Mercedes cars are ready to drive themselves up to 60 mph

The star manufacturer has announced that from early 2025 the Drive Pilot system in the S-Class will be extended up to 60 mph

Photo by: Mercedes-Benz

By: Gianmarco Gori

Sep 24, 2024 at 4:23am ET

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Mercedes continues to work on Level 3 fully autonomous driving. Its system is called Drive Pilotand debuted as an option on S-Class and EQS cars ordered and sold in Germany and the US during 2024.

Just a few months after the official launch, Mercedes-Benz announced that from the first weeks of 2025 its operating limit will be raised from 37 to 60 mph, with buyers already having the system on their cars receiving an OTA update or via a workshop visit.

Specially recertified

According to the company, in order to allow the operational speed limit to be raised, the Drive Pilot system will be recertified by theGerman Federal Transport Authority by the end of 2024, with the aim of starting first deliveries to customers in 2025.

Despite the upgrade, the price for having this option on a new S-Class will remain the same, i.e. starting at 5,950 euros on the German market, which is necessary to equip the cars with all the 'redundancies' of on-board and safety systems that are essential to enable homologation with this system on board and, in the future and in the United States, the special blue exterior lights.

Mercedes-Benz Drive Pilot (2024)

Mercedes-Benz

How it works

By changing the speed limit, the Drive Pilot will, according to the company, become the world's fastest Level 3 autonomous driving system in a production vehicle. But how does it work in practice?

Unlike the other assistance systems, which are equipped with cameras, radar and ultrasonic sensors, Mercedes' new autonomous system is also equipped with LiDAR, which is essential for sensing the environment in front of the car in front and has an even higher calculation capacity, even in real time.

Mercedes-Benz Drive Pilot (2024)

Mercedes-Benz

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A Mercedes equipped with Drive Pilot, therefore, can already today and will also be able in the future to determine its exact position to within a few centimetres, in an extremely detailed and continuously updated HD map, authorising or not the driver to take his hands off the wheel depending on the road he is driving on.

At present, we do not know when and if this system will also arrive in the UK (laws permitting) and at what price.