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BMW's Apple CarPlay Annual Fee is Next-level Gouging (cnet.com)
BMW announced this week that the company plans to shift Apple CarPlay infotainment support from a one-time fee to a subscription service. Tim Stevens, writing about the implications of the move for CNET: While GM and other manufacturers happily include Apple's CarPlay service for free even on their most attainable models, BMW and plenty of others have levied upgrade fees to enable CarPlay, or bundled the service inside pricey packages of widgets you may or may not want. That, sadly, is par for this margin-rich golf course, but when we learned this week that BMW would change from a single, up-front fee to an annual fee, in my mind that changed everything. Instead of a one-time, $300 fee, starting on 2019 models BMW will charge $80 annually for the privilege of accessing Apple's otherwise totally free CarPlay service. You do get the first year free, much like your friendly neighborhood dealer of another sort, but after that it's pay up or have your Lightning cable metaphorically snipped.
On the surface this is pretty offensive, and it seemed like something must be driving this. The official word from BMW is that this is a change that will save many (perhaps most) BMW owners money. Indeed, the vehicle segments where BMW plays are notorious for short-term leases, and those owning the car for only a few years will save money over that one-time $300. But still, the notion of paying annually for something that's free rubbed me the wrong way. And, based on the feedback we saw from the article, it rubbed a lot of you the wrong way, too.
On the surface this is pretty offensive, and it seemed like something must be driving this. The official word from BMW is that this is a change that will save many (perhaps most) BMW owners money. Indeed, the vehicle segments where BMW plays are notorious for short-term leases, and those owning the car for only a few years will save money over that one-time $300. But still, the notion of paying annually for something that's free rubbed me the wrong way. And, based on the feedback we saw from the article, it rubbed a lot of you the wrong way, too.
Oh no, a whole $80 a month! I bet you spend four times that on an oil change.
Carplay isn't a service. It's a pair of software programs, one runs in your car - the other on your phone. Bizarre. BMW must want their customers to switch to Android, maybe they have an investment in Google or one of the Android handset manufacturers.
You have to pay for BMW Assist and navigation updates too. If you don't like it don't buy the car. It's easy.
You’d be stupid for buying a BMW anyway. Nothing wrong with a luxury car, but “German Engineering” has an abysmal record of reliability and high maintenance. BMW knows they can stick it to the suckers.
Gouging is the dealer charging $500 to code and install a new battery, or $1000/axle to have the brakes done. The people complaining about this don't have BMWs.
It's to allow consumer choice. What if you want to switch devices and use the android version? You shouldn't be locked in with that single $300 purchase, and be forced to make another one. By charging annually you can choose which device type you want to use every year.
If you have a BMW or any luxury car, you can afford it.
If you can't, then WTF are you doing buying/leasing a BMW?!
All new Audis have CarPlay support. My A4 has a CarPlay and supports Android Auto too.
Other luxury brands that also have it without a recurring fee:
https://www.apple.com/ios/carp...
Mercedes
Volvo
Alfa Romeo
Porsche
Lincoln
Cadillac
Bentley
Astin Martin
Just don't buy a BMW -- the other brands are generally better cars anyway. Audis are awesome.
- Vincit qui patitur.
Given how entirely broken CarPlay is, it probably costs them at least that much a year to keep patching around Apple bugs.
It's a worthless feature anyway. Quick show of hands, who here thinks you should integrate texting into a car? Anyone? If car manufacturers cared about safety, they'd ban the feature anyway. You shouldn't be using your cellphone while driving.
Turn off your phone and put it away. Turn off all the 'entertainment center' bullshit. Put both hands on the wheel, look ahead, and drive your goddamned cars. A car should not be a lifestyle choice, it should be transportation. In fact don't even buy cars that have all this shit in the first place. Quit being spoiled babies that need a bunch of toys.
