Mercedes-Benz Drive Pilot: Eyes off the Road, Hands off the Wheel

• The 2024 Mercedes-Benz EQS sedan and S-class offer Drive Pilot, the first SAE Level 3 autonomous-driving system.
  

• When specific driving criteria are met, Drive Pilot allows the driver to look away for long periods and keep their hands off the wheel.

• Drive Pilot will be offered as a subscription service for $2500 per year in Nevada and California.

It's rare to wish for more traffic, but we needed a slowdown so we could stay below 40 mph and keep watching Beyoncé concert clips. We were heading east on I-10 from Santa Monica toward downtown Los Angeles, and when the other cars sped up, the Mercedes EQS580 we were driving (riding in? overseeing?) would beep gently, requesting that we retake the wheel. Which meant turning our attention away from Bey and focusing it on the Honda CR-V in front of us.

Are you rolling your eyes at yet another irresponsible driver using some poorly labeled "self-driving" tech and putting everyone around them in danger? That's a fair assumption. In this case, though, we were on the right side of the law even as we drank coffee and turned around to chat with a passenger in the rear seat. If our EQS580 had been involved in an accident during that time, Mercedes would have been responsible, not us.

Self-driving cars are probably the most egregiously mislabeled technology in the automotive sphere. Let's be clear: They don't exist. All the cars on the market at the time of this writing with any major drive-assist functions offer a Level 2 system. And yes, that includes Tesla's Full Self-Driving and GM's Super Cruise. With Level 2 tech, despite what you may have seen in YouTube videos, the driver is not legally able to turn their attention away from the road, whether that's hands on the wheel or eyes forward. Mercedes Drive Pilot is the first approved Level 3 drive system, which means that when it is engaged—and all the drive criteria are met—the driver can legally stop paying attention. At least until the CR-V speeds up, and Drive Pilot beeps at us to take control.

Drive Pilot: When Can It Be Used?

This was our first chance behind the wheel (although we did a ridealong back in March 2022), and it's interesting to tackle one of L.A.'s most tiresome stretches of freeway with the option of simply zoning out. Drive Pilot has strict parameters for its use. It's available only on mapped highways and during daylight when there is no rain or snow and the traffic is below 40 mph. It will return control to the driver if it senses something out of the ordinary, whether that's a pedestrian on the highway or an oncoming emergency vehicle.