The Long Goodbye

[kopik]

The key fob for my 2025 AT works as advertised about 95% of the time and the phone key about 80-90% of the time. Which I've learned to leave with. Sometimes its annoying (like today when I had to run around it pushing the door handles with hands full of grocery bags), but overall acceptable. And indeed all other cars I've ever owned had 0% issues with entry. But for me (at least for now) the likes of AT outweigh the dislikes. I think I would probably replace my current lease with another AT in 1.5 years (unless MB comes out with a reasonable electric E-class and not the POS they offer now).

 

[knewman]

Call from a senior exec on a Sunday is pretty cool, thanks for sharing that @hmp10 . Maybe a bit more outreach like this could stave off these kinds of threads. Obviously execs can't be calling people individually, but maybe line up some interviews between publications/users with followers and technical leadership at Lucid to take on some of the hardball questions.

I think a lot of the desperation comes from people asking service about software problems that service can't do a thing about. We usually get no feedback that Lucid is even aware of the problem let alone an indication that anybody is actively working to correct it. It's a crummy situation for both sides.

Sometimes its annoying (like today when I had to run around it pushing the door handles with hands full of grocery bags), but overall acceptable

You and I must live in different worlds. This would never be acceptable to me, and I suspect most people would feel the same way. I've said it in other threads, but keyless entry was perfected by the industry 20+ years ago. I can't fathom why Lucid thought it wise to try and re-invent it.

 

[socktucker]

The key fob for my 2025 AT works as advertised about 95% of the time and the phone key about 80-90% of the time. Which I've learned to leave with. Sometimes its annoying (like today when I had to run around it pushing the door handles with hands full of grocery bags), but overall acceptable. And indeed all other cars I've ever owned had 0% issues with entry. But for me (at least for now) the likes of AT outweigh the dislikes. I think I would probably replace my current lease with another AT in 1.5 years (unless MB comes out with a reasonable electric E-class and not the POS they offer now).

Have the door handles replaced that fixed mine. Had three bad door handles.

 

[kopik]

Call from a senior exec on a Sunday is pretty cool, thanks for sharing that @hmp10 . Maybe a bit more outreach like this could stave off these kinds of threads. Obviously execs can't be calling people individually, but maybe line up some interviews between publications/users with followers and technical leadership at Lucid to take on some of the hardball questions.

I think a lot of the desperation comes from people asking service about software problems that service can't do a thing about. We usually get no feedback that Lucid is even aware of the problem let alone an indication that anybody is actively working to correct it. It's a crummy situation for both sides.


You and I must live in different worlds. This would never be acceptable to me, and I suspect most people would feel the same way. I've said it in other threads, but keyless entry was perfected by the industry 20+ years ago. I can't fathom why Lucid thought it wise to try and re-invent it.

I think you overdramatizing a little bit. As we are different people, we have different acceptable and unacceptable things. And probably difference in tolerance to 10% in door response rate would not set us words apart. But you are absolutely right, this should not happen and I've never said it is OK that it does happen. I'm just able to tolerate it.

 

[kopik]

Have the door handles replaced that fixed mine. Had three bad door handles.

I think the handles are fine as they respond to the key fob 95% of the time. But thank you for your advice.

 

[RajD]

At the risk of repeating myself from another thread, this is relevant here too.

If a fully spec'd car was already hitting CPU limits, before even half of their advertised features were deployed and activated, that is a massive failure in their development processes and hardware/software architecture decisions for the Gravity.

They'd better not make the same mistakes for Cosmos/Earth, or it will definitely be the final nail in Lucid's coffin.

For all the shortcomings of Tesla, they have absolutely set the consumer's expectations that the processing power and memory in day 1 cars should have sufficient headroom to handle years of upgrades and additional features.

Hopefully Emad and team are successful in getting the rest of the leadership to understand and act on that for the Cosmos/Earth.

Wait… isn’t this exactly what Tesla didn’t tell their HW3 owners about FSD that they purchased?

