Nothing quite says “high-performance muscle car” like a popup ad for a Mopar Extended Warranty covering your whole center console. That’s right, Dodge Charger owners are now experiencing an exciting new feature: pop-up ads that appear every time the vehicle stops at a light. This absolute garbage feature was spotted in the wild, take a look here.
I am so happy that my car doesn’t update itself automatically
You’d may as well run the red light
That was my idea as well. You are providing a negative feedback for following the rules.
There was an article about this few months ago and the exact same reddit post was used there as evidence of this being true. This was most likely a bug and it probably has been fixed since. If what the headline claims here was true there would be tons of videos of it happening to different people on YouTube.
Reported by drivers as recently as Tuesday.
One of dozens of such reports, confirming make, model, and frequency of the ads (at every stop): https://www.reddit.com/r/Dodge/comments/1j838k8/why_tf_am_i_getting_ads_in_my_car/
I’m the world’s worst journalist, but I do try! When possible, I confirm facts with multiple sources. The “news” aspect here is that they were previously on a different Stellantis brand (Jeep), and now they have expanded to another Stellantis brand (Dodge).
If you have evidence that contradicts, feel free to share.
From your link:
this crap started popping up every time I stoped,
This should absolutely be illegal, as it blocks the use of the panel until the message is closed. This is an unnecessary traffic distraction, that is bound to statistically cause issues and even accidents.
Yea, but ReGuLaTiOn bAd, of course
Of course, Capitalism will regulate itself. Once we all get a Darwin award for thinking so.
2nd paragraph of the article:
Update: the above image is older, which has some folks on social media wondering
Stelantis was reported doing this with Jeep, and now they are doing it with Dodge too. You are confusing the issue because you are misremembering the facts.
3rd paragraph:
This isn’t the first time Stellantis has pulled this sort of stunt with popup ads, either. They already tried adding pop-up ads to Jeeps
This is just another example of the shitshow Stellantis has become! It’s an unnecessary distraction that blocks the use of the screen until you close the message. This is bound to cause issues and probably even accidents.
Two weeks ago it was Jeep. Now it’s Dodge. This is how it creeps. Are both those companies owned by Crystler?
Yeah, zero surprise seeing this happen to Chrysler/Stellantis cars first.
Yes, along with Ram pickup trucks and IIRC Fiat, somehow.
It’s called Stellantis now.
Welp, my days of not buying Dodge cars seem to be coming to a middle.
Fuck this made me giggle
For that rhyme you deserve a nickel!
Better than a twisted nipple.
You sure? Sounds like a nice tickle.
Be careful, it might be illegal to not buy one.
Been doing this with Jeeps already. They claimed it was a mistake.
https://fortune.com/2025/02/13/jeep-in-car-ads-popup-stellantis-software-revenue/
“Oops! We accidentally incorporates ads into our software! It was an honest mistake…”
I’ve never wanted to go smashing car windows in a lot until now
You right. This is the second time I’ve felt the urge.
I thought GM foregoing CarPlay in favor of their own proprietary UI was a great way to kill sales, this is absolutely genius. Way to ensure I would never purchase your products!
Damn, I would be pissed if my car started showing ads. I hope this enshitification doesn’t spread.
Narrator: “It spread. A lot. Like, a lot a lot. Really you wouldn’t believe how much it spread. It spread like Domino’s™ all new creamy red sauce on only the freshest of dough seasoned wi—”
*car crashes*
Dodge dropped 29% in sales in the USA last year, and something tells me, this isn’t going to have folks lining up to buy Chargers in 2025. Watch the free market* take care of this one.
*Unless you’re Tesla, in which case the market costs $277 million to purchase.
Free market doesn’t work if all car brands are owned by like 5 companies and all of them agreeing to add ads.
That is why we need to regulate cooperations as well as enforce them properly.Their new $85k Charger will surely save them…
I think that has more to do with ending production on the LX Platform Challenger / Charger tbh. They haven’t quite managed to gather the same hype among domestic car nerds with their replacements as those old boats had.
Hornet, Journey, Charger. That’s it. Hornet is a piece of cheap, charger has ads. Journey…?
I’d get rid of that car so fast it would make your head spin. There is no car I’d put up having this garbage to keep
Well I’d put up with an ad-driven free version of a Nissan GTR or so. Easily. But not if I paid for it properly.
