt for the subscription, then I personally don't really have anything against it.
I vote with my wallet, I haven't bought a new mercedes product after a decent history with them, and I hope others do the same, and if that does occur then mercedes & BMW would roll back these services, but if the majority of german buyers prefer subscriptions, then why should they care about my opinion?
I think part of the issue with this line of thinking is that for you, and everyone who is currently an adult - this is clearly a stupid decision. However for future generations, this will be normalized.
Your attitude is basically selling future generations a shittier car environment because??? You can make formed decisions right now? Glad you aren't making any important decisions.
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You're still paying for it in gas/electricity because hauling around the hardware inside your car isn't free.
And it's not saving money to begin with. If your car cost 50k today, but then tomorrow it's 50k plus a subscription, what have you saved? These car companies aren't going to lower the price of the car because now they're also including a subscription. This is a long way around just leasing/renting parts of your car.
> And it's not saving money to begin with.
Didn't say it saves money. Just that people think it does. And if those people want to get scammed who am I to say no. These companies do things for a reason, people are willing to pay subscriptions.
Adults capable of making their own descisions and digging their own holes
You can say this until every automaker rolls it out and starts charging for what should be standard equipment. Then the choice is gone and consumers are stuck with the bill. I understand ambivalence if it doesn't affect you currently, but don't give manufacturers any excuses either.
The issue is that corps play the long game while everyone else doesn't. It didn't work this time, they'll keep trying. They'll train the newer generation coming up with social media campaigns using their favorite influencers and celebrities. They'll lie and say it's for their benefit. And the newer generation will grow up thinking it's the norm and tell the older generations they don't know what they're talking about.
Look at what Apple has done over the last decade with their walled-garden ecosystem. Now people don't alter their sofware or customize it because they can't. They think being able to change wallpapers and some text colors is customization. They don't realize they gave up custom roms, removing any app they want, functional widgets, easily repairable devices, no forced upgrades, etc.
It's all just a matter of time.
The problem is when dumb people open up their wallets it incentivizes the market to move in that direction, and when you want to participate in the same market you get to the choices they've steered the market in.
I agree, but my solution to that would be to simply purchase a different car, I've quite liked mercedes but I wasn't a fan of the EQ range and the loss of the s-class coupe, and so I didn't purchase a new one.
Personally if a company's interest aligns with their customers than who am I (or who is the government) to step in for, these companies offer static purchases, but if customers choose subscriptions then it is what it is.
Sorry, is there a reason I should care about the downvotes
To be clear I absolutely wouldn't mind a regulation that says companies can't offer such features as only subscriptions, and that they have to have a one-time option available at purchase, I'd love such a regulation
But I see no reason to limit subscriptions if their customers prefer it and if they prefer it as well.
To take the article as an example, adaptive matrix/laser headlights were never standard, bixenon/led/etc. were always an additional option.
Same goes for heated seats, or ADAS, these options were always well, options.
There's a BIG difference between buying a vehicle with optional features, and paying rent to use features on a vehicle you allegedly own.
Might as well lease at that point, which is what automakers would prefer.
>Personally if a company's interest aligns with their customers than who am I (or who is the government) to step in for, these companies offer static purchases, but if customers choose subscriptions then it is what it is.
Because consumers aren't always the most logical or informed people.
I don't think nobody wants to pay for subscriptions, not even wealthy people.
Being able to pay for them, and not caring about it, it's different than wanting.
Same goes for micro transactions.
That doesn't mean they want to. I don't want to pay my bills every month and yet I do because it's That or be homeless with no phone or entertainment. If you don't pay the subscription now you have half the car so you're going to pay like it or not
They're not offering it because people *want* subscription services, they're offering it because they think they can get away with it and it benefits their shareholders.
take the mercedes electric lineup for an example, you can get a 350 model with certain specs, you have the option to go for a 450 model with the same motors but better specifications, or the option to do a one-time purchase for the additional power ($2k), or the option to pay a monthly/yearly subscription.
