Walkup unlock not working, locks perfectly

[adrianL]

MY M3 locks perfectly when I walk away from it. But it almost never unlocks when I approach with my phone in hand. Bluetooth is on, and yes, I know you have to try the driver's door handle, but nothing happens. It has occasionally worked in the past, though not recently. Anyone any ideas?

UK M3P- EAP

 

[akenham]

I had exactly the same trouble.

The car is (probably quite rightly) sensitive about phone proximity - your body blocking phone looks like "phone too far away".

I thought the unlock was flaky but it was simply back jeans pocket (flaky) vs front pocket or in hand (100% reliable).

Given that I don't want to sit on my phone and my first action is to dump it onto the charging pad I now am in the habit of getting my phone out ready. If my hands will be full, front pocket or turn sideways.

Context:
Car: Sep 2020 M3 LR AWD in UK
Phone: Pixel 4XL running android 11 (I think)

 

[adrianL]

Very helpful, thank you, but I always have the phone in hand, usually pointing at the car because I wondered if my body might be in the way. Doesn't help. Tried holding it near the card sensor in case that helped, but nothing. Tried activating the app in advance, no difference. It's really annoying.

 

[jjrandorin]

Very helpful, thank you, but I always have the phone in hand, usually pointing at the car because I wondered if my body might be in the way. Doesn't help. Tried holding it near the card sensor in case that helped, but nothing. Tried activating the app in advance, no difference. It's really annoying.

What type of phone? Tesla app needs to be running (although does not need to be front and center). Many android phones either shut down background apps or go into low power states that may "optimize" your phone settings.

If android, you might want to check your settings and make sure the app is not being put to sleep / optimized etc.

 

[Gasaraki]

Recently phones are really a n a l about power savings and will put apps to sleep, "optimize" them, turn off BT, etc. You'll know if you have the tesla app open and it works perfectly. You can just activate the app, turn off the screen again, put the phone in your pocket and walk up to the car.

 

[akenham]

If it's the app being battery optimized into oblivion you can fix that on android by going to "App Info" and disabling optimization for the Tesla App.

If Gasaraki's suggestion works (car unlocks with App open) then that's defo worth a try.

If all else fails then sometimes deleting all the app's data and uninstalling (which'll mean you'll have to log in again so have a key card handy to unlock your car!) can sometimes clear things up.

 

[NOMRGAS]

I have a Samsung Galaxy S20-5G phone and I have a terrible time with the phone being able to UNLOCK the car...works only about 33% of the time. Locking the car is never an issue!

I'll have to try the back pocket issue thing to see if that helps.

 

[jrweiss98020]

I think it just takes a bit of time for the car to detect the phone and wake up. I'll often trigger the Sentry on first attempt to open the door, but it works fine if I wait 2 or 3 seconds and try again.

 

[mikelipino]

@NORMGAS, I recently updated my phone to the Galaxy Flip S 5G and have seen a similar issue. First I would use akenham's suggestion to disable optimization for the Tesla app. I'm not sure if it also helps, but I've disable optimization for the Bluetooth app as well. Lastly every time I walk up to the car, I'll reach into my pocket and click the power button. My reasoning is that both the app and the phone can be asleep independently so the combo helps ensure that both are awake. So far it's been 100%. Good luck!

 

[adrianL]

Many thanks for the useful input, and especially to Gasaraki. I have managed to deoptimise (unoptimise?) the Tesla app, so I'll report back shortly to let everyone know if this works.

 

[Transformer]

Try the tip in the Android app (tap the ⓘ next to PHONE KEY):

Having trouble?
Try turning Airplane mode ON, then OFF in your phone's settings.​

 

[PianoAl]

I think it just takes a bit of time for the car to detect the phone and wake up. I'll often trigger the Sentry on first attempt to open the door, but it works fine if I wait 2 or 3 seconds and try again.

Yes, same here. IIRC, I can also just hold the door handle "in" and wait.

 

[adrianL]

Thnaks to all for really helpful input - and how nice to have a forum that seem free of trolls! The suggestion to reset my phone so that the Tesla app wasn't battery-optimised seems tro have done the trick, though as someone has mentioned, sometimes there's a small delay. But on the whole it's now working much better, so thank you all for the help.