They really don’t make them like they used to.
adds Dodge to the no buy list
Which one is NOT on that list?
For me right now? Mazda. They have always been enjoyable to drive, and if you look at their interiors in everything from the MX-5 and Mazda3 up to their big family SUVs, you see physical controls in the foreground and a moderately sized infotainment screen up and back. Good location for glancing at it, and not for using a touch screen for everything in the car.
I’ve been commuting in a 2012 mazda3 for several years and it’s been fun to drive and mechanically reliable. Also very fuel efficient with one of the early Skyactiv branded drivetrains.
If this ever happens to any car I buy, it’d be going right back to the dealer.
I would drive it straight back into the dealership through their display room window.
No you wouldn’t.
Of course he would. If he stopped outside he’d have to watch another fucking ad.
I bet you might have a court case if you could prove that the dealer had disabled this advertising “feature” during your test drive.
They’ll see the sales of the Charger tank and will conclude that people just don’t want muscle cars, which is sad because in the next few years I was thinking about getting one.
Oh well, what can you do.
I get that this is the point of the article, but wow seeing an ad in your car makes it look cheap as fuck.
There’s a chance I might tolerate it on a rental, but not on something I own. Absolutely not.
You do realize this is based on a almost half-a-year old reddit post? What has happens in the meantime?
Note to self, never buy a Stelantis car. Not that I have ever considered that anyway!
4 months is “almost” half a year, I guess.
Point of the post is that this popup ad thing has expanded from Jeep (small brand) into Dodge (large brand) from the parent company (Stellantis). What has happened in the meantime is that a bunch of other Dodge drivers has confirmed the issue is widespread and difficult to disable.
(Ope: I got fact-checked, turns out Jeep sells more vehicles per year than Dodge. I’m old, and apparently Dodge has lost a ton of market share since last I checked!
If y’all are concerned about recency, I updated the article to include more images of the popup ads, including one from as recently as 3 days ago.)
Jeep sells more than twice as many vehicles per year as Dodge. They are not the “small brand.”
Makes sense. I was surprised that Jeep was referred to as the “small brand”.
Yeah, maybe 50 years ago but with the popularity of SUVs Jeep is dominant at Stellantis. They sell almost as many Wranglers as Dodge sells vehicles in total.
seems like 80% of people are off road cosplayers these days.
So I drive a Bronco that’s 99% stock. I have a roof rack that I added. I do go offroading, but we also have it to tow behind our motorhome since the bronco is flat towable.
I ran into this guy who’s in a new (last 5 years), heavily modded Wrangler. He has the fenders cut away, huge winch on the front, etc… I ask him if he has any favorite spots around here and he says “nah I don’t really get out and do that anymore.”
Where are others confirming this? Not in the article.
Im in a challenger every week and have never seen an ad on the screen ever.
Is your Challenger using the dealer installed SiriusXM? That would be for new and CPO vehicles. That seems to be what it is linked to.
Y’all are… surprisingly hard to persuade! I thought sharing a literal image of popup ads in the car would be the proof y’all needed to believe it was happening.
I mean, there are… more images of it happening…? Like, damn. Here’s an instance of it happening in a Challenger.
Y’all are… surprisingly hard to persuade! I thought sharing a literal image of popup ads in the car would be the proof y’all needed to believe it was happening.
people are being rightfully skeptical of an auto news site using old reddit posts to get traffic. a single instance does not show how widespread the issue is. if you want to be a journalist do better.
I’m glad people are made aware of it!
My point was, if the ads are still pushed to cars, I’m surprised FuelArc used a 4 month old reddit post as reference. Someone most have contacted Dogde, Jeep, or Stelantis for a comment on this.
Someone most have contacted Dogde, Jeep, or Stelantis for a comment on this.
A Stellantis spokesperson told Fortune in a statement that “a temporary software glitch affected the ability to instantly opt out in a few isolated cases, though instant opt-out is the standard for all our in-vehicle messages. Our team had already identified and corrected the error, and we are following up directly with the customer to ensure the matter is fully resolved.”
Thanks for the extremely helpful analogy
That is even worse. So it has been ongoing for at least 4 months now.
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