🚗 Adding Your First Vehicle

To add your first vehicle, open the Vehicles tab and tap the + button in the top-right corner. You can enter your vehicle details manually or scan the VIN barcode to auto-fill most fields.

The vehicle form captures everything AutoDrive needs across iPhone and the web app:

• VIN — optional but highly recommended. Entering a VIN unlocks one-tap decoding of the year, make, model, trim, body style, fuel type, and MPG.
• Nickname — a friendly label like "Daily Driver" or "Work Truck" so the vehicle is easy to identify at a glance.
• Primary Driver — pick one of your driver profiles. AutoDrive uses this to pre-assign drives in shared households or fleets. You can always change it later or leave it blank.
• Type — a short category (Sedan, SUV, Truck, Van, Minivan, Convertible, Sport, Beetle) used for filtering and the right vehicle icon. This is set automatically from the VIN when you decode one.
• Year, Make, Model, Trim, Body, Color — the standard descriptive fields.
• Description — a free-form line for the engine and drivetrain (e.g. "2.5L 4cyl · FWD · Automatic"). Auto-populated from the VIN decode.
• Fuel Type, City MPG, Highway MPG — used to estimate per-drive fuel cost and efficiency.
• Mileage — your current odometer reading, shown on the web vehicle card as a rolling odometer drum and kept in sync as you drive. A non-zero value entered when you add the vehicle is recorded as its baseline. On the web, edits are protected by a rollback guard — a reading below the current one is held for confirmation and, if you proceed, saved as a logged correction — and every manual change is kept in a View odometer history audit trail on the edit screen. Use the Update button on the vehicle card (or tap the dashboard odometer widget) to record a new reading without opening the full editor; and if a fuel-up or charge log shows a reading ahead of the tracked total, AutoDrive offers to reconcile the odometer to match.
• Photo URL — optional image that appears on the vehicle card.
• MSRP, Invoice, Trade Value — optional price fields for tracking value over time. Leave blank if you are not tracking depreciation.

If your vehicle uses a non-standard fuel such as diesel or electric, select the correct fuel type so that fuel logs and cost estimates stay accurate. The mileage field accepts your best estimate if you do not know the exact number.

After saving, the vehicle appears in your list and becomes the active vehicle. All new drives and fuel entries will be linked to it automatically until you switch to a different one.