The BMW Panoramic iDrive system transforms your windshield into a 3D head-up display that shows you critical navigation data right in your field of view, like lane info and your next turn. And you can totally customize the ultra wide display below it with the widgets of your choosing. It's coming to all BMW vehicles by the end of 2025.
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TechTranscript
00:00When it comes to cars, I'm a fan of buttons, but now that BMW is getting rid of all of them,
00:04I'm actually a fan of what they're doing instead. And it all comes down to the panoramic iDrive
00:09that's coming to all BMW models starting next year, and it's going to be in one car by the
00:13end of this year. And there's some key components that you need to know when it comes to this
00:17system. It all starts with a panoramic display that goes from the left side to the right side
00:22of the vehicle, and you can completely customize this with various apps and widgets to your
00:26preference. And all of the key information is right above the steering wheel, and it's a
00:30multifunction steering wheel, as you can see behind me. And those functions change based on what you're
00:36doing, and it actually pings you based on what's happening in the car. Probably the coolest thing
00:41about this whole thing is the heads-up display that it's 3D above the steering wheel. So in your
00:46real-world vision, when you're making turns, you'll actually see those turn signals and those
00:51indicators when you want to make them. You don't have to actually stare over to the central display
00:55if you don't want to, where the map is always there if you want it. But I'd rather have those
01:00directions right where I'm driving, and that's probably the best part about this whole thing.
01:05When it comes to the central display, that's actually customizable too. Now this is definitely
01:08larger than life that you'd see over my shoulder, but all of those buttons right there, there's a
01:13home button so you can always get back home, but all of the main functions are always at your
01:17fingertips. So you can scroll through them like up and down to go to different features, or within an app,
01:23you can actually go left to right. So it's actually fairly intuitive. For me, the game-changing
01:26feature is the 3D heads-up display. A lot of people think that when it comes to technology
01:31in cars, it's really about distracting you. But what I'm seeing here is that BMW is flipping
01:35that on its head. Be sure to follow us at Tom's Guide across all of our social channels to see
01:40all the latest news from CES 2025, and I can't wait to test drive the real thing.
01:44It's a pretty large dashboard.