My concerns as a potential Rivian Owner

[mike2191]

I‘ve been driving a Rivian since 2022. R1T and R1s. No issues at all. I’ve been very happy with it. they are my 1st EV brand.

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[dekeen]

Yeah…

With a list like this and the tone you’ve already set…I’d wait.

It’s a car, not a life or death decision. Do your research, if it isn’t for you, move on or wait, but you’re setting yourself up for failure already.

Yep

 

[rapPayne]

• Demo drive times are poor
  • I live in the greater DFW area currently and the service center has no demo drives on the weekends?? How's a working person supposed to get over there without taking time of of work. I shouldn't have to take time off of work (the latest appointment is 6:15 pm, which can mean leaving work early if you know DFW traffic).

I'm in Richardson/Far North Garland near Jupiter and 190. Holler and I'll let you drive my R1S all you want. We'll grab a coffee and maybe I can alleviate some (but not) all of your concerns.

 

[orionexp]

I've been wanting a Rivian for a couple of years and seriously considering for a few months now. I've been lurking around here, Reddit, and watching a ton of YouTube videos. I compiled a list of fairly important items that I thought I'd post to see whether things I've read about have been resolved, or to flag for Rivian corporate what's between me and dropping $100k on one of their cars.

Important issues to me:

• Ride height adjustment can life up while trying to hook up trailer (safety concern)
• Infotainment maps sub par compared to Apple/Google. I navigate all the time and expect very accurate directions, POIs, traffic, offline downloads, etc.
• No vehicle to load adapter
  • The idea of plugging into one of those solar chargers as an intermediary may alleviate this concern
• No native NACS and adapters not readily available
• Want more aggressive regen and less friction brakes
  • I will be taking it on a lot of mountain roads and getting the most out of regen is big. I have a Polestar 2 currently and the friction brakes virtually never get used and the blending of regen and friction is so seamless I'm surprised Rivian is noted as being so aggressive on the friction brakes
• Apple Music costs more and needs a special subscription
• Gen 2 AC/Heat pump is loud/vibrating
• No native way to use text messages through infotainment (kind of a safety issue here too)
• Service time is very long
• Demo drive times are poor
  • I live in the greater DFW area currently and the service center has no demo drives on the weekends?? How's a working person supposed to get over there without taking time of of work. I shouldn't have to take time off of work (the latest appointment is 6:15 pm, which can mean leaving work early if you know DFW traffic).

Annoyances but not critical:

• The support site is so lean on details about the car. Interior dimensions, battery statistics, etc.
• Disabled blind spot monitoring while trailering.
• Autonomy driving has been described as that it kind of bounces between the lane rather than staying centered (or ideally Manual Lane Biasing like Lucid)
• Limited interior pictures compared to competitors (which have, e.g. 3D views)
• Website is not clear at all what the difference between "Adventure" and "Ascend" is.
• I'd like to see the company profitable so that I know there's some longevity to the brand. I'm willing to take a risk on the brand, but would want to see the product itself move past the "beta" phase since it's a generation 2 premium product commanding a premium price tag.

Everyone has different criteria on what they need/want in a vehicle. I've owned the R1T for over two years now. I don't do a lot of long trips. Usually two, possibly three a year. So 99.5% of the time I'm charging at home. The only trailer I tow is a flatbed for rafting and it's a fairly lightweight trailer at that.
For me, I'm happy with the Bluetooth connecting my phone to the truck. I don't need CarPlay or anything similar. They now have system works fine and most of the time. It's not 100%, but close. The high Regen is more than adequate, and I rarely ever use the brakes. This is without a doubt the finest vehicle I've ever owned by far. I can't speak to any of your concerns, because they haven't happened. Buying a vehicle, especially one with a lot of new technology can be a bit of a gamble. But I think this one more than exceeded my expectations. And some of the issues you have may be addressed in software updates which happen in every 5 to 6 weeks. The vehicle has changed so much in the two years I've had it that if I thought about all that, it would make my head spin. It's basically a new vehicle from what it was two years ago. What will it be like in another year?
It's good that you're questioning these things and eventually will decide if it's a go or no go at this time. I'm already jealous of the Gen2 vehicles that are starting to reach consumers.

