A lady drives alongside a bucolic coastal street at daybreak in her Honda 0 Sequence Saloon, which then asks her if she needs to see a “lovely view” someplace. It is aware of her favourite shade, the names of her associates, what sort of temper she’s in and the best way to maintain her after she’s had a foul day.
For those who drive a Honda proper now, it would not do any of that. (Nicely, possibly the final one, in the event you’re in a Civic Kind R or one thing.) And also you in all probability have not ever thought that it ought to. However Honda—like a lot of the remainder of the automobile trade—is banking on a future the place you want, and pay for, options powered by synthetic intelligence that may completely redefine the expertise of proudly owning and working a automobile.
However is that what individuals really need out of their vehicles within the coming years, and might it truly be executed? All of that’s laborious to say.
As anticipated amid its present growth, AI was all over the place at CES 2025. Dwelling devices, highly effective new processors and, sure, vehicles. Most of our collective expertise with AI up to now, if we’ve any, has in all probability been restricted to utilizing ChatGPT to cheat on time period papers, sifting by means of an limitless slop of faux photographs in our social media feeds and fretting for the day when it would possibly take our jobs. However buyers and the tech trade writ giant are bullish in regards to the methods AI would possibly rework each approach we work and stay—together with, sure, how we drive.
Photograph by: Honda
03 Honda 0 Saloon inside
Honda needs in on this too. The 0 Sequence Saloon and SUV could have made waves for slick, wedge-like designs that boldly present the world that Honda is lastly taking electrical autos severely. However this household of vehicles, that are headed to manufacturing in 2026, are extra than simply Honda’s first trendy from-the-ground-up EVs—they signify all of the methods Honda needs to plant its flag on the “mobility” tech of the longer term.
That, after all, means AI. So what does that imply within the context of a automobile? To Honda, it will be the “engine” that unlocks plenty of what makes the 0 Sequence particular.
A ‘Private’ Contact
“Our EVs will supply ‘ultra-personal optimization’ by pondering utterly in regards to the buyer, and optimizing all particulars together with exact management settings for car dynamics,” Honda electrification govt Katsushi Inoue stated in his CES keynote speech. “Like a smartphone, numerous features of 0 Sequence fashions will proceed to advance even after the acquisition. The extra it’s used, the extra personalised it would turn into.”
The “like a smartphone” half is simple sufficient to grasp. Proper now, within the U.S. no less than, only a few vehicles actually get higher over time with new options, with Tesla and Rivian main the best way. Most others have struggled deeply with over-the-air software program downloads past navigation system updates and possibly bug fixes. However all of them need to get there as a result of they assume they cannot solely make their vehicles higher that approach but additionally cost for a lot of completely different subscription providers alongside the best way.
Photograph by: Honda
“With the utilization of AI and large knowledge, the car will be taught the consumer’s preferences akin to music, in addition to the motive force’s behaviors and tendencies whereas driving, and can make numerous strategies,” Honda stated on the 0 Sequence web site.
Now, the AI private assistant that understands once you’re having a crappy day like within the video above could sound like a troublesome promote in 2025—possibly individuals will need it, however possibly they will not. (We do have a loneliness epidemic throughout practically the entire world.)
Photograph by: InsideEVs
A Higher Charging Expertise
However there’s another tangible space the place Honda hopes AI will make the EV possession expertise a lot better: charging. Principally, it hopes to lean on AI to remove issues like routing to chargers which can be offline, or too gradual, or jam-packed with individuals or in any other case simply not viable. Proper now, any EV driver in all probability leans on a hodgepodge of apps like ABRP, PlugShare or Tesla’s app to determine that out. Sooner or later, a 0 Sequence Honda will type all of that out for you.