Why not? The cost of feeding the ego of these customers is never high enough. All their income and all the money they can ever borrow is totally up for grabs. Honestly, I was expecting much higher fees when I saw the word "gouging". I'm disappointed. In my opinion, BMW is really leaving a lot of money on the table here...
You're NOT the boss of my testicle furs.
Good Day.
luxury brands
Volvo
lol what
I'm not sure even leases come out ahead here. Although the lessee doesn't get the full value of carplay over the lifetime of the vehicle, they also don't pay for the entire vehicle- only the depreciation on the vehicle for the period of the lease plus a profit margin. So, while it added $300 to the vehicle cost, it probably only added around $100 to the total lease payments over 3-years. Under this scheme, a 3-year lessee will pay $160 to have carplay for the duration.
I wonder if BMW drivers would use turn signals if they were Apple branded and cost more?
Great. SaaS coming to cars now. Just what we need.
I really wish this SaaS model would die.
Well, people have the same kind of complaint that luxury hotels charge their customers for wifi access (who are already paying top $ for the room). It's a price discrimination, willingness to pay thing.
Separately, BMW is falling way behind in awareness of consumer preferences for technology. They're relegating the product ownership of this stuff to a stepchild, while consumers are actually viewing it one of the core experiences of driving now. This is a mistake.
...unless you're a socialist.
Volvo is positioned as a luxury brand. It was under Ford and continues to be so under Geely.
Not sure why downvoted... I guess people are just jealous that you got first post and used it to make a good point.
Apple and Google provide the software saving the embarrassment of whatever (most likely inferior) software devs BMW could hire to make their own. Then they have the audacity to charge for Apple's and Google's work. Get fukt, BMW.
While GM is offering Android Auto & Carplay on most of their cars, they are starting to introduce ads into their infotainment. Just another reason to disconnect the onstar modem if tracking your ever move weren't enough.
Carplay isn't a service. It's a pair of software programs, one runs in your car - the other on your phone. Bizarre. BMW must want their customers to switch to Android, maybe they have an investment in Google or one of the Android handset manufacturers.
Actually the head end has very little software, it's just like a hardware VNC. The UI is entirely dependent on iOS or Android. It also means bug fixes and enhancements to the UI come with OS updates.
For BMW to charge $80/mo is pure larceny.
Make sure everyone's vote counts: Verified Voting
Hey, centuries ago called. News papers, news broadcasts, and news websites contain, and have contained for decades editorial content. This is nothing new, or nefarious. The headline calls out that this is a commentary piece, not a news piece.
They says that for leases, the 'pay per year' method is cheaper, but let's boil that down.
On a three year least, with the 'pay per year' method, you'll pay $0 for your first year and $80 for each of your next two years. So $160 total.
If you leased the car with the one-time $300 fee, you don't pay $300. You pay Sales Price minus Residual. And the residual on some of these cars is up to ~60% of sales price. So lets say that the residual on a BMW is 58%, that means Car Play would have cost you $300* 0.42 = $126! Still cheaper! You'd have to have a residual less than 47% for the new method to be worth it.
Lol at saving BMW owners money. BMW owners exist just to have their money extracted.
Way back in the day, one of the many reasons I went with the PS3 vs the Xbox360, was that they didn't require an anual fee to access services that were not provided by their network (youtube, netflix, etc...)
Way back in the before times, I had a Blackberry provided by my employer. It was on Verizon. The device had GPS hardware built in, and Google Maps was already a thing. But as soon as I activated with Verizon, they remotely disabled the GPS. For an additional $4.95/month I could have "Blackberry Navigation", which was a worse implementation of Google Maps.
Nope, no sig
You apparently need to go and sit in a Volvo. They are most definitely luxury cars, at least on a par with Audi and BMW, though not on a par with Porsche and Bentley.
This isn't Apple - they don't charge for CarPlay. I don't pay anything extra for it in my Kia.
...you shouldn't be buying a BMW.
Have you seen what a new Volvo costs these days?