If a customer looks at all of those options, and chooses the subscription (subscription revenue is $1B a year after all, they are keeping around those options for a reason), what are they "getting away with"?
The customer understands what they're getting into, has the options, and chooses the subscription.
Absolutely if the vast, vast majority were leasing, but thats not the case. In fact it is the other way around, in '23 one-fifth of new vehicles were leased, and the rest were sold outright.
And that is exactly what I'd like others to do, vote with their wallet, with a severe lack of subscription revenue & demand for one-time options, they'd do away with the subscriptions in lieu of traditional options.
>And that is exactly what I'd like others to do, vote with their wallet, with a severe lack of subscription revenue & demand for one-time options, they'd do away with the subscriptions in lieu of traditional options.
We are in agreement there.
Mercedes made USD 1 billion from subscription last year, there is demand ... if someone would like to buy your car for a million then are you going to stop them?
1. Even if it is that high, which.. Doubt. How much of that is non-backend subscriptions? Take away GPS, remote start, etc.. Those type of subscriptions.
2. Just because you force an issue and someone pays it doesn't make it right or that there's a demand. It just shows you have more control (or collusion) on a product.
1. https://www.drive.com.au/news/mercedes-benz-subscription-services-revenue/#
including this bit
> Automated driving functions are expected to emerge as our largest software-enabled revenue driver by 2030
2. thing is there is an option to permanently purchase these same options with the vehicle, so these are true subscriptions in that sense, the user had the option and choose the recurring cost
They don't split up software revenue, so I can't answer your question directly, but I just think it's telling that they expect their largest revenue driver as something that isn't really a backend subscription, at least currently.
Dude why are you being such a shill.
You know nobody wants to pay for it, period.
Not even remote start, my car has it for free, once it stops being free I could not care less, but if I lived up north where it snows I might pay for the subscriptions, not because I want to, but because it becomes kind of necessary.
There's a saying; when somebody tells you that you're wrong, you can ignore them, when 10 people you you're wrong, double check, when multiple people tell you that you're wrong, maybe, MAYYYBE, Stop for a second and think that MAYBE you're wrong.
Why do you think BMW scrapped the heated seats subscriptions, they will push whatever service people pay for, again, not because people want to pay for it.
Because you said "nobody wants to pay for it"
Except as the numbers show, people do want to pay for it, and do pay for it. The vast majority of these options are available as one-time purchase.
You know, you're right.
Let me change it, nobody wants subscriptions for things that did not require a subscription before.
Now, whats the reply here, and please don't let it be "people do want subscriptions because they pay for them"
Lets take the mercedes acceleration boost for an example, on e.g. an EQE 350, there is a choice between a lifetime purchase, a monthly/yearly subscription, or upgrading to the more powerful 450 trim from the getgo
If a customer, out of those options, picks and pays for the monthly/yearly subscription, would you not say they wanted that subscription? All three options (the traditional rolled into MSRP, one-time, subscription) are there.
I'm going to sleep. You're a hard head mf and I'm not going to convince you.
So, I'll leave you with this, you know what subscription I'll pay for?
If I have a 5 year old car and they develop a subscription to make my car more fuel efficient and it saves money even by paying a subscription, I'd pay for it. That's a win win for everybody. I'D WANT THAT.
I don't want to pay for heated seats, ac, remote start, gps etc. If you're gonna include those functions in a car, sell the car for what it's worth, stop trying to make everything a subscription.
Have a good night bb
That is fair and all but the point is mercedes or BMW don't care what *you* or other enthusiasts would like to pay for (or not pay for), its their customers that matter, and as long as their customers keep paying they will keep serving.
I don't like subscription services either, and for that reason stuck with my older mercedes, and customers have spoken with their wallet in the past (e.g. the CLE's return to larger engines), but that has yet to happen with subscription services.
But like, you're missing the core of the issue here, you are completely ignoring the fact that the subscription should have never been there in place.
