As essential as issues like touchscreens and software program are to the fashionable automotive expertise, we seldom cease to ask why every thing appears so ugly.
Your common automotive’s touchscreen and menus doubtless have all of the performance of a Palm Pre, with the aesthetic enchantment and creative worth of a Fort Value outlet mall. Their menus and controls usually really feel haphazardly designed and look completely forgettable. That is true even after greater than a decade of in-car display dominance and a future we’re always advised is centered round over-the-air updates and smartphone-like tech options.
So when Rivian got down to fully overhaul its in-car software program expertise, its designers declared that issues don’t need to be this fashion.
The electrical startup’s newest infotainment setup options cel-shaded depictions of its vans and SUVs, offset by animated depictions of various landscapes, vivid colours, pace traces such as you’d discover in a Japanese manga comedian and tons of “Easter eggs” within the backgrounds. New updates even give the software program “costumes” impressed by basic TV exhibits and flicks like Again to the Future and Knight Rider.
Once I requested Rivian’s Chief Design Officer Jeff Hammoud why his staff went this route, one phrase got here up many times: “Optimism.”
“We felt it was a chance to have a bit of little bit of enjoyable and create a persona across the automotive,” Hammoud stated in a latest interview. Greater than that, he stated, the brand new software program interfaces mirror a philosophy inside Rivian. “We would like all of it to look inviting,” Hammoud stated. “Our automobiles have a pleasant look and that’s a part of our model… that optimism round what we’re attempting to do by way of electrification and defending the world for our children.”
Picture by: InsideEVs
2025 Rivian R1S and R1T Graphics
Rivian’s new interface language went reside this summer time on the closely up to date 2025 R1S and R1T fashions and by way of software program updates to earlier automobiles. They offer house owners an animated illustration of their car that spins and transforms as they regulate issues like experience top settings and the assorted driving modes.
On one other automotive, switching to sport mode may imply a brand new set of gauges on the central show or shifting the menus to a pink shade scheme. However on an R1S or R1T, a cartoon depiction of the automotive zooms onto what appears like a race monitor as its glowing taillights fade right into a red-and-white background. As an alternative of pop-ups to verify you’re in “Snow Mode” or some off-road setting, Rivian affords a shift to a captivating winter panorama or the car perched atop a rocky mountain. Clouds, windmills and birds transfer about within the backgrounds and all of those visuals tackle a unique character at evening as properly.
Picture by: InsideEVs
2025 Rivian R1S and R1T Graphics
None of that is important for a automotive to perform correctly, after all, and it’s extremely unlikely that these animated graphics might be a make-or-break promoting level. However they add a ton of one thing intangible—character—to Rivian’s automobiles, they usually flip one thing that was once an afterthought at greatest into one thing you really look ahead to utilizing. And Hammoud stated {that a} ton of effort went into devising how this ecosystem ought to appear and feel.
“We used this concept of manga-style [or] Studio Ghibli movies, these actually optimistic motion pictures the place you’re feeling such as you’re in one other world, and actually taking that into a method the place we may create the completely different worlds of the drive modes,” Hammoud stated. He’s after all referring to the famed Japanese animated classics from Hayao Miyazaki and different creators like Spirited Away, My Neighbor Totoro, Kiki’s Supply Service and, most not too long ago, The Boy and the Heron. All of these are landmark animated movies launched to worldwide acclaim. However Hammoud stated additionally they share the final vibe Rivian goes for nowadays.
Picture by: InsideEVs
2025 Rivian R1S and R1T Graphics
“You take a look at one thing like Akira, versus Studio Ghibli,” he stated, referring to the Nineteen Eighties comedian and landmark animated movie a couple of dystopian future. The latter is “a bit of bit extra optimistic and on the pleasant aspect of that. We wish to talk energy and dynamism with the car, however we nonetheless needed to have this form of, ‘sitting down Sunday morning watching cartoons together with your youngsters’ vibe with it as properly.”
That stands in stark distinction with one other eye-catching electrical car designed that has a distinctly apocalyptic vitality: exhausting angles, allegedly bulletproof stainless-steel, a “Bioweapon Protection Mode.” Whereas Hammoud didn’t point out it by title, he made clear that he, Rivian CEO RJ Scaringe and their design groups didn’t share the identical philosophy.
Picture by: InsideEVs
2025 Rivian R1S and R1T Graphics
“Once you take a look at vans, their faces are very aggressive, very offended, just like the entrance ends may eat young children,” Hammoud stated. “Purposely, we’re like, ‘All proper, properly, we do not want an enormous grill.’ We would like it to look inviting. Take a look at our headlight shapes. Our automobiles have a pleasant look.”
A lot of this was afforded by the ability of the Unreal Engine, a 3D graphics software program system made well-known in video video games that’s now making its option to the automotive world. This allowed Rivian’s artists and designers to “scale” all these new photographs simply with out having to attract every one individually.
“It was actually necessary to us that no matter automotive you could have, it’s the fitting set of wheels and it is the fitting shade [on the screen], in order that manner we’re is definitely consultant of your car,” Hammoud stated. “If we needed to create, which is what we did previously, a picture for each single [Rivian color or option], that’s hundreds and hundreds of photographs.”
With the Unreal Engine, Hammoud stated, “You place within the specs of the car, like if it is a Forest Inexperienced automotive with 22s, you simply put that into the code, and increase, it is rendered and it updates.”
Picture by: InsideEVs
2025 Rivian R1S and R1T Graphics
Rivian isn’t alone in attempting so as to add a extra distinctive look and character to its software program expertise in addition to its exterior designs. Mini not too long ago added a cartoon canine to its infotainment programs as an AI-powered digital assistant, and a number of other Chinese language automakers are taking comparable approaches. And as with these automobiles, Rivian’s strategy goes past mere visuals; these features signify new methods for drivers to work together with their automobiles and management their options within the software-driven car period.
So does it work? Based mostly on a latest check of a 2025 Rivian R1S, I feel the reply is usually sure. It’s pretty simple to seek out the features you need and the large, vivid shows signify novel methods of presenting data to the motive force. That’s essential since Rivian famously—or maybe infamously—eschews most bodily buttons and Apple CarPlay in its EVs. It additionally goals to do extra with voice controls, though it has a methods to go there to match many opponents.
However this strategy to software program does present what Rivian’s made from, and why a conventional conglomerate just like the Volkswagen Group sees such worth in what the corporate does. That 2025 R1S obtained higher whereas I had it, receiving an over-the-air software program replace that improved the vitality and effectivity gauges (and put them in keeping with the remainder of the automotive’s new creative language) whereas correcting some points with the stereo and including the Halloween-themed visuals.
And till Rivian can get the upcoming R2, R3 and R3X fashions on the highway, it’s obtained extra in retailer for its present automobiles each by way of software program updates and extra tweaks—although Hammoud was cagey about what precisely is coming subsequent.
“We now have some new updates which might be coming subsequent 12 months on R1 that I am excited to share, some particular editions,” Hammoud stated. “I am going to go away it at that.”
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