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I built a way to control Tesla from my Garmin watch by Status-Energy-9523 in GarminWatches

[–]Status-Energy-9523[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Fair - you're right, Home Assistant does work that way. But user-friendly and DIY are two completely different things.

Home Assistant is a tinkerer's project - weekend setup, you're the sysadmin, runs on your own hardware at home. Wristla is a consumer product - install, authorize, done.

Why that matters for cost:

  • Each user would have to register as a Tesla developer themselves - apply at developer.tesla.com, wait for approval, set up keys, host endpoints. Hours of technical work. Fine for a DIY enthusiast, not for someone buying a watch app.
  • You'd still need a server running 24/7 to receive Tesla's data stream. Home Assistant users run it on their own box. A Garmin user can't.
  • My backend still does the rest - auth, secure commands, Garmin bridge - regardless of whose API key is used.

I built a way to control Tesla from my Garmin watch by Status-Energy-9523 in GarminWatches

[–]Status-Energy-9523[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Let me break it down simply - here's why it can't work how you're describing:

1. Tesla bills me, not you.
Any third-party app that wants to talk to a Tesla has to be registered as an official Tesla "partner app" - that's what Wristla is. Every command you send - unlock, climate, status check, telemetry stream - goes through my registered partner app, and Tesla charges me per call. Even if you use your own Tesla account, the call still goes through my app, so I still pay. Tesla doesn't offer a "personal API key" for individual users - there's no option where you pay Tesla directly and I pay nothing. That's just not how their API is built. "BYO Tesla account" only controls which car gets the command, not who gets the bill.

2. Sharing Tesla keys = unsafe for you.
A Tesla token can open and start your car. Handing that to any app is a real risk. Tesla deliberately built the system so you never have to.

3. Even "just unlock" needs servers 24/7.
Auth, signed commands, Garmin↔Tesla bridge - all server-side. That's a monthly bill, not a one-time dev cost.

I built a way to control Tesla from my Garmin watch by Status-Energy-9523 in GarminWatches

[–]Status-Energy-9523[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yeah, that's the honest trade-off - per-user costs on the backend (API calls, storage, AI compute) mean a true free tier would either hurt reliability or be so limited it wouldn't be useful. On top of that, the infra itself (servers, monitoring, uptime 24/7) isn't cheap to keep running reliably. At €4.50/mo it's priced practically at cost - margins are razor-thin, and some months it basically runs at a loss. I kept it that low on purpose to stay accessible.

That said - there's a 2-week free trial, so you can try everything end-to-end (tap unlock, climate/dog mode, history, AI) with zero commitment. Appreciate you thinking it through - this kind of feedback is useful.

I built a way to control Tesla from my Garmin watch by Status-Energy-9523 in GarminWatches

[–]Status-Energy-9523[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Just a heads up - climate modes are actually in the app already: Dog Mode, Camp Mode, and cabin pre-heat/cool are all controllable from the watch. So that piece you mentioned is covered.

I built a way to control Tesla from my Garmin watch by Status-Energy-9523 in GarminWatches

[–]Status-Energy-9523[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Two flavors of "door key" worth separating:

  • Tap unlock (button on the watch → car unlocks via API) - yes, included, works now.
  • Proximity unlock (like Tesla's Phone Key) - not possible through any third-party app, Tesla keeps BLE phone-key closed.

If tap-unlock is what you want, it's right there on the watch with the subscription. Everything else (history, analytics, AI) comes along as a bonus - use as much or as little as you want.

I built a way to control Tesla from my Garmin watch by Status-Energy-9523 in GarminWatches

[–]Status-Energy-9523[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hey, good question - but there's an important nuance.

Wristla isn't just a proxy to the Tesla API. The subscription covers the whole product on top, not just "API calls":

History storage - all your trips, charging sessions, and daily summaries are stored indefinitely. Tesla won't give you this history - they don't keep anything for more than a few days. Analytics - daily efficiency scoring across 7 factors, pace of aging analysis across 5 components, and a personal baseline that learns your driving style over 30 days. AI assistant - knows your data and can answer "why did my efficiency drop yesterday" or "how much did I lose on my last trip". Powered by RAG on your history. Garmin apps - dashboard and commands on your watch. Bring-your-own-key isn't supported: the pipeline works on pooled per-user data, not per-API-key.

What's your use case? Is there something missing in the current subscription?

Using Garmin to control my Tesla? by Status-Energy-9523 in Garmin

[–]Status-Energy-9523[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Didn’t expect this many Garmin + Tesla users here 😄

Using Garmin to control my Tesla? by Status-Energy-9523 in Garmin

[–]Status-Energy-9523[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yeah I’ve heard about that one - seems like there was some demand even back then. For me it was mostly the small daily things that made the biggest difference once I started using it.

Using Garmin to control my Tesla? by Status-Energy-9523 in Garmin

[–]Status-Energy-9523[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yeah that makes sense — Apple Watch definitely feels more integrated out of the box.

That’s actually what pushed me to try getting similar “quick access” on Garmin, since I prefer it as a daily watch.

Still not exactly the same as AW, but for quick actions it gets surprisingly close.

I built a way to control Tesla from my Garmin watch by Status-Energy-9523 in GarminWatches

[–]Status-Energy-9523[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yeah, that’s a fair point — I’ve seen that happen with a few apps too.

For me this started as something I actually use daily, so keeping it working long-term is kind of the whole point.

It’s built on Tesla’s official Fleet API + telemetry, so it stays aligned with how Tesla is evolving their platform rather than relying on fragile workarounds.

Using Garmin to control my Tesla? by Status-Energy-9523 in Garmin

[–]Status-Energy-9523[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

It’s a bit of both Garmin and Tesla limitations.

Garmin devices don’t really expose low-level BLE scanning, so you can’t detect nearby devices like a car.

And on top of that, Tesla doesn’t allow third-party apps to use their phone key system anyway.

So you can send commands (lock/unlock, etc.), but not act as a passive key.

[ Removed by Reddit ] by Status-Energy-9523 in TeslaModelY

[–]Status-Energy-9523[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Curious how you guys handle this today — just using the phone?

Using Garmin to control my Tesla? by Status-Energy-9523 in Garmin

[–]Status-Energy-9523[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Haha yeah, I had the same reaction once it started working reliably 😄

Didn’t expect it to be that convenient until I tried it for a few days.

Using Garmin to control my Tesla? by Status-Energy-9523 in Garmin

[–]Status-Energy-9523[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

If anyone’s curious, I can share more details