New MINI Connected Smartphone App

MINI is relaunching their smartphone app, called “Connected,” first introduced in 2010, with some exciting new features that enhance the app's driving related functions.

The new system provides improved calendar and online functionality between your phone and your car, as well as specific information about your MINI. It also combines navigation data and operational parameters such as fuel consumption, to provide route recommendations before you even get in your car. The route will then automatically upload to the navigation system when you get in.

The calendar function will display your calendar events on the navigation screen, and automatically create routes to and from addresses included in calendar entries. The online search features now allow the driver to search locations from the car and use the results of searches to place calls and generate routes through the infotainment system.

There is also a new “Sports Instruments” app that will display real-time data such as engine rpm, temperature, and overall output, as measured by the “Force Meter,” and app that provides a graphic depiction of all the forces acting on the car.

The last new development is the ability to use your smartphone to find your car and generate a route to it from another location. Which is perhaps the most useful of all the new features, since none of the others will do you a shred of good if you can’t find the car in the the first place!

The new MINI Connected App will be available starting mid-August 2015 from either the Apple App Store or from Google Play.