The price of the boost should have been included in the MSRP from the beginning, not after the fact in a lifetime subscription. In fact the car comes from fabric with the accessory needed to make the boost work, whether a customer wants the boost or not.
So technically Mercedes should be losing money anytime a customers chooses not to have the boost, but we all know that's not true, because they are not losing the car at a loss hoping to recover the money in subscriptions, they are double dipping the customer.
The issue is not whether people pay for it or not, it's just an anti customer practice.
=
If the customer chooses the more powerful 450 trim, then by all means you as a company get to charge them more because they are choosing to have a much better model, which cost the company a little bit more in R&D, parts, service etc. But you're advocating for companies to charge more to customers for functions that are already there, just locked behind a paywall.
> that the subscription should have never been there in place.
Personally I feel that is up to the customers to decide and they can speak with their wallets. I don't think it's anti-consumer if the consumer is happy with their choice.
And likewise I can't get mad at the company for offering options and catering to their customers.
If the subscription was something, like.
You need to bring the car to the dealership so we can install the parts needed for the boost to work, then it would make a little more sense.
But then it would go back to the issue, of why not selling a complete product from the beginning, why sell a car in parts. It's just to get more money out of the pockets. That's it, no benefit whatsoever to the customers.
You can't be serious. It's like glass backed phones. No one, and I mean literally no one, demanded glass backed phones.
They tried it .. people complained but they kept buying a new phone every year.
No one wants subscriptions in a car .. they are trying it out.... Trying to make it normal so they can keep pushing that boundary.
Who told you wireless charging only works with glass? The fuck?
My Pixel is in a plastic case, so it shouldn't charge wirelessly... It charges wirelessly as fast as without it. Several phones with several different cases... All charge wirelessly.
Premium feel? At least 2 3rds of us use cases... If not more. We don't truly care how it feels. Or looks.
> Who told you wireless charging only works with glass?
I never said that. I just said a glass back is how you do it while retaining a premium feel. Plastic does not feel premium. Regardless of if you put a case on it
And most consumers feel the same, hence why after feedback from the plastic-backed s21, samsung returned to glass with the next generation.
Absolutely hard disagree. Most consumers don't care what the back is made of. Only us "enthusiasts" truly do. And I'd bet the majority of us dint give a shit either. Actually typing this on my naked pixel and yea...it does feel nice. But 98% of the time it's in a case. A nice case that still feels pretty lux.
Only the regular 21 got a plastic back, not the higher end phones if I'm not mistaken. So the cheapest phone got the cheaper back? Way to make it feel like a down grade, Sammy.
And they had quality issues with those plastic backed S21s.
I just feel if most consumers didn't care, samsung would have gone with more plastic backs.
For what it's worth I had a plastic-backed S21 as my work phone, didn't have any QC issues, and was fine with it for the price, but I did feel the matte glass on my iPhone is more premium.
what?! they're not bringing in subscriptions because customers want them and they're doing for the good of the people! like everyone else who does it, they're doing it because it makes them *more money*
you're usually (one of the very few) a smart dude on this sad sub, so i'm quite befuddled you'd be stooping so low to defend one of the worst anti-consumer trends that has befallen our society over the past decade or so
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I’m encouraged to hear that people aren’t lapping up the idea of paying for heated seats. Now, if we can get the consumer to just close their wallets altogether to a whole lot of unnecessary, compulsive spending, we can make inflation gtfo.
I personally don't see much problem with subscription based services as long as you are allowed to pay a one time fee and have it forever.
It would be cool to try out some features, but not sink hundreds of dollars.
I just don't get that if it's cheaper to build every car with adaptive headlights & every car has the capability of faster acceleration, why not just make those standard features.
I get paying for premium connectivity because data isn't free, and you can *kinda* justify paying a subscription for mercedes drive pilot or similar features (e.g. FSD) because there is active development and improvement.
But mercedes is out here charging for traffic sign assist, trailer assist, beginner/valet mode, basic software that you can get out of standard toyota safety sense nowadays.