 

[Rivian Head]

I've been wanting a Rivian for a couple of years and seriously considering for a few months now. I've been lurking around here, Reddit, and watching a ton of YouTube videos. I compiled a list of fairly important items that I thought I'd post to see whether things I've read about have been resolved, or to flag for Rivian corporate what's between me and dropping $100k on one of their cars.

Important issues to me:

• Ride height adjustment can life up while trying to hook up trailer (safety concern)
• Infotainment maps sub par compared to Apple/Google. I navigate all the time and expect very accurate directions, POIs, traffic, offline downloads, etc.
• No vehicle to load adapter
  • The idea of plugging into one of those solar chargers as an intermediary may alleviate this concern
• No native NACS and adapters not readily available
• Want more aggressive regen and less friction brakes
  • I will be taking it on a lot of mountain roads and getting the most out of regen is big. I have a Polestar 2 currently and the friction brakes virtually never get used and the blending of regen and friction is so seamless I'm surprised Rivian is noted as being so aggressive on the friction brakes
• Apple Music costs more and needs a special subscription
• Gen 2 AC/Heat pump is loud/vibrating
• No native way to use text messages through infotainment (kind of a safety issue here too)
• Service time is very long
• Demo drive times are poor
  • I live in the greater DFW area currently and the service center has no demo drives on the weekends?? How's a working person supposed to get over there without taking time of of work. I shouldn't have to take time off of work (the latest appointment is 6:15 pm, which can mean leaving work early if you know DFW traffic).

Annoyances but not critical:

• The support site is so lean on details about the car. Interior dimensions, battery statistics, etc.
• Disabled blind spot monitoring while trailering.
• Autonomy driving has been described as that it kind of bounces between the lane rather than staying centered (or ideally Manual Lane Biasing like Lucid)
• Limited interior pictures compared to competitors (which have, e.g. 3D views)
• Website is not clear at all what the difference between "Adventure" and "Ascend" is.
• I'd like to see the company profitable so that I know there's some longevity to the brand. I'm willing to take a risk on the brand, but would want to see the product itself move past the "beta" phase since it's a generation 2 premium product commanding a premium price tag.

All Your concerns are legit, but for me the deciding factor is lack of Tesla level autonomy option. When you pay this kind of money, I want it as an available option. After driving FSD for 2 months, I will not want it any other way. Otherwise it is a fine vehicle that does everything decently well, and will satisfy most of consumers. It doesn’t have any major flaws otherwise. I have owned both R1T and R1S, but will not order another Rivian unless they drastically improve its autonomy to FSD level.

 

[s4wrxttcs]

My recommendation would be to test drive a Gen 2 vehicle.

I think we can safely exclude Gen 1 from your list because it fails the regen test.

Regen doesn't work consistently on Mountain roads due to heat generation which disables the regen.

The good news is its sucks so bad that it was an area in which they knew they had to improve on. So I expect Gen 2 to be better.

Not sure what the gold standard is as far as regen capability to compare again. At some point physics simply limits what can be done.

 

[amcg3]

Don’t get one. Hope you find something that will check all your boxes.

 

[BuckyThreadkiller]

Mine's a similar story. Looked and lurked for years. I took off work on Thursday afternoon to do my appointment at the Dallas SC. It's worth it, The guy walked me around the truck and then handed me the keys and said try and have it back in half an hour. I looked for the worst roads I could find (not hard over by Love Field,) jumped on Stemmons to see how it liked freeway traffic and tried everything I could. I ordered on Saturday.

 

[logan]

Just commenting on two items in case it helps with your decision making.

<snip>
Important issues to me:

• Ride height adjustment can life up while trying to hook up trailer (safety concern)

FWIW, we tow all the time and this really isn't an issue. Yes, it will level if the rear is pushed down but it is delayed and gradual. Basically only happens after you are hooked up. Does not create a safety issue. I doubt most people even notice and it doesn't do the reverse so when you are lifting for hooking up weight distributing bars there is no action.

• No native NACS and adapters not readily available

Third party adapters like Lectron and A2Z are readily available.

 

[Rivian Head]

Another big issue is unacceptably long wait time for a service. Just got a warning saying my motor needs a service. 2 months wait time..?meanwhile I can not tow my boat to a lake, there goes my summer plan. So ridiculous

 

[blueberrybeat]

tl;dr I am very happy with the R1S. A lot of the original concerns ended up not being a big deal or a misunderstanding.