It's in the same bracket as Mercedes/BMW/Audi/etc
Apple should, in their contract to car makers, request 70% of any fee's collected for feature accessibility... no fee no problem, you take a fee, it goes to Apple.
If BMW was interested in making Carplay more palatable to those who lease, they'd eliminate the fee altogether. Making people pay for integration with an infotainment system that has a UI so terrible it's legendary while it's totally free on the most "pedestrian" vehicles is beyond stupid/greedy.
~Any apparent grammatical or typographic errors are caused by defects in your display device.
We don't?
No sale, then, absolutely.
To a Lisp hacker, XML is S-expressions in drag.
It's not Apple charging this recurring fee.. it's BMW. No other car maker (that I know of) does this or intends to.
World's smallest violin...etc.
Question: "What's the difference between a BMW and a cactus?"
Answer: "With one of them, the prick is on the outside."
This isn't Apple - they don't charge for CarPlay. I don't pay anything extra for it in my Kia.
See my comment above. The article says that BMW is claiming this is a flowdown of an Apple fee.
As the new "features" of cars become more and more software-based, I expect monthly subscription fee presence to become more and more universal. It is a lot easier to enable a feature implemented in software (just toggle a flag), than it is to bring the car back to the dealer and install a feature that requires hardware. So as the focus of features becomes the dashboard display and the software that enables it, the car manufacturers are only going to exploit those features more and more for their monthly revenue stream.
My wife has an expensive BMW convertible with 90K miles. From a drivetrain POV, it is a piece of crap that has already topped $10K in maintenance and repairs and strands someone about three times a year with a cranking problem that has survived multiple expensive repair attempts. I have also heard many stories from other BMW owners of having to leave their sub 100K mile vehicles at the dealer overnight for repairs even while still under warranty. They often actually count themselves as "satisfied customers" due to the "wonderful service". Go figure.
My Hyundai Sante Fe, on the other hand, has over 160K miles on it and has never stranded anyone. It has had some repairs, but the total on them is less than $5K, the most expensive was a full brake system rework that was my fault, it has always made it to the shop on its own, and the repairs were always same day.
I am convinced that BMW owners include a high percentage of people who get off on financial domination. BMW is happy to be their money mistress/master. If BMW were to sell the vehicles to them as parts to be assembled by the dealership for double the factory price, they'd happily go for it. This is BMW's unique appeal.
You could argue that BMW drivers don't deserve this, but Apple users certainly do.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
Today I was looking into buying a car radio with Appleplay and Android Auto.
So I found a Pioneer radio and did a bit of googling to see what people says about it and I discovered that it had problems with IOS 11.
https://www.pioneer-car.eu/eur...
Now this radio was a new radio released in 2017 so one would assume that a update would fix it, but I have been unable to find any evidence that the issue have been resolved.(and I need a 1-din radio of which there are few options)
So apparently now your radio needs software updates to stay useful and keep functioning with the same feature set and I am guessing BMW wants money to keep programming and delivering software updates?
L'Idiot
And if you just want an ordinary car with CarPlay, Honda Accords have them.
It's an interface! Hack the fucker and put Android Auto on it!
According to the article, Apple is changing their fee structure so the cost is being passed onto the customer. Besides if you lease a BMW car, $300 for a 3 year lease is more expensive than 1 year free and 2 years @ $80 each year.
my cheap mirage g4 has aa/cp
Presumably you understand that you are buying a BMW and how much you will be wasting upfront and on maintenance/fuel costs. And that you can have "CarPlay" for $10 one time investment.. Let's not even go into Apple tax. If money is not an object for you, what do you care either way on buy vs subscribe? All things being equal, I would go for subscription. A lot of things could change by the time a purchase would break even in 4 years - I may not drive the same car, I may not use iPhone (I don't know, but I also may not in future) or CarPlay hardware/software may change without good support from BMW. At least subscription revenue might motivate BMW to offer support and upgrades. Not like with the useless 30 pin iPod jack on my wife's car.
