Tesla spoils its customers for Christmas with the 2024 Holiday Update. This remote update (OTA) is particularly full of new features this year, although not all of them are of the same ilk. Here are the ones that will most interest drivers of the brand's vehicles.
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An app for Apple Watch
The first new feature, undoubtedly one of the most anticipated, only concerns users of the Apple ecosystem and more precisely the brand's connected watches. Thus, the Tesla application is now available on watchOS, which allows you to use your Apple Watch as a hands-free key to access and start your car.
Hopefully, Tesla will now work on developing a counterpart to this application for Android and Wear OS connected watch users.
Automatic switching between forward and reverse
The latest Tesla Model 3, which does entirely without controls, allows you to activate an Autoshift function which automatically engages forward (D or drive) or reverse (R or reverse) when the car is parked, depending on the position of the vehicle. From now on, it will be possible to let the car automatically switch between forward and reverse gear during maneuvers, without going through the P (park) position.
A reversing traffic alert
When reversing, the car will now be able to alert the driver of the presence of a pedestrian or even a vehicle. This traffic alert, which many manufacturers already offer, will be both visual and audible. This new feature concerns all cars in the Tesla range.
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The route planner is getting better
While most electric cars now come with a route planner, not all are created equal. The Teslas benefit from a fairly precise planner, but which still lacked a very useful function, that of defining a minimum charge level on arrival. This will now be possible, for example to ensure that you can leave your destination if it does not have a charging solution.
Dashcam and Sentinel mode become more practical
The Tesla's integrated dashcam and their famous Sentinel mode, which monitors the surroundings of the car when it is stationary, are very useful functions of the brand's cars. However, to retrieve their recordings, it was still necessary to read the USB key in the glove box. Now recordings can be downloaded directly from the Tesla app, which seems much more convenient.
And the rest
If these improvements are not revolutionary, they are still welcome and the content of the Christmas 2024 update is far from stopping there. There are still many new developments, but not always as important. Tesla listed them in an article on X.
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