“By incorporating [Amazon Web Services] generative AI and associated applied sciences into Honda clever know-how, and analyzing knowledge obtained from the Honda 0 Sequence and the intensive charging community”—on this case, the Tesla Supercharger Community it is natively suitable with and the Ionna community Honda is a part of—”we are going to present a customized charging expertise for every particular person when it comes to discovering charging amenities and simplifying fee,” stated Jay Joseph, American Honda’s Vice President of Sustainability and Enterprise Improvement.
No matter makes public charging higher will surely be welcome.
Autonomous Driving
Photograph by: Honda
Arguably, getting a automobile to totally and safely drive itself can be AI’s greatest social gathering trick within the 0 Sequence. Tesla, after all, is leaning on AI too to make Full Self-Driving a actuality (maybe, as many critics say, to a fault.) However each automaker will want some extent of superior synthetic intelligence to essentially make command choices on the street—particularly the proper ones.
The 0 Sequence vehicles will goal to return with so-called Degree 3 automated driving help, which means a human driver can take his or her fingers off the wheel and eyes off the street, whereas being able to intervene if crucial. Up to now the one U.S. vehicles able to true Degree 3 driving are the Mercedes-Benz S-Class and EQS EV, however solely in California and Nevada and solely beneath very particular circumstances. (Maybe pushed by Tesla CEO Elon Musk, the incoming Trump administration is searching for to modernize and federalize the principles round autonomous automobile testing.)
However Honda acquired there first in Japan with the Legend sedan in 2021, though that system was additionally restricted to below-highway speeds and not particularly spectacular in apply.
Photograph by: Honda
Honda 0 Sequence Saloon Driving
So the place does AI are available? Supposedly, by studying in regards to the many alternative edge circumstances and nuances concerned with driving, similar to a human can—besides higher, as a result of there could be no level in any other case. Some examples Honda gave embrace “AI that may acknowledge and perceive its environment by itself,” together with several types of timber alongside a street; turning left whereas avoiding bicyclists and motorcyclists in a crowded metropolis; auto-braking when one other car cuts into the automobile’s lane; and detecting and avoiding a chunk of burst tire on the street.
Photograph by: Honda
“The energy of our know-how is that it will probably reply appropriately to irregular conditions,” stated Steve Frey, the Vice President for Improvement Operations at Honda’s North American growth heart. “Our AD was developed for each attainable occasion to make it usable in site visitors environments the place ‘something can occur.’”
That is an enormous promise to make. It is the aim that numerous automakers and tech firms alike are chasing, and to imagine the 0 Sequence can be prepared to totally obtain all of that when (and if) it goes on sale in 2026 could be to imagine lots. However the automobile will include some potent {hardware}: a “system on a chip” (SoC) from Japanese tech firm Renesas that is tailor-made particularly to this challenge.
“The truth is {that a} general-purpose SoC can’t unlock the complete potential of AI software program for the 0 Sequence,” Frey stated. “If we are able to understand the complete potential of this ultra-high-performance SoC, we are able to run [autonomous driving], dynamics, power administration and extra on a single chip.”
Can It Be Executed, And Do Individuals Need This?
Photograph by: InsideEVs
These are huge guarantees to make at CES, a present recognized for large guarantees. And so they signify a wholesale transformation by Honda into a brand new type of tech firm, one targeted extra on delivering automated driving and personalised app experiences than high-revving engines.
Extra just lately, when “conventional” automakers and newcomers alike have tried this, the tip consequence has been product delays or transport incomplete vehicles—or typically, each. It might be laborious to see an automaker with a blue-chip fame for high quality like Honda need to do the latter, so if it runs into points, the previous is extra doubtless, particularly as that is Honda’s first actual foray into the reinvention of the automobile that is occurring proper now. And what’s extra, the far-off guarantees of AI have, as I write this in 2025, stayed largely conceptual.
However the 0 Sequence is due out within the first half of 2026. Within the trendy automobile trade, a yr to 18 months could as effectively be 10 years. We’ll quickly see what Honda can ship right here, and what function AI will actually play in it. And one factor is for sure: the AI-in-car wars are simply getting began.
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