Tesla Hints at Support for Amazon Music Streaming in Update 2024.14.3

Tesla is getting ready to add support for Amazon Music

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Thanks to Tesla hacker Greentheonly, it looks like Tesla will soon offer a native experience for Amazon Music in their cars.

Green decompiled Tesla's latest update, version 2024.14.3, and found references to Amazon's music service, Amazo Music.

In this same update, Tesla added Audible playback, the audiobook service Amazon bought back in 2008.

For Tesla to add support for these music services, they need to have access to APIs that are provided by the music provider. Like everything else, there's likely a deal Tesla and Amazon struck, not only for Audible which was released in this update, but also for Amazon's other services. Given that there are already references to Amazon Music in 2024.14.3, it may not be long before we see the service launch in an upcoming update.

Prime Video 

Although Green doesn't mention any references to Amazon Prime Video specifically, it's possible we may see that service added as well. Tesla's Theater "apps," are essentially links to a browser without the user interface, so detecting references for Amazon Prime Video would be more difficult to discover in Tesla's source code. Since Tesla already implemented Audible and there are now hints of Amazon Music, it’s looking like we may see support for Amazon Prime Video as well.

Not the First Time Tesla Has Hinted at Amazon Music

Back in 2020, we saw Tesla add hints of supporting Amazon Music, although the code was scrapped in a later revision. The same source code in 2020 had references to Pandora, Audible and Apple Music. Since then we've seen Tesla add support for two of those services, with Pandora being the only one left out.

Top Music Services in the World

According to Exploding Topics, Amazon Music is the fourth most popular music service in the world as of February 2024 with a 13.3% share of the market. Number one is not surprisingly Spotify, with Apple Music and Tencent (Chinese music service) taking the second and third spots respectively.

Who Will Get Access

Amazon Music will actually be a great addition, especially if you don't pay for a separate music service like Spotify or Apple Music, but have Amazon Prime.

In the U.S., LiveOne, previously known as Slacker is the default music service that comes for free with Tesla — although Premium Connectivity is still required to listen while driving. Tesla simply calls it "Streaming" in the vehicle since this was named before Tesla had support for multiple music services. Tesla currently supports LiveOne, Spotify, Apple Music, TIDAL, TuneIn and SiriusXM on the Model S and Model X.

Although LiveOne is free, it has several limitations on audio quality, music curation and song selection. It also doesn’t allow you to jump to certain parts of a song.

Amazon Music offers a much more robust solution, so it's expected to be a nice upgrade for owners who already have access to the music service.

If you subscribe to Amazon Prime and get the free version of Amazon Music, it's expected that you'll have access to it in your vehicle without any additional charges, just like you do on your phone and other devices.

Amazon also offers a premium plan for $10 per month that includes higher-quality audio and access to a larger music library. However, we don't believe the premium plan will be required to use the service in the vehicle.

Tesla update 2024.14.3 is currently rolling out to customers around the world, although it could be several weeks before most customers have access.

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Tesla Files Patents for Wireless Charging the Robotaxi

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Tesla has filed four patents for wireless charging. Previously, Tesla acquired the experience and skills of Wiferion’s engineering team in an acquisition in June 2023. Tesla quickly sold off the company but kept the company’s engineers. This was an acqui-hire, where large companies rapidly onboard top talent by purchasing a company for human capital, rather than products, services, or intellectual products.

Following the Wiferion acquisition, Tesla showed off a wireless charging mat several times and even confirmed they are working on wireless inductive home charging. We expected this to arrive with the Cybertruck, but now we hope to see more details at the upcoming Robotaxi reveal event in October, at the Warner Bro.’s studio in Hollywood.

Wireless Charging Patents

First Patent

The first of the four patents looks at temperature sensors and applications for wireless charging. Tesla intends to track the temperatures across both the wireless charging pad, as well as the inductive charging coils in the vehicle. The third patent details how they’re planning to use this in an innovative way.

WIPO

Second Patent

The second patent is a shorting switch, which is designed to prevent or reduce leakage of energy to ground sources near the wireless charging mat. This shorting switch is used to create a short with the receiving side of the inductive charging, essentially making energy transfer faster and more efficient – while also reducing the amount of energy that is leaked out elsewhere. We’ll leave this one for the electrical engineers to explain in our forums.

