Volvo Announces Plan to Replace Physical Car Keys With Your Smartphone [Video]

Volvo has announced that it plans to become the world's first car manufacturer to offer cars without keys from 2017.

Volvo customers will be offered an application for their mobile phones to replace the physical key with a digital key. The innovative Bluetooth-enabled digital key technology, will offer Volvo customers far more flexibility, enabling them to benefit from entirely new ways to use and share cars.

The new Volvo app enables the digital key on the customer’s mobile phone to do everything a physical key currently does, such as locking or unlocking the doors or the trunk and allowing the engine to be started.

A benefit of this new technology is that customers would be able to receive digital keys for more than one vehicle, allowing them to access different Volvo cars in different locations. You could potentially book and pay for a car rental online and receive a digital key for the vehicle immediately, eliminating the need for lineups at rental desks, etc.

Volvo Cars’ digital key means that sharing a car will become both simple and convenient. Volvo owners will be able to send their digital key to other people via their mobile phones so that they can also use the car, this may be family members, friends or co-workers in a company.

“At Volvo we are not interested in technology for the sake of technology. New technology has to make our customers’ lives easier and save them time. Mobility needs are evolving and so are our customers’ expectation to access cars in an uncomplicated way,” said Henrik Green, Vice President Product Strategy & Vehicle Line Management at Volvo Cars. “Our innovative digital key technology has the potential to completely change how a Volvo can be accessed and shared. Instead of sitting idle in a parking lot the entire day, cars could be used more often and efficiently by whoever the owner wishes.”


Volvo is planning to pilot this technology in spring via its car sharing company, Sunfleet. A limited number of vehicles with the digital key will be sold in 2017.

Physical keys will continue to be offered for people who want them.