Well... despite the concerns, I ended up getting a Trimax delivered yesterday. I thought it would be right to go back and revisit the list that y'all helped me think about a few months ago.


Important issues to me:

• Ride height adjustment can life up while trying to hook up trailer (safety concern)
  • This I haven't tested out yet but the responses from others were comforting that I was making this a bigger worry than it warranted.
• Infotainment maps sub par compared to Apple/Google. I navigate all the time and expect very accurate directions, POIs, traffic, offline downloads, etc.
  • Background: I exclusively used Google Maps for many years, and then started using exclusively Apple Maps on CarPlay for the last 2 years. The Rivian navigation is good enough it seems. Traffic seems similarly accurate as Apple Maps, POI search has been good for me, and the actual map legibility is also good. I do miss detailed navigation views for turns (e.g. at complex highway interchanges, seeing the actual layout of the road/turn). If Google and Apple Maps got an "A", Rivian navigation is a "B".
• No vehicle to load adapter
  • The idea of plugging into one of those solar chargers as an intermediary may alleviate this concern
  • I am still interested in this and intend to fully kit my house in the next few years with solar, so I hope that a solution matures in that timeframe. In the meantime, some "lightweight" backup with a solar generator intermediary or a direct extension cord seems like it's serving folks well in a pinch (as evidenced by posts about Hurricane outages).
• No native NACS and adapters not readily available
  • Rivian is now sending this shortly after deliver for new vehicles.
• Want more aggressive regen and less friction brakes
  • I will be taking it on a lot of mountain roads and getting the most out of regen is big. I have a Polestar 2 currently and the friction brakes virtually never get used and the blending of regen and friction is so seamless I'm surprised Rivian is noted as being so aggressive on the friction brakes
  • This was a point I was confused on; one pedal driving remains regen braking only and the friction brakes only blend upon hitting the brake pedal. I have not yet towed in mountains, but around town and on highways I've been very satisfied with the regen braking.
• Apple Music costs more and needs a special subscription
  • The features added since my original post (wifi, Google POIs, live cam) make the $15/month acceptable to me.
    
• Gen 2 AC/Heat pump is loud/vibrating
  • When stopped and quiet, the AC is noticeable (noise and mild vibration) but only because everything is quiet and still. I've not noticed it at all with temps in upper 90s while driving.
• No native way to use text messages through infotainment (kind of a safety issue here too)
  • This is still a bummer, but in Gen 2 I found that with my phone on the charge pad (doesn't seem to move too much, as others complained about?), I can just say "Siri, send a message to XXX" and then the music will quiet down on the car and I can speak to the phone though the car microphone. This was actually pretty seamless. I haven't yet gotten inbound texts while driving, so I'm not sure what that experience is like.
• Service time is very long
  • Vehicle was flawless (knock on wood) upon delivery, so I haven't had direct experience with this to comment.
• Demo drive times are poor
  • I live in the greater DFW area currently and the service center has no demo drives on the weekends?? How's a working person supposed to get over there without taking time of of work. I shouldn't have to take time off of work (the latest appointment is 6:15 pm, which can mean leaving work early if you know DFW traffic).
  • This was relatively tough to schedule still. I ended up having a day off of work for other things and was able to schedule time during the day to do this (two+ weeks in advance). They let me use the car for 20 minutes solo (Gen1 Quad) and I was convinced enough to put down a deposit for a custom order afterwards.

Annoyances but not critical:

• The support site is so lean on details about the car. Interior dimensions, battery statistics, etc.
  Still somewhat frustrating to try to figure out available options (e.g. how Adventure trims lose the rear cubbies... how are you supposed to know this as a potential buyer?).
• Disabled blind spot monitoring while trailering.
  TBD, still need to trailer something.
• Autonomy driving has been described as that it kind of bounces between the lane rather than staying centered (or ideally Manual Lane Biasing like Lucid)
  Highway driving has been very smooth, very satisfied compared to the pilot mode on my 2021 Polestar.
• Limited interior pictures compared to competitors (which have, e.g. 3D views)
  Still somewhat frustrating to try to figure out available options (e.g. how Adventure trims lose the rear cubbies... how are you supposed to know this as a potential buyer?).
• Website is not clear at all what the difference between "Adventure" and "Ascend" is.
  see prior point
• I'd like to see the company profitable so that I know there's some longevity to the brand. I'm willing to take a risk on the brand, but would want to see the product itself move past the "beta" phase since it's a generation 2 premium product commanding a premium price tag.
  I think the product is incredibly solid but I do feel a bit like it's "in development" still. No VTL, underbaked Driver+ still, audio system still working out kinks, and software holes (texting, "B" rated navigation, no auto-trip stats, no podcasts app).