‘As of April 2026, Tesla has confirmed that Hardware 3 (HW3) vehicles cannot achieve unsupervised Full Self-Driving (FSD) due to computational limitations, specifically regarding memory bandwidth.’

 

[DBV]

So you expect Lucid to be as good as a manufacturers making cars for almost a century? I like the way you think…….

Most definitely they will, otherwise people will not buy the Cosmos.

 

[DBV]

People need to realize, grass is not greener elsewhere…..BMW software not that great

BMW, I am so breaking up with you | TechCrunch

I’m driving my i4 back to the dealership as soon as my lease is over. I'm surprised to say I can't wait.

techcrunch.com

So, one article? I have had countless BMW’s and still have one and think they make the best software by far.

So funny, when people bring up examples of other mfg’s. Who cares, all I care about is that Lucid fixes there issues, so they become successful. Anyone can give examples of good or bad things on anything, but what only matters is what you do on your own!

 

[exxxviii]

It’s already improved significantly after last update. And there is a posting bias, those with problems post, those without do not. You are depriving yourself of the best SUV ever made.

I know the Gravity is great at 99% of the things that it is. But that 1% is a deal killer for me. There is some material percentage that I would get a car with the fob issue, and if I had it, it would likely be incurable for now. Given that the basic dependability of the car's core function is my highest priority, then the Gravity would be unacceptable to me.

I am very familiar with adverse selection bias, and when I posted earlier that I have seen nothing remotely similar on the other sites I am following, I was not joking.

• BMW iX3 - Following the iX as a proxy - BMW had some early software and hardware issues with the iX, but those were all resolved in the first model year. The iX forums are mostly just regular BEV discussions and no chronic problems. I would expect the iX3 to have first-year problems, but nothing impacting the basic ability to use the vehicle.
• Cadillac Lyriq V - Chronic HUD problems, but driveability issues (12V failures) have been resolved for years. The Lyriq still has chronic software and charge curve problems, but nothing that affects core function. The Lyriq forums are a mix of software hassles and regular BEV stuff.
• Polestar P3 - Had chronic GHCA failures that affected drivability, but that is solved now, and most forum activity is about generic BEV stuff.
• Rivian R2 - Following R1S as a proxy - only seeing regular BEV stuff. Rivian's software platform seems to be a generation ahead of Lucid and more stable.

The Gravity forum activity, by contrast, is heavily slanted toward problems and software issues with the core fob issue impacting basic function. Lucid probably has 1+ years before the software matures, based on what it took GM and Polestar to work through their comparable backlogs.

As an aside, I applaud Emad Dlala's masterclass in targeted marketing. That one call and resulting forum post activity will definitely generate a positive buzz for the brand. But, I need to see the actual outcomes before I pull the trigger on a purchase decision. As I said above, I will continue to watch until I have to make a car decision around October.

 

[Macgreiner]

This thread should be the primary topic during Lucid’s Monday morning C-level staff meeting. Losing their most dedicated supporters is a serious concern.

This!

 

[Macgreiner]

You can rag on manufacturers like Tesla (and they mostly deserve it), but one thing I have never experienced in my Model 3 is having any difficulties getting into to the car and driving the car. Never had issues unlocking the car, have it recognize my settings and start driving. Even in the earlier days, 2013, I remember someone saying the alerts were too loud on Twitter. The very next update contained an option to turn them down. When you start losing your biggest advocates, something is very wrong.

 

[prgarg]

As an aside, I applaud Emad Dlala's masterclass in targeted marketing. That one call and resulting forum post activity will definitely generate a positive buzz for the brand. But, I need to see the actual outcomes before I pull the trigger on a purchase decision.

Right... He told John Moloughney that "all the issues were resolved" when 3.5.1 was deployed, only to learn now that they weren't and an architecture change impacted that. So yes, first deliver then we discuss again.

 

[BS8899]

Right... He told John Moloughney that "all the issues were resolved" when 3.5.1 was deployed, only to learn now that they weren't and an architecture change impacted that. So yes, first deliver then we discuss again.