> why not just make those standard features.
[Market segmentation.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Market_segmentation) Charging some buyers more for the same product.
I didn't even notice but apparently traffic sign recognition (and honda's sensing suite as a whole) is standard on almost everything now
I mean the system itself is not great. But its standard
> You can have a subscription that you pay monthly for, but can also pay a set amount and have it forever.
/r/cars refuses to acknowledge this.
$500 at the time of purchase to add heated seats == "a-ok!"
$500 at any point after purchase to have the dealer add heated seats == "a-ok!"
$500 at any point after purchase to *activate* heated seats forever == "OMG! THEY'RE MAKING ME PAY EXTRA FOR HARDWARE THAT'S ALREADY INCLUDED IN THE CAR!!!111ELEVEN!!"
The argument seems to be that the car would be $500 cheaper at purchase if they didn't include the hardware. It won't be, because the manufacturer cost on that hardware is probably around $50.
Personally, I'm shopping for a used Mazda for my child now, and the only thing that they care about is heated seats. Heated seats are standard on the grand touring and optional on touring and maybe the model under it. If I could buy any of them and press a button on an app to make it have heated seats, that'd be handy as fuck. Right now, I have to dig through pictures looking for the buttons like a goddamn caveman.
Give an inch and they take a mile
"OH Ja Hanz, they pay for the seat heater, we lock ze bluetooth behind ze paywall next"
Next thing you know you're being nickelodeon and dimed for other features. Then they stop the upfront buyout uption and it's a monthly subscription only
Look at the state of console gaming. You can't play anything without paying a monthly fee anymore. But Microsoft set the precedence with Xbox live and now it's the standard
>"I'm angry about things that haven't actually happened yet."
I've been around long enough to see how this works
I watched them do it to sports broadcasts
I watched them do it to video games
Idk what to tell you. If you can't see this coming you're just sticking your head in the sand
> I watched them do it to sports broadcasts
That was consumers asking for something and then realizing why things were how they were before. For years people said cable was stupid because nobody ever watched all the channels and they'd be happy to pay for only the viewing they wanted. Well that's what we have now with one payment for soccer, another for golf, a third for tennis, etc whereas before you could pay one flat fee and get them all. You'd also get 300 channels you'd never watch, but at least all the sports (or anything else) you wanted were bundled together.
No
This is like cooking a frog from cold water gradually. You feel comfortable and when you feel the danger of the heat it's already too late.
Your car invoice already included all the hardware install, I will not pay someone to change a 0 to 1 for a limited time no matter how cheap.
I will not buy any care that come with a subscription to use a feature thats installed on a car already ( I guess the only exception is cellular connection related as it is a running cost). But not function like heated seats where the only thing they have done is flipping a switch remotely.
It's a cancer that's slowly spreading to everything, some of the manufacturers are just a bit smarter about disguising it.
Toyota made remote start (including from the fob) a subscription, but they include a long trial to the service to spread out people noticing and getting pissed off about it.
Ford always catches so much shit but they’re one of the very very few with an app that has those features and is at this point in time free for life. Both the Ford Pass app and Lincoln Way.
They work well and don’t cost anything extra. More should be following their lead instead of nickel and diming consumers.
The apps don't cost anything since Ford sells your driving behavior per ToS. It's the very reason why I never bothered with it. It also doesn't help that the app doesn't do anything for/with my car.
I feel like it doesn't make sense for cars though. The people who are fine with paying a subscription for their car will just get a rental.
Paying 50k for a car *and* a subscription is just ridiculous.
I view it as a negotiation tool at the time of purchase.
Oh you want me to buy this car? Then all available features are unlocked in perpetuity.
If the sales person / manager disagrees, you get up and walk out. Spend your $$$ elsewhere.
Agreed here too. I don’t have a need for the services it provides or says it will provide.
People got on just fine without so many features previously, and I am doing just fine without them as well. What I need most of all, what so many need most of all, is the ability to shelter ones self, feed ones self, and save a modest amount of money for a rainy day.
