The annual Consumer Electronics Show is currently underway in Las Vegas, and as has become traditional over the past decade, automakers and their suppliers now use the conference to announce their technology plans. It was Ford’s turn tonight, and it’s very much on trend for 2026. If you guessed that AI is coming to the Ford in-car experience, congratulations, you guessed right.
Even though the company is bound to mass-produce identical vehicles, it says it wants AI to personalize its car for you. “Our vision for the customer is simple, but not primal: a seamless layer of intelligence that moves with you between your phone and your vehicle,” said Doug Field, Ford’s chief EV, design and digital officer.
“Not general intelligence – a lot of people can do it better than us. What customers need is intelligence that understands where you are, what you’re doing, and what your vehicle is capable of doing, and then makes the next decision easy,” Fields wrote in a blog post that Ford shared with Ars ahead of time.
For example, Fields suggests you could take a photo of the item you want to load onto your truck, upload it to the AI, and figure out whether it will fit in the bed.
At first, Ford’s AI assistant will only appear in the Ford and Lincoln smartphone apps. The rollout is expected to begin early this year. By 2027, AI assistants will become a native experience as new or refreshed models will be able to include it, possibly starting with cheap electric trucks that the automaker tells us is coming next year, but also including gas models like the Expedition and Navigator.
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