Tesla Navigation is Terrible.

[Skotty]

I've never had a problem with the nav.

Testing to ensure routing works well is a herculean task. There are so many roads in America that they can only really test a limited subset.

What they might should do is provide an easy way to submit screwy nav routes to Tesla. They can then have a team address them on a case by case basis. So imagine a button you could press in nav to submit a bad route, and then it gives you a text area where you can make comments if you want, and then submit. Team at Tesla receives it, and then debugs that specific route or area, fixing these problems as customers encounter them.

 

[adwang]

With the new release, Tesla lost 50% local road speed limit. Now, tesla does not know speed limit on well established roads! I go to a gym few times a week, about 15miles away, Tesla Nav would tell me to take a scenic route (highway, local roads,....), the route tesla told me to take is just hilarious to say the least. The other day, we were driving on highway, all the sudden, it tell us to make a detour! ... the navigation has about 60% success rate finding the best route at the best.

 

[bob_p]

The Tesla navigation system worked surprisingly well as we were driving out of the Houston area, with the nav software usually offering us routes around the roads that were closed due to high water.

So, while the nav software and map data have considerable room for improvement - when we needed help in finding a safe route out of the disaster area - it did work. Though we also used Google Maps to display the areas of high water and road closures.

 

[StoXto3toY]

Does anyone else have problems with the navigation system like this: View attachment 242079

Clearly it's not trying to avoid traffic, 202 is green all the way! I get the most obscure reroutes for what it seems like no reason. I emailed Tesla Support but haven't heard back. It's annoying to have to use my phone to navigate when I have a 17" screen on my dash.

ALL THE EFFING TIME. Here are a couple fun ones:

 

[Boatguy]

ALL THE EFFING TIME. Here are a couple fun ones:

Yes, I've gotten routes like that where it literally drives me around the block in some area where I have no local knowledge. Sometimes I can see it and abort, other times I end up following the silly route.

But hey, 83% of Tesla owners tell CR they love it!

 

[n2mb_racing]

I run Google maps on my phone to check everything the car navigation suggests. It's ridiculous, but needs to be done.

 

[jerry33]

I've not had any issues with the Nav system after they put in the fix to dump toll roads. There is no Nav system that is perfect.

 

[Boatguy]

I've not had any issues with the Nav system after they put in the fix to dump toll roads. There is no Nav system that is perfect.

I'm not looking for perfection. On my last road trip to Canada, it literally gave me bad directions to a Supercharger. That's basics, not perfection.

And keep in mind the "route planner" is still in beta after almost two years. Somehow I don't think anyone is actually monitoring the feedback from the "beta testers".

 

[Sylvia]

I've not had any issues with the Nav system after they put in the fix to dump toll roads. There is no Nav system that is perfect.

I must have missed this. How can I have it avoid toll roads? Now that a couple other chargers are up and running I don't regularly drive near a toll, but would be nice to know.
Mostly I drive with the car only showing traffic flow. I don't use the actual Nav very often, unless checking expected arrival time, distance remaining and at least once to check what charge status at destination is expected to be.

 

[jerry33]

I must have missed this. How can I have it avoid toll roads? Now that a couple other chargers are up and running I don't regularly drive near a toll, but would be nice to know.
Mostly I drive with the car only showing traffic flow. I don't use the actual Nav very often, unless checking expected arrival time, distance remaining and at least once to check what charge status at destination is expected to be.

Press Controls-->Settings-->Apps-->Navigation. Check the appropriate boxes.

 

[jerry33]

I'm not looking for perfection. On my last road trip to Canada, it literally gave me bad directions to a Supercharger. That's basics, not perfection.

And keep in mind the "route planner" is still in beta after almost two years. Somehow I don't think anyone is actually monitoring the feedback from the "beta testers".

FWIW, it worked fine for me traveling to and in Thunder Bay. I've found the best results are to only plug in the next destination. I've never actually tried the whole trip as I sometimes change which way I'm going.

 

[PhatCat]

Last weekend I made a round trip from outside NYC to VT by the Canadian border. Two supercharger stops in each direction. My laptop is being repaired so i decided to trust the Tesla nav. Big mistake. Even though i routed just to the next supercharger and it was all interstate highway, in each direction it missed the nearest exit and sent me to the next one with an exit and re-entrance. The first time it happened i thought maybe the route was necessary because the SC was on the other side of the highway, but when i reentered i saw this was not the case. At a different SC on the way back the same things happened. Fortunately i had enough buffer that this was more of an annoyance.

 

[DJ_S75D]

After dealing with the same issue as OP, I started using a combination of Tesla Navigation (to keep track of energy consumption during road trips) and Waze. Because Waze also alerts me to speed cameras, police, and hazards, I rely on it for route information.