Agree, if they need some sort of subscription for BMW assistance or cellular based services, not great but fine, but like now 90.00 bucks a month and we will store your favorite radio stations, and for only 3.99 more. Intermittent Wipers!, they can fuck off.
The enshittification of all industries is as reliable as clockwork. There is nothing to indicate that a business will NOT attempt to do as many things as inhumanly possible to bump profits, it’s the sole purpose of large businesses. They are not our friends, and their needing to provide a service or product in order to earn money is an undesirable speedbump between them and your money. I’m a subscriber to the capitalist system btw, it’s the only one we have that leverages our inherent competitive (and often counterproductive and/or terribly destructive) practices as a species into something useful. The issue is uninformed regulation, corporate infiltration of government, and the ability of a corrupted market to slowly adjust the public’s acceptable margins of shittiness. Cars cover their shittiness up with shiny things, underneath those things they are more than ever inherently destined to become useless after a finite span of time. At least you could engine swap an old lemon without needing to be an electrical engineer. New lemons have no life path other than being thrown away
The only reason these companies do this is because people keep buying this crap. Its not the market's fault, the business's fault, or the government's fault people have become wide eyed tech-crazed fiends. Its the consumers themselves driving this. As we've seen before, the consumers pushed back enough to push BMW away from this. Hopefully we see that again
No, this is the fault of those create rules and regulations. You don't own the software the car comes with and you paid for so the creators of the software can have free reign to fuck you over. Consumers were given no choice on this.
>No, this is the fault of those who create rules and regulations
No regulator is forcing BMW into this
>Consumers were given no choice on this.
They are, don't buy it. There's plenty of other brands that aren't trying to implement this. You have choices man, we all have choices.
That would be great but the automotive industry is a highly regulated one. We are seeing a lot of startups right now because of EVs but in reality there are only a few manufactures of cars so its not like choosing toilet paper. Your choices are limited.
https://www.whichcar.com.au/car-advice/car-manufacturer-brands-family-tree
What if basically every car company does this though? Right now it’s just a few trying it here and there, but I suspect they are playing a game of chicken with each other and they all feel that this is part of their 10 year plan. There will be some sales hits and consternation as various companies introduce it, but if I had to bet I would wager that in 10 years this will be the industry norm.
I just don't imagine they're all colluding behind closed doors to implement a subscription service scheme. I'm 99% sure that's illegal and the whole conspiracy could be upended by one or two manufacturers reneging on the agreement.
Now, if BMW could do this and not see a sales hit, I'm sure others would follow suit. But even so, just because a high-end luxury brand can get away with it, doesn't mean lower end model buyers would tolerate it.
I’m not saying it’s an explicit collusion, but it’s an obvious way to make more money from the same amount of hardware, and they probably know that if only one of them does it then it’s easy to single out that brand. I know that if I were in charge of a company I would be thinking that way. Not that I’m endorsing this behavior - I drive 20 year old cars and will continue to do so. But we’ve seen companies push each other in other businesses like airlines and software, not sure why it wouldn’t happen here
It is going to continue for as long as consumers act like self-deprecating fools. In the past several years, I've had countless people support things like video game cosmetics that cost more than whole games and subscription price hikes that give you nothing and making you pay for ad-supported content and the like.
All along the way, people keep letting it happen. They should have put their feet down during the ridiculous markups on products during COVID. They should have been watching their streaming services turn into "cable, but with more passwords." There's no critical thinking or survival instincts in most consumers, as they won't take any stand that involves even minor inconveniences.
Yep. I’ve experienced all that you mentioned. For me it’s basically Minecraft with friends and Fallout: Tale of Two Wastelands now, online gaming feels incredibly toxic, manipulative, and generally parasitic anymore. I only have so much time and patience… Best to put it into other things. The only subscription I have is YT premium because I am admittedly lazy and it’s an easy way to listen to my comfort media without signal while driving.
