An Over-The-Air (OTA) update to the infotainment system in some Jeeps appears to be causing certain models to go into a limp mode or otherwise fail to operate. The update appears to have gone out on Friday.
OTA updates have become more popular recently as automakers try to avoid the costly and annoying requirement that customers schedule service merely for something that involves updating software. This was first popularized by Tesla, but the practice of doing OTA updates is becoming increasingly common.
There’s an entire category of new cars and trucks called “software-defined vehicles,” which are vehicles that offer advanced software-based features that somehow supersede the driving experience. The downside of all of this software is that cars seemingly ship now with more issues than in the past, similar to what’s long been common with phones and other devices. Tesla repeatedly sends OTA updates, both to add features and to fix bugs.
It’s not clear what the most recent update from Jeep was supposed to do, though owners are referring to it as a “U-Connect update,” which is to say that it’s possibly related to the infotainment system.
How that results in the vehicle’s powertrain failing is not yet obvious, though this happened before with at least one other automaker.
Back in 2023, Rivian pushed out an update for its electric trucks that failed. The vehicles would get to 90% and then not complete the installation. While this was an annoyance, we reported at the time that the vehicles could still be driven. Rivian blamed the incident on a “fat finger” coding mistake. In 2023, some Lucid owners also reported that an update caused their cars to “brick,” which is to say the vehicle stopped functioning.
With the Jeep issue, this seems to have made it so that some owners have difficulty driving their vehicles. It’s unknown the full extent of the issue, but it seems to be impacting primarily the Wrangler with the 4Xe plug-in hybrid system.
How It’s Happening
A Jeep owner behind the Wrangler 4XEFans/Jeeps On The Run group decided to take one “for the team” and attempt to drive his Jeep after accepting the U-Connect system update on Friday.
As you can see in the video above, he was able to get his Jeep started and drive a short distance before encountering a power loss.
“We just came to a screeching halt. Every light in the thing came on… service stability control… now we’re stuck. I can’t even come out of Drive now.”
The gauge cluster throws a check engine light as well as other warnings. You can see the driver has an issue getting the vehicle to shift gears, though is eventually able to turn the vehicle off and get some power in the hybrid drive mode.
“Do not drive your vehicle if you’ve got this,” he warns.
He’s not the only one. A reader wrote into our tipline this morning complaining of the same issue:
I had this happen to me after the software update ran last night. I was able to limp in electric mode to get where I needed to be this morning (After our ‘17 Pacifica wouldn’t start, but that is probably bad timing with just a battery)
If you go on Reddit, you’ll see plenty of complaints, like this one claiming that the loss of power happened while on the highway:
I was driving 65 on the left lane of the highway when my car started slowing down. It started saying to put it into P and to push to start. The car was off and I couldn’t accelerate! I almost crashed trying to get onto the right lane shoulder. 4 lanes over before it completely stopped and caused a huge accident They are saying it’s something with an update jeep is doing and the cars are just stopping! There were 4 jeep wranglers on the side of the highway as I tried driving to the nearest dealership 25min. It turned off 3 times
Because this is a Reddit post, it’s not possible to verify it, but I did speak with a large Jeep dealer on the East Coast, and they confirmed, on background, that they were aware of multiple customers experiencing this issue.
The poster above said the dealership told them not to update their vehicle.
Should You Update Or Not?
Until you hear from Stellantis, I’d be tempted not to update your vehicle.
However, JeepOnTheRun posted a YouTube Short saying he was told by someone that if you park the vehicle in an area with good cell service, you should turn on your Jeep for ten minutes and that it’ll automatically download a fix with no pop-up.
His vehicle is at the dealership, so he couldn’t confirm. Multiple commenters on his video did say that the fix seems to have worked.
Again, this doesn’t appear to be an update, but rather a fix that’s automatically downloaded.
Photo: Jeep/Reddit user Raider222x
I tell you what: I’m this () close to figuring out what fuse to pull to disable OTA updates to my Kona N. I’m afraid this kind of crap is going to happen more and more often.
“Bless their little hearts”
TLDR. AV guy here. Never do software/firmware updates on Friday. If is me, I wouldn’t just do an update if it is super recent. I don’t want to be the first guy in the block with a crappy update.
Pushing to production on a Friday? I too like to live dangerously! Someone just did some weekend work as a result
Probably related to ignition security, iirc the infotainment is linked to vehicle security systems. iCE engine turning off sounds same as what happens when you don’t program a key correctly (engine starts and then dies).
Another fun stellantis software bug that they seemingly won’t address; their automatic headlight software no longer sets faults or gives drivers a warning if the light sensor has a problem. It just goes into fail mode operation, which is headlights on but no running lights. If you see a stellantis brand vehicle driving at night with headlights but no tail lights that’s probably what’s going on with it
Thank you for that. I have seen two vehicles recently on my way in to work in the dark with zero running lights and what looked like very bright DRLs. I couldn’t make sense of it. One was a minivan (possibly Chrysler) and the other was a Jeep SUV something I don’t care enough to remember.
Only in a Jee………………