South Africa’s best-selling electric car has a big missing feature — one year after launching

The best-selling electric vehicle (EV) in South Africa — the Volvo EX30 — continues to lack Internet-in-the-car (IITC) connectivity a year after rolling out locally.

The EX30 has been praised by critics for its good value. It offers excellent performance and high-tech features at a starting price under R800,000.

The crossover’s single-motor model is South Africa’s most powerful and quickest-accelerating car under that price, while the dual-motor holds the same accolades at the R1 million price point.

Illustrating its allure is the fact that 406 EX30s were sold in South Africa in 2024, making up over 32% of the total EV sales in the country for the year.

The model single-handedly pushed Volvo’s fully electric sales to neck-and-neck with BMW, which has been the country’s dominant EV seller for a decade.

However, the lack of one essential capability that has become standard across many other premium cars has frustrated many South African EX30 owners.

Like many other modern cars, EV and fuel-driven, the EX30 supports in-car Internet connectivity through built-in telematics hardware with an eSIM, enabling remote control and monitoring.

This capability also makes connecting to online platforms like navigation and streaming simpler and faster than tethering through a phone’s Internet connection.

It also allows manufacturers to perform over-the-air (OTA) updates, which can save owners the time and fuss of going to a dealer.

That aspect is particularly beneficial for EVs, which don’t need to be serviced as regularly as petrol or diesel cars.

The OTA feature will become increasingly important for many Volvo owners in the near future, as the company is shutting down 12 of its 19 dealerships.

EX30 owners in South Africa have needed to visit dealers to get their updates due to the lack of IITC support.

To use the online features of the Volvo EX30’s infotainment system, they must also tether their phone or a router’s Internet connection.

The lack of constant in-car connectivity is potentially one of the major reasons why the Volvo EX30 app frequently fails to update the car’s latest status or perform remote actions.

By August 2024, a handful of EX30 owners in South Africa had already threatened to launch a class action lawsuit or demanded a full refund for the car due to the issue.

Some also criticised Volvo for advertising the car as “Apple Carplay-ready” when the feature was not yet available.

This made it even more challenging to use online features on the infotainment system.

Pointing the finger at the wrong culprit

Some owners have recently accused the Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (Icasa) of dragging its heels in type-approving the IITC hardware in Volvo cars.

However, Icasa has told MyBroadband that this was not the case.

The communications regulator explained that Volvo had two type-approval certificates on record with Icasa.

The first was for a telematics gateway, which was issued on 26 February 2021. The company had applied for this approval sometime in 2020.

The second was for a wireless power charger, which was approved on 26 February 2025.

The prevailing theory — and more likely cause — is believed to be an impasse between Volvo’s global headquarters and Vodafone regarding roaming fees for IITC services in certain countries.

Volvo previously said the issue was not limited to South Africa.

“Volvo Cars’ global team is aware and currently working on a solution, which we will communicate to local customers once finalised,” the company told MyBroadband.

However, it appears to have given up on the feature arriving anytime soon, as it recently started offering new EX30 owners a free Wi-Fi dongle with 10GB of Vodacom monthly data for 36 months.

Bizarrely, Vodacom’s parent company, Vodafone, is Volvo’s global IITC partner for the EX30.

This has raised questions about whether the real problem isn’t data roaming fees.

MyBroadband asked Volvo Cars South Africa and Vodacom why it was taking so long for IITC to launch the EX30 in South Africa, but they did not provide feedback by the time of publication.