Well, this is nothing compared to per-click fee for using turn signals I have to pay on my BMW. Why else do you think I change lanes without a warning, as if I have a death wish? I am not a maniac, I simply cannot afford to signal.
The problem with Audis is the huge dashboard. I mean WTF, the thing looks as big as a kitchen table.
I'm sure there are many, many options/features on cars that include licensing, and you already pay a premium for advanced infotainment systems. Those tend not to have recurring charges outside your purchase or lease price. At best, that's just an excuse from BMW.
Rents are the future of innovation.
Taste the Freedum!
Who is RTFM and when will he help me with Unix?
...who gives a FUCK about BMW drivers??
The more pain they suffer, the better.
Hell Hyundai Canada just released an update that added CarPlay to my 2015 Sonata. And it was DIY if you wanted; go to a website, put in the VIN, download the update, get it on to an SD card, and apply it to the car. Done and done.
Vintage computer games and RPG books available. Email me if you're interested.
BMW is making a profit off of an apple product and apple not getting its 30%!!! Release the lawyers.
But crap just like this and unreasonable dealer fees made me leave, I am a person that once you lose my business I never return because your money is the only true voice you have.
Is there some way in which I can boycott, in protest, misbehavior of a corporation when I was not planning to buy their products ANYWAY? I suppose I could buy a shirt emblazoned with "Fuck BMW" but somehow, I don't think it would really have any effect besides making people wonder, "why is that guy wearing a 'Fuck BMW' shirt?" and "What did they ever do to him"? To this I would be obliged to reply, "well, they're planning to start CHARGING their customers for using Apple CarPlay!" to which they'd likely reply, "so what, they're rich assholes in the first place, so fuck 'em" and I'd be virtually forced to respond, "you know what, I think you may have a point there." Then I might perhaps have to turn my shirt inside-out.
Our reign has gone on long enough. Indeed. Summon the meteors.
They says that for leases, the 'pay per year' method is cheaper, but let's boil that down.
On a three year least, with the 'pay per year' method, you'll pay $0 for your first year and $80 for each of your next two years. So $160 total.
If you leased the car with the one-time $300 fee, you don't pay $300. You pay Sales Price minus Residual. And the residual on some of these cars is up to ~60% of sales price. So lets say that the residual on a BMW is 58%, that means Car Play would have cost you $300* 0.42 = $126! Still cheaper! You'd have to have a residual less than 47% for the new method to be worth it.
You are assuming that the CarPlay license is part of that residual. Is CarPlay transferable to the new owner? Are you sure the "remainder" of the CarPlay fee goes into the residual value? I expect CarPlay is outside that residual. The residual is supposed to be the wholesale value of the car. If CarPlay is not transferable it can not be part of that value.
I want cars to be sold with an empty double-DIN slot. If you want a radio or entertainment or whatever installed that should be from a third party. Anything else is anti-competitive practices and this would be solved if BMW and others didn't have the EU wrapped around their finger.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
My wife has an expensive BMW convertible with 90K miles. From a drivetrain POV, it is a piece of crap that has already topped $10K in maintenance and repairs and strands someone about three times a year with a cranking problem that has survived multiple expensive repair attempts.
I have a 13 year old Z4 convertible, I have consistently spent $1,000 to $1,500 on repairs each year out of the last 6 out-of-warrant years. Repairs have been things that wear out over time.
I have also heard many stories from other BMW owners of having to leave their sub 100K mile vehicles at the dealer overnight for repairs even while still under warranty. They often actually count themselves as "satisfied customers" due to the "wonderful service". Go figure.
Yes, because that service includes a free loaner if they need your car overnight. The free loaner still occurs after the warranty expires. So leaving the car is largely a non-issue.
In the United States, that's illegal. They can't force you to use the dealer for service
Yet John Deere has been doing just that by asserting anti-circumvention law on its tractors' firmware. Which cases have defined the boundary between Magnuson-Moss and the DMCA?
