Why You Might Never Stop Paying for That New Car

Subscription fees have come to your vehicle

Julie Halpert,

AARP

Comments

Published January 20, 2026

a graphic illustration shows an SUV cruising down a scenic mountain highway, speeding away from a pile of cash. There is yellow road sign on the right with a dollar symbol displayed

Getty Images

Until recently, buying a car meant full ownership: Pay once, and everything in it was yours.

Today, that car purchase could come with a catch. Take, for instance, the case of Ronald Montoya, 47, of Los Angeles. When he bought his 2019 Mazda3, he liked the accompanying phone app, which allowed him to remotely lock and unlock the car, locate it by GPS and display its tire pressure. Three years after the purchase, Mazda emailed him to say he would need to start paying a monthly subscription fee of $10 or he would lose access to those features.

Montoya, who works as a manager for consumer advice at the car-buying site Edmunds, ultimately decided not to pay for his Mazda app subscription. “Were the added features nice to have?” he says. “Yes. Is it something I needed to have, and worth paying for? Not for me.”

Mazda is just one of many automakers now charging subscription fees for features. Others include Toyota, Rivian, Volkswagen, Tesla, General Motors and Ford. And they aren’t just charging for out-of-vehicle extras like those accessed through a phone app. In some cases, you might need to pay to use options inside the car, such as hands-free driving, acceleration increase, electronic parking assistance, stolen vehicle location or teen-driver monitoring.

According to S&P Global Mobility, an automative research company, the connected/subscription services are a windfall for manufacturers, with revenue anticipated to grow from about $6 billion in 2024 to about $15 billion in 2030.

The costs can add up for consumers. Sam Abuelsamid, an automotive technology analyst and vice president of market research for Telemetry, a communications firm specializing in the auto industry based in Novi, Michigan, points out that just one subscription feature at $20 a month could cost a car owner around $3,000 for the life of the vehicle.

Carmakers say these charges are necessary, as they face continued costs in providing such services, especially those that use the advanced computer systems in today’s vehicles.

For example, General Motors’ Super Cruise is optional technology that offers hands-free driving in some Chevrolet, GMC and Cadillac vehicles. The hardware and three years of connectivity are included in the car’s purchase price. After that, owners need to pay a subscription fee of $25 a month or $250 a year. Anna Yu, director of communications for global technology and innovation at GM, says the Super Cruise feature relies on updates to maps and “highly precise GPS, which requires ongoing maintenance and network connectivity.”

At Ford, customers can pay a onetime fee of about $2,500 for the BlueCruise hands-free highway driving feature or subscribe to it for $495 a year or $50 a month.

Most Popular

Sometimes these fees lead to backlash, such as when BMW experimented with subscription charges for heated seats in a market outside the United States. “They abandoned it because the customer feedback was so bad,” Abuelsamid says. BMW product and technology spokesman Jay L. Hanson emphasized that “BMW does not and never has charged for heated seat activation in the U.S.”

How can you keep from paying more than you want for your vehicle?

Brian Moody, senior editor at Kelley Blue Book, says the best strategy is to arrive at the dealership prepared to ask these questions:

Does this car have any subscription-based services?
Are there any additional monthly fees that I can expect?

Also consider taking a “technology test drive,” Moody suggests. “How that technology works for you,” he says, will “determine whether you need to spend significant dollars a month or not.”

And don’t think you’re safe if you buy a used car. You’ll want to know if any features carry over from the previous buyer or if you’ll be on the hook for ongoing subscription costs. Montoya advises car buyers to explore the technology section of an automaker’s website. Find the section that covers connectivity “and look for the small print” to see if there is a trial period and how long that lasts.

Kathy Rizk, Consumer Reports’ senior director of user experience benchmarking and technology, says to then do the math. “A feature may not seem to cost much on a monthly basis,” she says, “but multiply that number out over the life of the vehicle to see if the cost is worth it to you.”