R2 Day One thoughts
First time Rivian owner in Palo Alto. Picked up my white R2 yesterday in Milpitas. The pickup experience was terrific: casual, friendly, helpful team (thanks, Danielle!), in a nice environment. Took about 30 minutes. Here's my impressions after driving it for a day:
Overall, exceeding my expectations. It's a beautiful car, the software is terrific. I was expecting something akin to the Apple-under-Steve-Jobs experience, and that's my overall takeaway. Porsche feels that way, but not the cars I've driven since. Feels like a team that cares, building a thing that stands for something. Feels like a whole different era of car (I've driven an EV and Hybrid in the last few years). I'm a fan.
I'm loving the Autonomy features. I never bothered with the lane assist stuff in other cars, and was expecting this to be basically that, plussed. Instead, this feels like FSD-minus. Today I drove on the freeway for almost two hours and never touched the steering wheel or the pedal. The UI is so crisp and simple. Love how it resumes autonomy mode after an intervention, or how I can use the pedal to get the speed I want. Feels sooo close to P2P, but I'm cool - I'll just be using Autonomy a ton til then.
Def feels like a V1. I know it's the v2 of the software, but a v1 car and new software platform, and it feels like it. I LIKE THAT: I'm an early adopter, and this is just like running the iOS27 Developer Builds, warts and all. I've noticed a dozen of little things that will just keep getting better - small stuff, such as the way my podcasts keep playing after I get out of the car. Pretty sure we'll be getting tons of software updates that tackle pretty minor quality of life things. Good times - this is what I signed up for.
What's up with that charge port door. Yikes. Depending on the angle, it looks all crooked and not-flush (but at some angles it looks fine). Feels flimsy and plasticy and I cringe each time I see or use it. Someone slept through that signoff meeting. I think I'll take it to our local don't-call-it-a-dealer sometime in the next week and see if they're all like that or mine can be made a little better. But that's literally my only real beef - 9.5/10.