 

[cpa]

Yesterday I returned from a short trip out of town. The directions to the Petaluma Supercharger had me make a left turn onto the access road to the Superchargers. Well, the road has a concrete median strip, and there was no left-turn pocket. Hmmm. When I was able to make a left turn about 50 yards away, the directions kept telling me to use "Unnamed Road" as I drove in the parking lot for the Mendocino County Fair.

Then, when I was at Gustine I just wanted to see how much I needed to get home. (I did not need directions.) Instead of directing me back onto southbound Interstate 5, the navigation routed me northbound about 9 miles to the SR140 exit. It had me exit, go under the freeway, and then reenter Interstate 5 southbound.

Finally, the navigation wanted me to exit Interstate 5 at highway 152 and proceed east to CA99, and then southbound to go home. I do not recall the distance, but the estimated drive time was 62 minutes. I prefer another way to get home--staying on Interstate 5 to the Nees Avenue exit, then heading east through Firebaugh to reach Avenue 7 in Madera County to join CA99. Once I bypassed the exit for highway 152, the navigation recalculated and determined my drive time to be 58 minutes taking my preferred route.

 

[Padelford]

We've had our share of crazy Nav system routing. Coming home to Seattle from San Diego via US 101 in Northern California, we were taken off 101 twice for no apparent reason. The second took us thru wine country more or less parallel to 101, and someone in the San Diego SC had mentioned that Google had deliberately put in the wine country re-route as a prank.

On the other hand, coming back to Seattle from eclipse watching in central OR, we were sent off on what would have been considered wild goose chases from I-5 in SW Washington. The routes were mostly OK two-lane side roads in the dark, but including one that was being repaved (gravel). We ended up getting home about an hour sooner than another person who stayed on I-5 the whole time. So it does work sometimes.

BTW, I've heard that the Seattle SoDo service center has apparently also complained about the Nav system routing.

 

[BeamMeUp]

Does anyone else have problems with the navigation system like this: View attachment 242079

Clearly it's not trying to avoid traffic, 202 is green all the way! I get the most obscure reroutes for what it seems like no reason. I emailed Tesla Support but haven't heard back. It's annoying to have to use my phone to navigate when I have a 17" screen on my dash.

Yes, absolutely. Tesla's navigation is the worst ever. It sometimes leads you through small back roads while a perfect secundary road lies next to it. It cannot cope with sudden trafic jams and does not recognize when you want to avoid a route, it keeps redirecting you to the problem area. And this is not wishful thinking, I have driven BMWs for the past 7 years and their navigation is way superior. Even the simplest option 'avoid highways' is missing. Some of the options I have in the BMW and that I'm missing in my Tesla: for every route you can choose between 3 variants; fastest, shortest or most efficient. Per each of these options BMW's navigation will calculate again 3 options you can choose from. While you are driving you can switch between any of these options at any time. If you deliberatly take another route it will try to redirect you to the original route for some time but soon afterwards will detect you want another route and recalculate the route and stop trying to get you back on the original route and so on... I'm happy with my Tesla in daily commute where I know the way, but am very hesitant to use it for a cross Europe trip because I don't know where I will end up. Well, actually I do know: I will end up using another Nav and a map!

 

[kutkuzak]

It seems like it's simply a matter of the tesla navigation always wanting to take the 'shortest' route (barring heavy traffic) which in many cases is far from the 'fastest' route (default for most other nav systems). Presumably to get better EV range.

 

[bhzmark]

I've had Tesla Navigation reroute me around a traffic jam from a new accident before Waze did -- Waze knew about the accident, but just didn't change the route until I had it recalculate the route. Tesla was better than Waze in that instance. I use both and judge for myself. They are both very good but not perfect. They both sometimes miss the best route, especially in urban areas. Waze is good to for police alerts. They are both just tools to use with occasional limitations.

 

[CinRedMan]

Having now consumed this entire thread, I am super interested in how my 2017 MS will perform around here in Ohio. With that said, I have been using wake, google maps and apple maps for some years. All are far from perfect and your own local knowledge should always trump "the computer".

I use Waze for the social awareness, speed trap info.
Apple MAPs has been relatively good, but there are times when the suggested route ignores the straightforward path.

In the end, none are perfect, so I just remind myself, it is the "suggested" route.

My fundamental concern is with respect to Tesla... properly routing to charging stations during longer trips (Ohio to Chicago).

 

[Kandiru]

Another thumbs up to OP. Tesla nav. works great in large urban conglomerations, but sucks in rural areas.

Last night I had to drive into the dark woods of Trumpvirginia to retrieve one of my partying teenagers. The nav. located
the mansion on a whole another ridge 3mi away.

The above is about the fourth time I had similar issues.

Love my Tesla, lover her very much four years later!