For many years, Tesla, Polestar, Volvo and some other EV drivers have enjoyed inbuilt trip planning.
Now, it seems BYD Seal owners are likely to receive the same feature with an upcoming over-the-air update.
According to an owner in Europe, the version 1.3.0 update contains multiple new upgrades including what the company is calling “EV trip charging planner function on Navigation”.
This was shared by a BYD Seal owner Jason O on X and sounds a lot like trip planning seen in some of Australia’s best-selling vehicles like those made by Tesla.
@LudicrousFeed Rolling out in Ireland. pic.twitter.com/gmyd3RYWdo
— Jason Oakley (@WauloK) August 19, 2024
With trip planning, the in-car navigation system automatically calculates the destination arrival range of the car along with working out charging stops needed for long trips.
This has been a much requested feature in BYD vehicles so it’s good to see it being rolled out to some BYD Seal customers in Europe.
On the back of this development, owners of local BYD Seal owners were excited with one saying: “Looking forward to testing the EV charge planning function of the navigation. That has been a big gap”.
Others were impressed by just the frequency of the OTAs on the Seal: “Wow! I know we are always wanting more but honestly, I think the speed on these OTAs is being fantastic!! What is this… the third this year? Quite impressed”.
Recently, BYD also rolled out a sudden update to allow Seal owners to be able to use a digital key instead of a physical one.
That feature has been well received by those owners and is expected to be rolled out to other models in the line up
BYD Seal has been a popular model for the brand and it’s sales have been out performing the Atto 3 in 2024. With pricing starting at under $50,000, it’s been seeing stable month after month sales.
Currently, it’s unclear if and when this update with trip planning will start arriving to owners here in Australia or the functionality it would add to local vehicles after it lands.
Riz is the founder of carloop based in Melbourne, specialising in Australian EV data, insight reports and trends. He is a mechanical engineer who spent the first 7 years of his career building transport infrastructure before starting carloop. He has a passion for cars, particularly EVs and wants to help reduce transport emissions in Australia. He currently drives a red Tesla Model 3.