The latest Rivians just got “universal hands-free” and a bunch of other updates
- Rivian announced a major software update on Thursday.
- It includes “Universal Hands-Free”, Rivian’s new driver assistance feature.
- The update also brings a new phone key and off-road features.
Last week, Rivian announced “Universal Hands-Free,” its most advanced driver assistance feature to date and — the startup claims — a key milestone on the road to highly automated features.
On Thursday, the electric car maker began rolling out Universal Hands-Free to the second-generation R1S and R1T controllers via software update 2025.46. The release also brings a lot of other upgrades, mostly for Gen 2 owners.
Universal hands-free
This feature takes Enhanced Highway Assist, Rivian’s existing highway driving feature, and extends it to many more roads. Before that, Rivian encouraged owners to take their hands off the wheel (while keeping an eye on everything) on 135,000 miles of approved highways in North America.
It has now grown to more than 3.5 million roads of all kinds – highways, country roads, city streets and whatever else. “If the lane lines are clearly marked, you can engage,” Rivian said in a blog post Thursday.
Assuming the system works well, this capability will blow features like General Motors Super Cruise (750,000 miles split highway) and Ford BlueCruise (130,000 miles) out of the water. To make this possible, Rivian says it has stopped relying on high-resolution maps for its automated functions. This feature is much more about what the car actually feels about its environment.
Because Universal Hands-Free doesn’t stop at traffic lights or stop signs—it steers the car in a lane and reacts to traffic speed—there are probably many roads where it’s not as useful, such as dense city streets with lots of action. However, it seems useful for routes that get you from the city to and from the highway. I look forward to trying it out and seeing how it works in the real world.
Rivian R1T and R1S drivers get a 60-day free trial of Universal Hands-Free. After that, they’ll have to pay $49 a month or $2,500 upfront for 24/7 access through Rivian’s new Autonomy+ offering.
This is probably the biggest update in the latest version of Rivian software. But there are a few other improvements worth noting.
New features related to autonomy
We learned all about Universal Hands-Free earlier this month at Rivian’s Autonomy and AI Day event. Rivian’s blog post revealed some additional autonomy-related features we hadn’t heard of at the time.
Rivian is launching “Autonomy Drive Styles” as part of its driver assistance features, similar to what Tesla offers for Full Self-Driving (Supervised).
Here’s how Rivian describes the three options:
- Moderate: relaxed style with more distance and more gradual lane changes.
- Medium: Balanced style to manage dropouts and accelerate with traffic.
- Spicy: a more dynamic style with a narrower gap and faster steering when changing lanes.
You can now use the right scroll wheel to adjust the speed of the cruise control. (Before, buttons did the trick.) And there’s an update to the in-vehicle environment visualization that Rivian calls “Autonomy View.”
“With this update, Autonomy View now zooms out to show more space behind your vehicle, giving you more context for maneuvers like changing lanes and turning,” says Rivian.
Kick Turn
Four-engine R1 vehicles now receive two interesting innovations. Kick turn sweeps the rear and helps with sharp turns when driving off-road. RAD Tuner provides an interface for drivers to customize things like acceleration, stability and torque balance. Mack Hogan already tested these features when he sampled the upgraded four-engine Rivians this summer.
New key based on phone
Rivian’s new digital key replaces the Bluetooth phone key that owners have been able to use for years. Owners of Gen 2 R1 vehicles can now add a Rivian key to their wallet on compatible Apple, Google and Samsung phones, allowing them to access and control their vehicles via Ultra-Wideband (for passive entry) or Near-Field Communication (for wiretapping).
Rivian’s new digital key can be added to smartwatches.
Photo credit: Rivian
Rivian says this should make access to its cars more seamless than before. Additionally, owners can share up to eight digital keys with friends or family members, which seems really useful.
One other perk: Drivers can lock and unlock their cars with their smartwatches — while surfing or what have you — which feels very Rivian indeed.
If you have any of these features and have thoughts, let us know in the comments or contact me at Tim.Levin@InsideEVs.com