I’m in the market for a new car, most likely an EV, and am curious which company’s app integrates best with HA. More specifically, I’m really hoping to be able to remotely control my (future) car’s climate controls through HA.
The reason is that I live in a place that that has really hot summers and really cold winters and where I work I’m not allowed to have my phone. I generally leave it in my car. I can, however, access HA through a browser at my desk. It would be awesome to be able to turn on my car’s AC or heater from my desk before I leave work so that it’s nice and comfortable by the time I get to it.
A lot of car manufacturers’ mobile apps allow you to turn on climate control remotely. Do any of them integrate with HA such that you can control it from there? Which company’s app does this the best?
“The best” is a relative term. The Skoda integration does the job well, but the API is not published by Skoda/VW. The same goes for the VW integration. I have no experience with that, or any other car brand. The point is that it is up to some hard working enthousiasts to figure out how the app works for each model car and try to mimic that. So in terms of risk of faillure it is far from perfect. But the people working on the integration are sure doing their best to keep up.
Kia/Hyundai has a nice HACS integration, but at least when I used to use it, there was a problem with the frequent API polling requests causing battery drain in my Kia EV6. Also, I see that the code maintainer doesn’t own a Kia any more, so the future is a bit cloudy for that one.
You mention that your key requirement is browser control. I can access the remote functions of my Kia via the Kia app or just via their owner’s portal via a browser. So maybe Home Assistant integration isn’t your top need?
Finally, keep in mind that remote climate functions may require a premium subscription. In my geography, you have to pay $200/year to be able to use all the remote functions for Kia. You’ll just have to do your research once you have narrowed down your consideration set.
PS: I love my EV6, and everyone I know who has a Hyundai Ionic is highly satisfied too. You can also get great deals on lightly used EV6s right now.