What is your Go-To Trip Planner?

[TeslaToRivian]

Brief background: Long time Tesla driver here, making the conversion to an R1T. After waiting about two years, I am scheduled to pick up my Rivian next weekend!

Meanwhile, I am already starting to feel something I never felt in a Tesla: range anxiety. Tesla makes it really, really easy to plan a trip. Punch in an address in the Nav and it tells you exactly what to do: Where to stop; how long until your next stop; it even tells you when you can stop charging at any given stop based on the final destination.

It appears that Rivian offers a similar concept, but does it work? Can you rely on the Rivian nav to point you in the right direction for the best charging options, or do you have to rely on a third party app?

My Rivian guide actually suggested A Better Route Planner. I have been playing with the web based version (not sure if there is an iPhone app) and I find it a bit user unfriendly. Is this your go-to for planning a trip?

My first trip would be from the factory in Normal to St. Louis, which is about 180 miles.

Sponsored

 

[astonius]

The Rivian nav is hit-or-miss. It does have route planning, but it's not as elegant or bulletproof as Tesla's since they don't manage their own network. (Edit: well, technically they do, but it's not quite the same scale!)

I find ABRP to be pretty damn good, though you'll want to pair it with PlugShare to make sure the chargers aren't having issues.

 

[zefram47]

ABRP for route planning and PlugShare for checking reports on charger status.

 

[ForestGump]

A Better Route Planner (ABRP) is your EV's best friend when planning a road trip. Having planned and successfully taken cross country Tesla road trips, I have already planned out future R1T trips in ABRP, including Yosemite. However, since my start/finish are in southern Cal, your route will be different. Combining ABRP with Plusgshare (for charging reliability) is always key to my route planning. I signed up for ABRP premium although the free version is a great starting point.

HTH

 

[Yellow Buddy]

Brief background: Long time Tesla driver here, making the conversion to an R1T. After waiting about two years, I am scheduled to pick up my Rivian next weekend!

Meanwhile, I am already starting to feel something I never felt in a Tesla: range anxiety. Tesla makes it really, really easy to plan a trip. Punch in an address in the Nav and it tells you exactly what to do: Where to stop; how long until your next stop; it even tells you when you can stop charging at any given stop based on the final destination.

It appears that Rivian offers a similar concept, but does it work? Can you rely on the Rivian nav to point you in the right direction for the best charging options, or do you have to rely on a third party app?

My Rivian guide actually suggested A Better Route Planner. I have been playing with the web based version (not sure if there is an iPhone app) and I find it a bit user unfriendly. Is this your go-to for planning a trip?

My first trip would be from the factory in Normal to St. Louis, which is about 180 miles.

Former/Current Tesla driver here, and range anxiety definitely came back after years of no longer worrying...hopefully this helps.

1 - Can you rely on Rivian's nav? In my experience, no. Or at best loosely to identify the correct chargers. It's way too conservative IMO but the bigger problem is that the routing is terrible.

2 - ABRP - I've used this before I go on a trip. I always run several situations so I know what I'm dealing with. I've been a little hesitant with the R1T calculations as they don't seem as accurate, but it's still my go to.

3 - PlugShare - You didn't ask but I'm throwing it in. It's a pretty terrible trip planner as it doesn't tell you when to charge. But it's great for telling you when you're coming up on a charger, type of charger, and give you a sense as to if it's working. This is the one I pull up if I'm getting driver fatigue and looking for a place to stop anyway. It's my go to bailout planner.

So as you can see, like others on here 2 & 3 are used in combination frequently. Maybe one day one will buy the other and we'll have the ultimate tool...

 

[TeslaToRivian]

Former/Current Tesla driver here, and range anxiety definitely came back after years of no longer worrying...hopefully this helps.

1 - Can you rely on Rivian's nav? In my experience, no. Or at best loosely to identify the correct chargers. It's way too conservative IMO but the bigger problem is that the routing is terrible.

2 - ABRP - I've used this before I go on a trip. I always run several situations so I know what I'm dealing with. I've been a little hesitant with the R1T calculations as they don't seem as accurate, but it's still my go to.

3 - PlugShare - You didn't ask but I'm throwing it in. It's a pretty terrible trip planner as it doesn't tell you when to charge. But it's great for telling you when you're coming up on a charger, type of charger, and give you a sense as to if it's working. This is the one I pull up if I'm getting driver fatigue and looking for a place to stop anyway. It's my go to bailout planner.

So as you can see, like others on here 2 & 3 are used in combination frequently. Maybe one day one will buy the other and we'll have the ultimate tool...

Great stuff. Thank you!

Can you tell me a little about your history of driving Tesla vs. Rivian? You still have a Tesla? Your thoughts on the Rivian? I know they are very different cars with different purposes.

Thanks.

 

[Dark-Fx]

My first trip would be from the factory in Normal to St. Louis, which is about 180 miles.

Just plug your destination in the Nav and go. 180 miles won't matter unless it's actively snowing and you're trying to drive 85 mph.

 

[Yellow Buddy]

Great stuff. Thank you!

Can you tell me a little about your history of driving Tesla vs. Rivian? You still have a Tesla? Your thoughts on the Rivian? I know they are very different cars with different purposes.

Thanks.

I still have my Tesla been driving it since 2016 and have had 3 of them.

I have about 7,000 miles on the R1T.

The transition from a Tesla to a Rivian is an easy one with the major difference being the charging network. But otherwise the feel and operations is very close.

I will also add that after posting, I just finished a 600 mile drive. It’s a drive I did with my model X and averaged 365-385Wh/mi. On the R1T/Conserve/22s I averaged 393Wh/mi.

ABRP wanted me to stop 3 times. The built in Nav wanted me to stop 2x. Both taking very different paths.

I ended up stopping once and made it with 15% charge remaining. I used that one stop for bathroom and to grab lunch, it took 38 minutes in total. I didn’t wait for the truck, I left as soon as I was ready. Normally I stop 4x in the Tesla.

I flipped back and forth a number of times but I eventually settled on having Waze on my phone, and Nav on the R1T - silenced. The GOM has been pretty spot on and it’s a trip I’ve taken multiple times…so I just rolled the dice. I ignored all the charging stops and other directions and just followed Waze until I dropped under 50 miles of range. Once I did that, I just looked for the nearest EA/Walmart.

Obviously that won’t work for every trip, but I beat ABRP by roughly 40 minutes. Compared to the drive in my Ridgeline, it only took 10 more minutes…I was really surprised.

Sponsored