The concept of paying subscriptions for added vehicle features has been very controversial, and for good reason. BMW is ready to implement it soon, and you'll probably pay up on a daily, monthly, or yearly basis for stuff like heated seats or adaptive cruise control, which makes sense if you lease the car, but not when you own it outright. Mercedes-Benz seems is following the Bavarian automaker's footsteps by implementing a similar strategy to the EQS full-size electric sedan.
Pay $100 Per Month To Unlock The EQS's Full Potential
If you want to increase your car's performance, you could either bring it to a tuning shop (if the shop can work around manufacturer safeguards) or in the future, potentially pay Mercedes-Benz $1,200 a year for the benefit, according to a report from CarBuzz. Yes, that's right. In order to unlock the EQS's full performance, you'll possible have to pay Mercedes-Benz annually for the privilege. And it seemingly won't be limited to the top-tier EQS. Mercedes could apply the same business model (and price tag) to the EQE midsize electric sedan, EQE SUV, and EQS SUV. For the EQE 350 sedan and SUV, power gets bumped from 288 horsepower to 349, with its 0-60 mph time dropping from 6.0 to 5.1 seconds for the sedan and 6.2 to 5.2 seconds for the SUV.
Lastly, the EQS sedan and SUV range, both of which are for the EQS 450 variant, get a power bump from 355 to 443 horsepower. This decreases the 0-60 mph time from 5.3 to 4.5 seconds for the sedan and 5.8 to 4.9 seconds for the SUV. When the subscription is already availed and paid for, the full performance can be accessed when selecting "Dynamic" mode. While Mercedes-Benz says that the torque figures also increase, they did not specify hard numbers.
Will You Support Such A Service?
As mentioned, subscription services aren't new with BMW already rolling out its first in South Korea. However, paying a subscription to unlock a car's full performance potential could set a dangerous precedent. For one, as electric vehicles become commonplace, most of these cars have electric motors that can be sandbagged solely by software. That's exactly what's happening now with these electric Mercs, which as we now know, are actually capable of much higher power figures. Normally, a one-time fee to unlock its full power would be the normal route to take, but an annual fee? It effectively means you're just renting out its full power figures even if you've fully paid for the vehicle and all the hardware that's already built in.
For now, the service, which is called "Acceleration Increase" is listed as "coming soon" on the Mercedes-Benz USA online shop. Maybe, just maybe, Mercedes-Benz is testing the waters before implementing such a service. At least now we're able to find out that the EQE 350 and EQS 450 are capable of producing far higher power figures than what was initially announced.