Back to cars, this discussion is why I’ve never owned anything newer than 2001. I’m currently diesel swapping a couple of things and beginning to gather parts for the future. I want to know I can burn any lubricant I can get my hands on, and in a pinch I can run without an alternator. Fun times we live in.
Just another reason on the list to buy and own older cars why would I pay what should be a mortgage payment on a car for 7 years just to have to pay extra for something like a/c. No thanks.
The only subscription service that makes sense to me is hands free driving. There’s a lot of back end maintenance of the routes and updates along with the liability. I’d definitely prefer not but I can see the rationale.
>The MyBMW application and BMW’s ConnectedStore have grown a lot in recent years and are helping to normalize something that’s ultimately designed to get customers to pay more for services they previously either wouldn’t have had access to or would have been tabulated in the original MSRP.
Why does a car need an app store?
I'm all for a lot of new things in cars, but the phone-ification of cars is not something that I'm here for. I know this place likes to make fun of people who don't immediately accept and love every new bit of tech in cars, but please explain why I would want/need this?
Yeah it’s wild. I love having an app I can check at my leisure for my car for things like “are my doors locked” or “how much gas/range do I have” or things like remote start or maintenance stuff, but the App Store piece is a joke.
I’ve looked at the connected store on my app, it takes me to a webpage within the app, shows me all the things I could get that are (spoilers!) already part of my car and then nothing optional for me to add. So it’s just a useless page that I’m sure will fill up with terribly basic things in the not-too-distant future.
Partly the size -- the 4series coupe is a little longer, felt bigger (but not necessarily heavier) when test driving, and is more expensive. But also I'm filled with hopium that an xDrive M2 would keep the manual transmission. If my M240ix had a manual, it'd be perfect for me honestly. I've always loved/wanted an AWD manual coupe, and the M240 checks off most of that while being a fantastic daily and having god's gift of an engine in it. If there was a (newer) STi coupe I'd probably have one of those instead haha.
This would replace my main car, and AWD is a want for me in my daily. For my third/fun car, I'm more flexible and looking for just some tossable RWD or FWD fun machine I can turn into a rallycross toy, but I don't have the scratch to make the third car something this pricy yet.
Your point is definitely valid about AWD possibly going against the idea of the M2, but someone else might argue that the weight itself is already doing that. Honestly, if money weren't the factor in all things I'd probably just get ready to order the M2 and start planning my rally build around the M240...
An app on your phone for the car makes sense. Being able to remotely control the door locks or start it, is neat.
It sounds like the built-in car app store is even worse than I imagined lol
As much as I hate Teslas as an actual car that’s what they do super well. As snowbirds, my parents have a house in Florida. They also have 2 teslas in it. A couple years ago they let me use the house for a buddies bachelor party and let us use the teslas so we didn’t have to rent cars. It was early September in Florida so it was hot as fuck but I could just hit the ac 3 minutes before we left some place and the cars would be nice and cool when we got in. It was great. Was also nifty in the case of an EV where I could charge the battery the night before for how much range we needed the nest day. Super convenient. Added bonus points that we didn’t need to buy gas for the weekend.
But fuck them as cars. First night I get there first and have to pick my buddy up from the airport. No problem. Except it started raining and I’m driving in an area I’m not at all familiar with and the fucking windshield wipers won’t go on. NP. I’ll just hit the stalk. Oh wait! There is no fucking stalk! Thanks Elon! So now I’m driving in the pouring rain navigating a fucking iPad menu diving for the wipers. Very cool and very safe.
Yeah the connectedstore I have is at least via the app on my phone. If there’s a way to see it via iDrive7 then I thankfully haven’t found it but an AppStore on my actual car UI is a whole ‘nother hell.
On my older Volvo there are 5 apps I can download. 5. We got 5 at launch. Never added another.
This i don't hate. I agree... I don't need an app store. Newer Volvo? AAOS... Of course has app store. Still a limited number. And YouTube? Why?
"But you can only play it while parked" say the people happy to have YT in the dash.