If Kia can put Apple Car Play into even their cheapest base model cars as a standard feature, why the hell does BMW need to charge money (either a one-off fee or a monthly fee) for the thing?
The problem with something like this is that they're trying to extend the subscription model to everything. It's part of the physical goods makers' obsession with making consumers pay for a product over and over rather than owning it outright.
With rare exceptions, there are 2 types of people who buy BMWs:
- People who "rent" them on a throwaway basis on 2/3-year business leases, who will only pay $160 or $240 to rent CarPlay access before they turn it back in for another one. Even if it was $500 a year, the people in this set probably wouldn't blink an eye.
- People who buy them used because they like the cars, who will now not benefit from a pre-activiated CarPlay. Even many enthusiasts don't buy BMWs new...they're too expensive and it makes sense to let some doctor or real estate agent eat the depreciation.
BMW fans and Apple fans are also in the union part of that particular Venn diagram for the most part, so I'm really surprised they're doing this. Not really though...lately, they've been doing things like requiring that key parts like the battery be "programmed" by the dealer before they work, and basically any part with space for flash memory in it is a target for this too. (Adaptive headlight controllers are a good example.) I imagine that just like Office 365 and Adobe Creative Cloud, consumers will just accept paying and paying to use something they bought.
It's too bad they're continuing down this road. Infotainment and other electronics are already fiddly enough once they age sufficiently, and now you have to pay to access them.
I don't need no infotainment in my car. Give me an AM/FM radio with a USB port to plug a thumbdrive with all my songs and that's all.
And please, could we have our climate control knobs back? Independant from the radio?
I'll probably be on the market for a new car in 2-3 years, but I'm afraid I won't find any car that will fit my requirements... I don't want an IOT car. Can I rip the antenna out?
I feel like I should browse the Classic Cars ads instead of going to dealerships.
Try it! Library of Babel
Prostitutes think carplay is good.
If they paid me, I still wouldnâ(TM)t use whatâ(TM)s essentially a crippled version of iOS.
Witness BitZtream getting pwned!... twice.....three times..... four times!
Not sure why downvoted...
Seriously, you're not sure. For real?
Maybe it's because this fuckwit constantly calls everyone else 'assholes' just because he can't bear the thought of anyone else not having the exact same opinion as his.
Since when is Volvo a luxary brand?
It's bitztream the autism-hating, custom EpiPen-hating, Musk-hating, Qualcomm-hating, Firefox tabs-hating, Slashdot editors-hating Slashdot troll!
The peak of usability. 3 knobs in the center, easy to locate by touch. Left is fan speed, middle is temperature, right is vent location. For the vent knob it's basically all the way to the left in he summer off in the middle and all the way to the right in the winter. Dirt simple to do with one hand without ever taking your eyes off the road.
How's life in the hypocrite lane?
Cadillac and Lincoln cannot be taken seriously as luxury vehicles. Moreover, you could not even buy them if you wanted to in most of the world.
See my comment above. The article says that BMW is claiming this is a flowdown of an Apple fee.
Clearly you failed at reading comprehension. TFA says:
He was told that Apple will be changing its fee structure such that manufacturers would need to pay on a per-car, per-annum basis to keep CarPlay running. That statement has since been retracted and a BMW Canada representative told me that Mr. Bubbers was given "inaccurate information."
funny thing is, i cant look at my phone while driving because is super unsafe, sometimes i even hear newspeople say things like i really should not maintain conversations while im driving because thats also unsafe, but somehow, probably magic, selling all these cars full of touchscreens is super fine and not a problem whatsoever
you know im kind of reveiving mixed signals here
subaru as well.
On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero.
Just don't buy a BMW.
Or just don't buy Apple products. Then you'll have enough to afford the BMW (the M240i in manual is fantastic).
Hell, of all the options I said no to on my M240i, Apple play is the one I honestly couldn't care less about.
Astin Martin
Good thing it's not an Aston Martin then
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.