Regardless of years of effort and the outlay of billions of {dollars}, not one of the world’s automakers have but to match Tesla’s prowess in delivering over-the-air (OTA) software program updates. Identical to together with your telephone and laptop computer, these working system refreshes permit homeowners to improve their vehicles remotely.
Tesla launched OTAs in 2012, however now Elon Musk’s firm pumps out these updates like no different automaker. “Tesla as soon as issued 42 updates inside six months,” Jean-Marie Lapeyre, Capgemini’s CTO for automotive, tells WIRED. However for a lot of different automakers, says Lapeyre, OTAs ship “perhaps annually.”
For conventional automotive corporations, software program stays, or has been till very lately, merely one bolt-on element amongst many. In distinction, for Tesla and different digital-native automakers—amongst them Rivian, Lucid, Polestar, and Chinese language manufacturers akin to BYD, Xpeng, and Xiaomi—it’s nearly the entire shebang.
Curiously, GM was really the primary automaker to introduce OTA performance, two years forward of Tesla, but it surely was restricted to the OnStar telematics system. OTAs from conventional automakers usually add simply infotainment tweaks, whereas OTAs from the digital-first manufacturers might be shape-shifters, growing vary and boosting pace. They usually additionally reward options from the puerile to the genuinely performative: fart noises on demand from Tesla, plusher suspension for Rivian homeowners, and automotive unlocking by telephone from Polestar.
Automobiles have had onboard microprocessors because the Nineteen Seventies, however till comparatively lately conventional automakers made their vehicles with software program designed to stay largely unchanged all through a automobile’s 20-year lifespan. Since 2021, the complexity of the newest automobile software program platforms has elevated by about 40 p.c per 12 months, estimates McKinsey. There are actually 69 million OTA-capable automobiles within the US, reckons S&P World.
Such software-defined automobiles, or SDVs, would enhance automotive gross sales, automakers hoped. In response to two scorecards measuring SDV progress, Tesla leads the pack. Gartner’s Digital Automaker Index for 2025 locations Chinese language EV producers Nio and Xiaomi in second and third positions, respectively. Wards Intelligence agrees these are the three to beat. On the opposite finish of the size, and much like the Wards evaluation, Nissan, Toyota, Mazda, and Jaguar Land Rover wallow on the backside.
Saving and Promoting
Completed proper, OTAs not solely freshen a automotive’s person expertise, they’ll additionally slash the price of recollects for automakers. Greater than 13 million automobiles have been recalled in 2024 because of software-related points, a 35 p.c improve over the prior 12 months. Earlier than OTAs, the common price of an auto recall was about $500 per automobile. OTAs could also be delivered wirelessly, however they don’t seem to be cost-free, both for the setting or for automakers—Harman Automotive, a provider of OTA software program, estimates that it prices an automaker $66.50 per automobile to ship a 1 GB replace.
However it’s normally solely the digital natives sending out large replace recordsdata, as a result of usually solely they’re able to firmware over-the-air (FOTA) updates. These can replace powertrains, battery administration, and braking methods. FOTA capabilities require vehicles—normally EVs—to have good, persistent connectivity and vital computing energy, a lot of it left latent for future updates. Lucid’s Gravity electrical SUV, for example, is supplied with the newest Nvidia Orin-X processor, with 512 GB of onboard storage, but the automobile’s OS suits on simply 100 GB, leaving oodles of room for later OTA refreshes.
As Western automotive firm revenues fall, automakers need to earn money from OTA-enabled subscriptions. Give Tesla $2,000 and, with the non-compulsory Acceleration Enhance, your EV might be unlocked over-the-air to grow to be a tire squeal faster off the mark. For an additional $10 a month, Tesla’s “premium connectivity” package deal provides streaming knowledge, dwell sentry cams, and different goodies. Need what critics declare is the misleadingly named Full Self Driving (FSD) Supervised characteristic? It’s yours for a further $99 a month.
