Rivian Drive cam not Recognizing USB Drive: A Simple Fix

Rivian Mom · 2025-05-15T14:45:12+00:00

I've been using my phone's hotspot for months, and my Rivian connects to it automatically to run TuneIn and Spotify through the built-in apps on the main display. To be clear, this wasn’t Bluetooth streaming but actual phone data, and the apps worked perfectly without any issues. In Monday for the first time, I saw a Connect+ message pop up, even though the truck was linked to my phone’s data. I can still stream from my phone using Bluetooth, but the sound quality and user experience weren’t as good. This issue started between over-the-air software updates, though it might be tied to a specific date in the system. I tried a soft reset, but nothing changed. Has anyone heard if Rivian changed their policy on this? I remember Connect+ used to mention it provided "data" for streaming apps, suggesting you could use your own data instead. Now, it seems like you need Connect+ just to access the apps at all. I was surprised they allowed phone hotspots to work before, so this might be a deliberate change. I’m okay with paying for Connect+ if this isn’t just a temporary glitch. Any insights would be appreciated.

Rivian Blue

Member

Mar 4, 2025

One of the first things I did on getting my R1S was set up the drive cam. I had the drive and took it to the service center when I took delivery last year so they could walk me through setting it up.

Worked fine, but it stopped recognizing the drive at some point, so I got a name-brand (Transcend) drive to replace the no-name one.

I set it up, but later realized that it wasn't recording. So I googled "Best drive for Rivian drive cam" and it said this one:

Amazon.com

Still didn’t work. So I went to "set up drive cam" and it goes through the format & test routine and says I'm good to go. But the screen still says it needs to be set up.

I repeated same procedure several times, each time it says the format & test is good, but it doesn't take.

So the fix I got was, I let Rivian format the drive. I'm using 128GB USB-C flash drive. I also did a reboot for the vehicle (hazard button and left toggle on the left-hand side of the steering wheel) by keeping both depressed until the screen starts to reboot. This helped me with my fix and I hope it can help someone out there too.

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