I don't know Emad's technical background. Based on his early days at Lucid, I thought he was mostly a drive motor guy, kind of Rawlinson's clone. He came across very knowledgeable and passionate. I don't doubt his smarts. Glad he reached out to @hmp10.

Now, he is basically all of engineering, HW and SW, correct?

I hope he gets his arms around this mess real soon. I am concerned about all the talk about the lack-of computing headroom on both the Air and Gravity platforms. Seems like very poor (technical) planning. Upgrading the hardware is one solution. But is it the best approach?

With the roadmap of Air upgrading to UX 3.0 (which requires CCC2), lots of Gravity bug fixes, and the imminent arrival of the mid-size, can Lucid handle all of this stuff?

Also, in the longer term, Lucid's core competency and vantage over its competition is its hardware platform and efficiency. Having SW be the rate-limiting factor is a "self-mutilating" strategy. I heard recently fired their entire SW team. I presume they are rebuilding a new team. Is there time for that?

What-if they ally with Rivian on SW for the next generation? I know that's heresy for the Lucid enthusiasts.....but!!

 

[Lucken]

People need to realize, grass is not greener elsewhere…..BMW software not that great

BMW, I am so breaking up with you | TechCrunch

I’m driving my i4 back to the dealership as soon as my lease is over. I'm surprised to say I can't wait.

techcrunch.com

And yet we had an i4 that was absolutely wonderful and 100% trouble free. It had good range, great handling, bulletproof software, a fantastic sound system and despite limited back seat comfort it was a great car to own. Truthfully we liked it better than our current i5. There wasn’t a day during our ownership tenure that we were the least bit concerned about BMW’s future.

So yes, there are other perspectives.

 

[hmp10]

As an aside, I applaud Emad Dlala's masterclass in targeted marketing. That one call and resulting forum post activity will definitely generate a positive buzz for the brand. But, I need to see the actual outcomes before I pull the trigger on a purchase decision. As I said above, I will continue to watch until I have to make a car decision around October.

I think your view of that call is too cynical by half. Yes, it was a wise move. But I've spent enough years around corporate marketing efforts to know this call was not that.

Dlala was more candid on the call than my post about it might have conveyed. He spent zero time trying to make excuses. He told me that Lucid made a mistake in not putting more early-on focus on UI software. He told me that quality assurance procedures had been sorely lacking. He told me about issues they were seeing with some cars that I had not ever heard about. He confessed that there were problems with the HUD system that go beyond software, to the point that he has turned the system off in his own car. He told me that there were times he would drive the car but would not turn it over to his wife because of some of the problems we on the forum have experienced.

Throughout the rest of the day after the call, he texted me several times asking for more specifics and any photos, videos, or other information I could give him to help him run down issues. He texted me several times with follow-up questions. He has asked me to try to get a recording of one of the problems unique to our Lucids so his team could understand it better as they have never encountered it. (This relates to the fact that when any two of our Lucids are on the road at the same time, both lose the ability to play music without interruption even though they're playing from different sources. He said they were aware that two Lucids in the same household would experience the problem if they were both streaming from the same source, such as Tidal or Spotify. But they had never seen our problem where the cars are streaming from separate sources -- even from a USB stick.)

This was not a man who made a slick marketing call and then ascended back into the clouds. I have talked to a couple of people who know Dlala personally, and the man I heard on the call yesterday was the earnest, candid, and knowledgeable man they have described to me.

 

[gaskiller]

You're forgetting that Peter Rawlinson, the Chief Engineer of the Lucid Air, was the Chief Engineer of the original Tesla Model S at the time it broke ground with its UI suite of features. That whole effort was under his oversight. And before that, Rawlinson was the head of Advanced Engineering at Lotus, the firm to which Tesla turned for help with the original Roadster because Lucid could not figure out how to handle the power electronics and balance the cells in the battery pack, all part of a battery management system driven by software.

