With Audi connect your vehicle can now go online at any time: with high speed internet access and an integrated wireless hotspot. The driver and passengers can enjoy news, traffic information and weather reports. Navigation is based on images from Google™ Earth and Google™ Street View, and photos, reviews and listings can be viewed for destinations. Audi traffic information online presents data on the flow of traffic on the navigation map and detects traffic jams, even while they are forming, ensuring the driver is always shown the ideal route.

And that’s not all: using Audi connect the car can become a mobile wireless hotspot, enabling passengers to surf the internet with up to eight mobile devices and download their e-mails. In the future, special smartphone functions will also facilitate new software functions in the car.

Audi connect can now be experienced in a range of Audi vehicles.

New technologies and services require new operating concepts. We used to turn, press and pull buttons and knobs; now we scroll, tap and speak. But the most important thing is intuitive operation.

Clearly structured, intuitive and easy-to-understand operation is one of the main standards set at Audi. In all our vehicles, the driver is incorporated perfectly into the cockpit and can safely read and operate the large instruments at a glance.

This manifests itself in particular with one of the latest Audi connect services – the Audi point-of-interest search with voice control. The integrated speech recognition system can be activated by a button on the multifunction steering wheel making its operation even more convenient.

What is accepted as the norm at Audi is the result of extensive development work. Several teams develop and optimise the ‘feel’ of each control that the driver interacts with and ensures that the appropriate acoustic feedback is given. In doing so, our engineers do not rely solely on their own knowledge but also on the know-how of our customers: the findings from driver and user surveys are directly integrated into the development process.

Intuitive operation can now be experienced in Audi vehicles, for example with the Audi MMI^® and MMI^® touch with voice entry.

Numerous “helpers” change the way we drive. Drivers rely more and more on innovative technology that enhances comfort and safety when driving.

Thanks to networked assistance systems, we can give driving our full attention. For example, adaptive cruise control: the automatic system detects vehicles ahead and maintains a constant distance. This minimises the need to accelerate and brake – and therefore reduces fuel consumption. Audi connect enables the adaptive cruise control to work with the navigation system so it knows the selected route in advance.

The adaptive light system provides extra safety. It controls the headlights automatically to ensure the optimum lighting is supplied for each driving situation. In line with the principles of the Audi connect technology, the route data is read in advance and transferred to the computer that controls the lights – the appropriate light settings are therefore set even as you are driving onto the motorway and the turning lights are activated before you get to junctions. This enhances safety significantly and makes sure the driver has a relaxing journey.

Keeping to the proper limits is made even easier by the speed limit display. With the aid of a camera-based system and the data from the navigation system, it identifies all the speed limits and displays them on the head-up display. This also applies to temporary speed limits, such as those sometimes encountered on motorways. The driver can therefore always concentrate on the road.

These different driver assistance systems are already available in many Audi models.

For many years, we have been working on making the data in our navigation systems as photo-realistic as possible. The work has now come to an end: Audi simply uses real photos – from Google™ Earth and Google™ Street View.

Audi connect enables you to navigate in a new dimension – with the UMTS module of the Bluetooth online car phone you can navigate using true-to-life Google™ Earth images. High-resolution aerial and satellite images, photos, geological formations, roads and their names/numbers and business listings make the data even more useful.

The system accesses the data on the selected route in advance and combines the data from Google™ Earth with the information on the road network from the MMI® navigation plus.

Thanks to Google™ Street View you can see what the destination looks like while you are still driving there: just “run through” the street views made up of numerous photos and look at it from every perspective.

Navigation with Google™ Earth and Google™ Street View is already available in a number of Audi models.