If I'm waiting for someone.... I have this thing called a phone I can kill time with.
Car manufacturers, especially the German ones are already struggling to deliver a software performance that could match a 5 year old smartphone, I don't trust them to not fuck up an app store for cars.
The app isn't meant to be for current buyers, it is meant to grow with younger/new to the brand buyers who either will grow used to Car as A Service( pay a monthly fee to access a model that can be switched (along with the functioning options) or it meant to lower the MSRP the same way some condos)houses has long term rented water heater and such.
Basically keeping a lower base price to finance then rent every accessory out. To the First, second and 3rd owner until the car is out of the extended warranty.
I’ve owned a few BMWs over many years and all of them have various apps you can subscribe to.
I’ve never bothered paying for a single one, haven’t even given it a look as I couldn’t care less.
I had an Audi that had a similar set up. Also never cared to subscribe after the free trial ended.
It's all grotesque, right? Modern games have transactions in their gameplay to upgrade the character, cars have subscriptions for heated seats, Office 365 is a subscription, so is Adobe. This pay-as-you go model is anti-consumer.
We're looking for a new car. I had not considered BMW, but we ended up getting one for a rental, and while this particular model isn't what I would choose, I quite like driving it. BWM also appears to have addressed reliability issues that were a thing last time I looked. But I don't want a car that nags me about apps and accounts when I start it up. Oh, and it also flashes the speed limit icon if I go above the speed limit and it's super annoying. I've considered looking into how many years back I would need to go to not have an annoying techno-feudal experience, but it's probably more than I'd care to.
Get a late F generation car. They're the sweet spot between lots of nanny systems/enshitification and it just being a good car.
I intend to run my F36 in to the ground, modern cars are tech garbage now.
Same thing with our 2015 X5 35i (F15).
Modern enough to have all the necessary standard tech (cruise control, heated seats, etc.) and interactivity for music playing (iDrive) and it's been a pleasure to own at 154k miles and counting! It's one of those cars to keep.
Completely agree. F generation BMWs are the last decent ones. Sure there’s people that prefer e-gen cars but they never came with CarPlay integration, and will be getting on a bit now.
Had a go of an early G20 320d and hated every second of it. Cheaper plastics and worse ergonomically, and an unnecessarily thick steering wheel. Won’t be getting a newer bmw now.
I’d settle for an F90 M5 though.
Most BMWs are leased--something like 25% over comparable carmakers. Once the lease is up/drivetrain warranty runs out, the car isn't BMW's problem anymore; either the current "occupant" buys it out, or it goes back to the dealership and becomes a used car. The dealership might get to double-dip, but the car's 2nd or 3rd owner will in all likelihood not be giving BMW a single dime.
BMW and Mercedes-Benz (and Audi, to a lesser extent) earned a reputation for reliability and the resale value that goes along with that, back when American and Japanese cars still only had 5-digit odometers. The key there is "resale value"; they realized that they no longer needed to build cars that ran for 300,000 miles without major work when they could just coast on that reputation, because the people buying their cars don't keep them that long. If pay-to-play options are covered for the first *n* years, a new owner won't feel a thing. It's the secondary market that has to worry about it--both buyers and sellers, since a used-car dealership getting a unit at auction won't know which options can be "turned on", so they won't know what to use in marketing (this is assuming such features can actually be enabled/disabled by a secondary owner; I haven't seen anything indicating carmakers' willingness to accommodate that one way or the other).
If the tech requires preimstalled hardware but no continued backend support, then there is no justifiable reason for it to have a subscription cost. End of story.
There is no mandatory subscription cost, you can buy it outright like any other feature. This post is just ragebait like every other post on this topic
"Customers can buy the feature outright and BMW will likewise allow drivers to subscribe on a monthly or annual basis"
What they're describing is not a subscription. It's paying for a feature in installments. After the buyer pays the full cost of the feature, the payments stop and the buyer keeps the feature. With a subscription you pay in perpetuity for continued access to the feature. If you stop paying your Netflix subscription you lose access to Netflix no matter how much money you've put in.