Third Patent

The third patent is actually the wireless charging circuit itself, and how to manufacture it. This one is straightforward and explains how Tesla intends to design and build the prototype inductive wireless charging mats. Beyond the basic design, this document also details how Tesla intends to lay out the inductive charging coils and how it expects the entire assembly to function – which includes a small cable that runs to a wall-mounted energy source.

Fourth Patent

The final patent is for intelligently estimating and adapting to variations in wireless charging layouts and systems. This one is probably the most interesting of the four patents, as it involves adjusting the coils in the mat to dynamically account for the positioning of the vehicle, as well as responding to the information from the first patent – the temperature sensors.

Essentially, by varying the coil induction across the mat, Tesla intends to dynamically aim the wireless charger at different parts of the inductive coils in the vehicle, thereby reducing heat. This patent will also help Tesla to determine the adequate charge speed and other key information they may need to relay to the vehicle, or back to fleet management software.

Cybertruck Inductive Charging

While the Cybertruck never actually arrived with inductive charging, it was noted in the Service Manual to have 2 Inductive Charging Headers, so it is ready to be upgraded to have Inductive Charging support. We expect that Tesla will release this as a purchasable upgrade for the Cybertruck sometime in the future – likely as a package with the Inductive Charging Mat.

Robotaxi Inductive Charging

The Robotaxi will likely be the first of Tesla’s vehicles to feature inductive charging – which. makes sense given its autonomous nature. Plugging in a NACS charger will likely be fairly difficult to automate, and the 5-10% efficiency loss of wireless charging isn’t a huge deal. It’s possible Tesla chose this route due to cost, as having an automated NACS cable like the “snake” prototype we saw years ago could be costly.

Having a simple parking stall with an inductive mat on it, alongside all the tech and supplies needed to automatically clean and sanitize the Robotaxi makes far more sense. This means that a Robotaxi will be able to roll in, charge and clean itself, and then roll out to go pick up more customers. Tesla is planning a super-efficient system here that requires minimal intervention from real humans.

Essentially, by effectively managing the Robotaxi fleet, Tesla can offset the increased time that wireless charging would take, and also reduce the amount of waste energy by charging when energy is cheapest. While this could prevent Tesla from taking advantage of the sheer battery mass of a Robotaxi fleet – by selling power when it’s expensive and travel demand is low – this doesn’t make it impossible.

Smartphone manufacturers have demonstrated reverse wireless charging with the inductive charging coils already present in modern smartphones. We could see Tesla low-power bi-directional charging in the future too.

We’re looking forward to seeing Tesla unveil this at the upcoming Robotaxi event. It’ll be something special, for sure.

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Tesla Adds Ability to Swipe Left and Right in Browser

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Tesla has made a spate of improvements to its vehicle software recently, starting with the big Spring Update, and then the Summer Update more recently. While we see most of the updates mentioned in the release notes, Tesla often also adds smaller quality-of-life improvements along the way.

Browser Controls

When using the Tesla Browser in the vehicle, you can now swipe left and right to go back or forward a page in your browser history. When you start swiping on the screen, Tesla’s Chromium-based browser will now display an arrow that slides out from the left or right. The circular icon is initially white, meaning that the action won’t be executed, but if you continue moving to the left/right, the icon will eventually turn blue. The blue icon means that the action will be executed once you let go of the screen.

This is a simple quality-of-life improvement that makes using the built-in browser easier.

We’re happy to see updates like these come to the browser, whose last major feature was the full-screen button that was added in update 2024.14.

Future Browser Improvements

While we’re on the topic, let’s look at some future Tesla web browser improvements we’d love to see.

Access to the Mic

Full access to the vehicle microphone isn’t allowed through the web browser right now. That means if you want to get into a Discord, Slack, or Teams call, you’ll only be able to listen – not speak. All of these apps fully function in the Tesla browser for sending messages, but are fairly limited for meetings.

Better Bookmarks

Tesla’s current bookmark system is simple and barebones. You can bookmark a page and give it a name. Once you visit a bookmarked page enough, it’ll show up as an icon in the center of the browser when you go to the homepage.

However, it's difficult to keep a larger set of bookmarks since there aren’t any organizational tools provided. A better bookmark system or the ability to sync bookmarks would be a welcomed feature.

Custom Homepage

Tesla’s current homepage in its browser is simply just a Tesla logo in black or white, depending on whether your car is in dark mode or not. A custom homepage that provides widgets with basic local news, stock information or other details would be fantastic. We’d ask for weather too, but the recent Summer update shows weather at the top of your screen.

If you’ve got more ideas for the fairly barebones Tesla web browser, let us know.

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