This notion that Lucid launched as a company with zero experience in software while others were light years ahead is just wrong. Take the software management of the powertrain components, the chassis, and other non-UI aspects of the Air. Lucid is not only up to speed with any other manufacturer there; in some areas it is at the front of the pack. If Lucid powertrain software was in the state that its UI software is, not a single Lucid could make it out of a driveway.

The reason Lucid UI software is behind the curve is that they didn't devote the resources and attention to that part of the car, not because Lucid was caught flat-footed by coming late to the party.

Unless Lucid engineers copied Tesla proprietary UI software, you cannot expect them to reach the same level of stability. Lucid had to design their own.

Same issue with Tesla- no powertrain issues but initial UI software was horrible.

We are talking about the same thing, but you are saying UI should have been rock stable since they were tesla engineers, I disagree, they cant copy Tesla.

 

[gaskiller]

And yet we had an i4 that was absolutely wonderful and 100% trouble free. It had good range, great handling, bulletproof software, a fantastic sound system and despite limited back seat comfort it was a great car to own. Truthfully we liked it better than our current i5. There wasn’t a day during our ownership tenure that we were the least bit concerned about BMW’s future.

So yes, there are other perspectives.

Exactly, and thats why people should stop assuming Lucid is software is all bad.....it's actually much better than many other manufacturers. Even Rivian owners had issues. Every manufacturer has some who had bad issues, but that is usually a significant minority.

 

[jered]

I just got a call from Emad Dlala (he was in the office on Mother's Day) that lasted well over an hour. He said he is fine with my posting about the call, so here goes . . . .
[...]
I was extremely appreciative of his call and have a bit of restored confidence that we may yet see some light at the end of this tunnel.

Wow; what an amazing response.

I could be wrong, but I feel like it would go a long way with owners if there was that sort of honesty in just everyday communication with owners. A blog that says "these are the things that we know are fucked up, they've been fucked up for a while, we know that they are, and here is our plan and timeline on fixing them". Maybe that would be bad PR and new buyers would be turned off... but won't they have a bad experience anyway?

We haven't had the showstopping issues you have and our Gravity has been generally a joy to drive (we just had the 1 yr/12k mi service done) but the software still makes it really hard for me to recommend the vehicle. "It drives great and is comfortable and convenient, but you have to realize you're still beta testing the software any things will just stop working daily" is not a good sell for the average buyer, let alone a luxury car buyer.

I'm planning on writing a longer retrospective in 7 weeks when we actually hit a year... I hope there's a software update before that so I can say good things about it.

 

[hmp10]

Unless Lucid engineers copied Tesla proprietary UI software, you cannot expect them to reach the same level of stability. Lucid had to design their own.

Same issue with Tesla- no powertrain issues but initial UI software was horrible.

We are talking about the same thing, but you are saying UI should have been rock stable since they were tesla engineers, I disagree, they cant copy Tesla.

Depends on who's copying who. Some of the software in the Tesla came from the days when Lotus was driving that boat. Remember that Musk recruited Rawlinson because he knew him from Lotus. And when Rawlinson arrived at Tesla, the through out the whole Model S development program and started over -- except for the body shell, which Musk did not allow him to touch.

Lucid could not legally just copy Tesla software code. But every engineer at Lucid understood the role that software plays in modern cars and the role it was playing at Tesla.

I think the problem at Lucid is that they were attempting to move the needles on so many fronts at once -- efficiency, power density, space engineering, chassis development -- that they made an ill-fated choice to put UI software on the back burner for a while. The irony is that they actually did move to the front of the industry on every aspect they focused on but are now paying the price on the UI software front.

 

[gaskiller]

Only issue with Gravity is the keyfob.... just like the other manufacturers issues, this too will be fixed. Its actually much better with recent updates. Many have posted it is working great. Go look at reddit.

PAAK should be comng soon.

If the key is your main concern, I would wait till PAAK is introduced. The Gravity driving experience is unparalleled. Its a sports car, SUV, luxury car 3 in one. A remarkable piece of engineering.

I wouldn't base my car buying decision on a few posters who had a bad experience. Every manufacturer has those.