Welcome back to another update on what it's like to live with one of BMW's most controversial cars of the moment, the all-electric BMW iX SUV. If you haven't been playing along, my wife and I leased the 2024 BMW iX xDrive50 that you see here with our own money last year. Since then I've been providing regular updates on life with the thing, reporting on everything from cargo capacity to cupholder placement.
So far, the only real issue we've had with the car was a blown tire suffered on a freshly graded, unpaved road in Vermont. I can't really blame the car for that one, of course. Sharp gravel and heavy EVs don't really mix regardless of tire or vehicle manufacturer.
Gallery: BMW iX Long-Term Test
That's really been our biggest frustration. My wife and I are still very much enamored of our big SUV despite its understated Stormtrooper aesthetic. But that isn't to say that we don't have some frustrations. So this month, I thought I'd run you through our "biggest" complaints.
Fair warning: They're all pretty minor.
Pet Peeve 1: Are You Off, Or Are You On?
An increasing number of EVs on the road today are doing away with the dated Engine Start button. Tesla primarily deserves credit for driving the trend, and others are gradually following. Basically, you get in (if you have a key and/or smartphone app, of course), set the car to drive and then speed away. For the iX, BMW decided to literally half-ass its implementation. That is to say, it's only button-free when your butt is leaving the seat, not entering it.
The BMW does indeed have a Start button, or a START/STOP button, as it were, right above the gear selector. The car wakes up as you approach it and is more or less fully booted when your booty is in the seat. But, to actually go somewhere, you must hit the START/STOP button before you can use any of the shifter buttons.
What's really annoying is what happens when you open the door. Here's how it usually plays out: I get home and I want to grab the mail out of our mailbox. So, I put the car in park and hop out. Before my foot hits the ground, the car has turned itself off. Upon returning to the driver's seat, I need to turn the car back on again before I can again pick D and drive up our driveway.
It's a minor frustration for sure, but a frustration nevertheless. Even after nearly a year of ownership, I still reach for the shifter every time, before remembering I need to hit the START/STOP button first.
The car knows when I've occupied the driver's seat, so why do I need to hit a button before I'm allowed to hit another button? It all reeks of actuarial conceit.
Pet Peeve 2: Selective Seat-Folding
This one's a pet peeve of mine across plenty of modern cars: rear seats that you can't fold down from the rear seats. The iX has a pair of buttons back in the cargo compartment that, when pressed, flip down the left or right rear seats.
The problem is that I constantly find myself wanting to fold the rear seats down while I'm coming in from one of the side doors. You can't do that. You have to walk around to the back, open the hatch, hit the button to release the rear seats, close the hatch, and walk back around to the side again.
BMW is far from the only company that does this, and I understand that the majority of time you'll want to fold the seats when loading something lengthy through the rear, but would a secondary release on the seatback itself be too much to ask for?
Pet Peeve 3: Those Damned Disclaimers
I've already heaped praise on BMW's Assisted Driving Plus, part of the Driving Assistance Professional package. With that system, the iX will allow you to take your hands off the wheel and steer itself on most divided highways. It's always watching you to ensure you're watching the road. Pay attention, and it'll handle the wheel.
But before you get there, every single time you enable the system, you get a full-screen disclaimer on the infotainment screen. It blocks navigation and everything else, requiring a tap or a press of the iDrive wheel to dismiss. This is on top of another full-screen disclaimer that pops up every time you turn on the car.
I fully appreciate that it's important to remind drivers that they're still responsible for the car, but given how good this system is at detecting whenever your gaze tarries too long on a passing taco truck or donut stand, I kinda feel like BMW could tone down the disclaimer action a smidge. At the very least, it could be made into a smaller, momentary pop-up on the gauge cluster or even the HUD.
Pet Peeve 4: Delayed Door Handles
This is another one that is far from unique to the iX. This one, though, is a literally painful trend for me across the industry as more and more manufacturers move to digital door latches and flush handles in the name of security and aerodynamics.
Like on many other cars, the recessed door handle of the iX doesn't actually move. There's effectively a button inside that you press as you pull, which tells the car to trigger the actuator that releases the door's latch. This then allows the door to open.
The problem is there's a fraction of a second delay between pulling on the handle and the door opening. Most people probably don't even notice this. However, for someone with rheumatoid arthritis, someone like me, this lag is a bit more significant. Any extra stress on my finger joints is somewhere between mildly or moderately painful, depending on just how hard my body is working on dissolving itself on any given day.
And so, given that delay, for just a moment I'm effectively pulling on a locked door, and on some days that really hurts.
Given that negative feedback, literal pain, you'd think I'd remember to squeeze the handle, wait a moment, and then open the door. But I often forget, give the door a tug, and get a jolt of knuckle-ache out of the bargain.
It's another minor annoyance, I know, but there are better solutions. I like the design of the handles on the Ford Mustang Mach-E, for example, where you press a discrete button. This turns opening the door into two motions, saving me from inadvertent finger pain.
A better option, though, would be to simply kill that delay so that the door opens instantly. Maybe the boosted response from BMW's new, integrated Heart of Joy system for the Neue Klasse platform will make that possible.
Pet Peeve 5: Auto-Locking Charge Port
This is another common one in EVs, and another one where I think manufacturers could do better. When you plug in the iX and lock the car, it locks the charge port, too. In most situations, that's fine, because you wouldn't want some anti-EV passer-by to just yank the cable out on a whim.
However, my wife's office has a shared charger setup where she can charge for half the day, then someone else plugs in for the second half. Ideally, that someone would be able to simply grab the charger when it's their turn and plug in, but we can't find a way to disable the auto-locking of the charge port. My wife tried unlocking things via the My BMW app, but the SUV re-locks itself within a few minutes.
Pet Peeve 6: Software And App Support
My final grievances largely concern the My BMW app and the iX's occasional reluctance to respond. Sometimes, things like precondition requests happen instantly. Sometimes, they take upwards of five minutes. Sometimes, they simply don't happen at all.
But I'm overdue on doing a deep-dive on the iX's app and software experience, so we'll save that one for next time. For now, as you can see, the issues we're having with our SUV are extremely minor, to say the least. Compared to more significant issues I've had with prior EVs, things like inaccurate range estimates or increasingly deranged CEOs, we're extremely happy with how everything is working out.
Coming next... well, what else do you want to know? I'll try and bake it into my next update.
Tim Stevens is a veteran editor, analyst, and expert in the tech and automotive industries. He helmed CNET's automotive coverage for nine years and acted as Vice President of Content. Prior to that, Tim served as Editor-in-Chief at Engadget and even led a previous life as an Enterprise Software Architect. Follow Tim on Twitter at @tim_stevens and catch his Substack.
