A man is walking across a full parking lot, when he realizes he forgets where he parked his car. He speaks into his watch, saying “Find car.” He glances at the watch, and immediately walks towards the located car, speaks into his wrist again, and the door opens. No, this isn’t a scene from a sci-fi movie back in the 90s. This can be an actual real-life scene, that is, if you’re a Hyundai car owner. Welcome to life with your Blue Link smartwatch app.
The Blue Link app has actually been available for Android smartphones and compatible Hyundai vehicles but at CES 2015, they unveiled the app for smartwatches running on the Android Wear platform. Now you’ll be cooler as you try to control your car just by swiping your wearable, or even more convenient, just speaking into your smartwatch (especially when you’re driving).
Now you’ll be able to remotely start and stop your car (only if it is in remote engine start mode), lock and unlock the door, honk the horn and flash lights. You can also find your car if you’ve “misplaced” it and call Blue Link’s roadside assistance if you run into car trouble. Just make sure you won’t get distracted while playing with your smartwatch while driving and that you keep your wearable safe from other people.
The app works with Android Wear smartwatches, including Samsung Gear Live, LG G Watch, Moto 360, and Sony SmartWatch 3 among others. Some Hyundai vehicles, like the Sonata 2012 and 2013 models already have Blue Link support but they will be further expanding it to the newer 2015 models of their Genesis, Sonata, and Azera. You can download the Blue Link smartwatch app from the Google Play Store by the first quarter of this year.
When I search Blue Link in my Samsung Gear app I get no results and I can’t find it anywhere. It just updated when I opened it, so what gives? There’s no evidence of this app anywhere on my Blue Link app or my Samsung Gear app and certainly not on my Gear S2 watch.
Which is slower, a snail or a turtle – that’s Hyundai’s speed.