It looks like the monthly installment is £10. Buying multiple months saves you on the per-month cost. The strange one is that 3 years or 36 months only costs £150 which comes out to £4.17 per month. Or you can get unlimited for only 50 more. tbh I remember the heated seat pricing breakdown to be easier to follow than this.
Paying for something that's already installed (like heated seats) is absurd. The only excuse would be if the car manufacturer would have to cover the costs of maintaining the servers / online support related to some software options... even then it should be covered in the initial price and free for at least a few years after the purchase.
The car community loves to make joke around how one day we’re going to watch ads to start the vehicle but at this point it’s genuinely starting to look like it’ll come true.
I think subscriptions are fine if the value add is there.
My car has a 50 dollar a year subscription to make the garage door automatically open and it works 70 percent of the time. Lotta money just to avoid pressing a button.
The networked digitalization of motor vehicles in general can fuck off. It creates a centralized, single-point-of-access that only the keyholder (in this case, BMW) can control -- and you can guarantee that governments will demand the authority to seize control over the functions on-demand.
Call me a boomer, call me anachronistic -- but I view a vehicle as an extension of my own autonomy. It's not a stock option that I purchased the right to hold and sell; I bought the vehicle and every physical component and feature in it. If I have to pay an annual premium to access it, it's really just an up-jumped lease.
That being said, if there's a hardware component to it, you bet the bullshit can be bypassed. And if it can't, it's getting ripped out of my vehicle.
I'm currently pissed off that my Neato vacuum cleaners are becoming useless because they rely on servers and the company went bankrupt. I can't imagine being dependent on servers located somewhere for the operation of my car.
Hopefully companies start getting pushed in bankruptcy proceedings to open source their services for things like this. That, or someone cracks the code and provides a way for people to locally (or group) host servers that keep devices and games operational.
Between this and all the data collection, I guess cars are just another anti-user tech product now. I've noticed that a lot of ADAS features (IE BlueCruise and Supercruise) are going subscription only, and in some cases it's hard to tell exactly what you get when that subscription expires - seems like GM gives you just cruise control while Ford at least leaves you hands-on lane centering, for example.
Then there's the thing where everyone wants to remove CarPlay/Android Auto for some BS publicly stated reason while also moving to subscription data plans.
I hate to say it but it's only going to get worse in the absence of regulation. I hate being cynical, but I'm old enough to remember when computers and things did what you wanted them to and cars were just driving machines with firmware to make the engine go.
With features like SuperCruise, the expectation is that your subscription supports ongoing development and updates for the service. However, I worry the progress won't justify its cost. I looked months ago, and it didn't support more than the biggest of the biggest highways anywhere near me.
I’m a life long BMW fan and have owned 5 BMWs over the years. This subscription bullshit has ended that relationship for me. BMW is fucking dead to me.
Is it the subscription you have a problem with or paying for already installed hardware? Because what's being described is by definition not a subscription. It's spreading the cost of an option over a period of payments, after which you keep the option. That was the case with heated seats, and it sounds like that's the case with the adaptive headlights as well.
I’m detecting that you are emergency braking on a slippery surface, would you like to subscribe to the ABS option? If so, please fill this short 5 minutes survey.
>The outlet stated that most people are already burnt out on subscriptions going toward other services that have nothing to do with automobiles, adding that drivers were likewise unwilling to opt into monthly or yearly fees for equipment they already expect to be on their vehicle. The last issue was that car prices have only increased in recent years and people simply had less disposable income in general.
LOL Repo's are at record highs and they want people to throw a subscription on top. Folks can barely afford cars as is.
The article is just rehashing another article Autoevolution (can’t list the URL as the automod will delete the comment).
In reading the original article, seems like this is still Europe only. Haven’t seen BMW try to pull some bullshit like charge a subscription for adaptive headlights here in the US.
Almost as bad as when they tried to charge for CarPlay.
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