---
Other thoughts as an owner now:

• Build quality is top notch, everything feels and looks great.
  • People complained about the doors but compared to doors I have recent experience with (Subaru, VW, Polestar, Mazda, Ford, Kia) , the Rivian's have the most umph and premium feel.
  • Only thing I have not gone totally smooth is trying to set up a USB stick for the Gear Guard recording. I seem to have the issue described as fixed in the 2024.35 update, but that update hasn't come to my vehicle yet.
• Forest green with range wheels is an incredibly nice sight to behold.
• Trimax is lovely and launch mode is fun. Coming from a Polestar 2 (and before that a Golf GTI) which was quick and super well balanced as a driver's car, I'm a little bit disappointed in the driving dynamics of the Rivian. However, I test drove an iX and an EV9 and much much prefer the Rivian's sport mode + all purpose over those two. I think it's probably as good as it gets for a seven seater. It's still a lot of fun to drive in sport, and is much comfier when in all-purpose mode (the ability to pick and choose is really nice).
• Premium Audio system has been very polarizing. My hot takeas someone who has previously dabbled in audio gear and likes a quality listening setup:
  • The songs sound as they should via a very neutral, clean, and crisp setup overall, which is what I prefer. Music is very subjective and perceptually different to different people. Some (most?) people like to have a richer mix (e.g. why a lot of people prefer the non-neutral sound of Beats or AirPods Max over something more neutral like a Sennheiser 600. My thought is that most of the complaints come from folks with a preference towards a less neutral sound. Kind of akin to color saturation in photos, some people like a slightly more saturated look.
  • The one area where I would agree with the complaints is that the bass is lacking in power (and maybe depth, but hard to tell since it's much less pronounced that I expected in bass rich songs).
• Dynamic Glass Roof and overall sun ingress in Texas has been totally fine, no issues but I haven't had any mid-summer experience of course. My guess is that I would end up tinting the other windows.
• I wish the compact spare was available from the shop... it's been OOS for months now.
• I'll make another post about the order/purchase process in the Gen 2 order thread sometime soon.
• Charging pad and phone slipping around hasn't been a big deal, a little bit of movement but I don't think it's impaired charging.
• I have fears about people's stories that something (m&m, airpod, coin) falling into the floor vents. I would love easy suggestions to fix this, or if someone had a 3d printed grill to aid in the defense.

 

[shap]

Everybody has a different perspective and demands from 100k cars. Coming from BMW X5 45e(I still own it). Rivian (R1T 23 in my case, quad) is a nice car and had very minimal issues (5 visits to SC, mostly alignments and AC). It is a capable vehicle, with good offroad and on-road options, and great clearance.

Said that IMHO, this car does not justify the price tag, either by internal salon luxury or technology.

1. ADAS in Gen1 (I do not think GEN2 is a way different for now, maybe in the future) is subpair not just to X5 but even to the cheapest Kia. No traffic jam assist, works only on particular roads, disengages with even slight correction, etc. So if you are looking for a good ADAS for long trips - Rivian is not for you, at least now. They use a bad implementation of Mobileye right now.

2. Software stack - many would praise Rivian for its being software on wheels. However, a number of software bugs and time that takes Rivian to fix them, and constant regressions - I wonder where their development is done. Software is kind of "ok", but nothing special. After 2 years it still can not do many things reliably and needs a soft reset occasionally. Having a phantom drain of less than 1 kwh per day seems to be impossible unless you trickle charge 12V battery.

So it all depends on what you need. For me having dog mode, access to Tesla SC, and having a truck bed is critical. But if I want a leather luxury salon, massage seats, superior steering and handling, and an amazing air suspension drive - I take the X5

All this is very personal, but one thing is objective - when you buy the car, do not base your decision on what features the manufacturer says they will add in the future. Do not trust anyone with this.

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