GM Rebuilds OnStar With In-House AI Assistant for 2027

General Motors said Wednesday at its GM Forward event in New York that it will build an in-house AI assistant into OnStar, the connected-car service the automaker launched 30 years ago, with the feature debuting in the 2027 Cadillac Lyriq EV before expanding to more GM vehicles, TechCrunch reported.

GM also plans to retire four separate brand apps — for Buick, Cadillac, Chevrolet and GMC — along with the OnStar Guardian app it launched in 2020, replacing all of them with a single OnStar mobile app set to launch in 2027 and sync with the new in-car software, according to the company's announcement cited by TechCrunch.

What does the OnStar AI Assistant actually do?

Cameras on the vehicle will feed live views and crash and safety recordings into the software, TechCrunch reported. Drivers can set the cameras to trigger automatically when the vehicle senses an impending event, such as an aggressive horn honk, capturing footage that uploads to the OnStar app. Voice commands will extend to climate control and questions about specific vehicle features.

Why is GM moving away from Google's AI tools?

GM has leaned on outside AI since 2022, when it began using Google Cloud's Dialogflow to recognize spoken requests, expanding in 2023 to handle routing and navigation queries, per TechCrunch. The company said last year that Google Gemini would roll into vehicles starting in 2026. The new OnStar AI Assistant, by contrast, is built in-house.

"OnStar is now transitioning to be a connected intelligence platform, not just the call center that it's historically been known as, but a mechanism for interpreting, understanding, and providing predictive, proactive support to its owners," GM chief product officer Sterling Anderson told TechCrunch.

How does this connect to GM's $25 billion subscription target?

GM has previously outlined a plan to build a $25 billion subscription business by 2030, a goal that has driven years of OnStar updates, TechCrunch noted — including the 2021 expansion of the Guardian app to non-GM-owning phone users for crash detection and location sharing. The in-house AI Assistant is the latest step toward making OnStar a recurring-revenue platform rather than a roadside-assistance add-on.

Does the timing matter given the broader AI market mood?

GM's announcement landed the same week major technology names disappointed investors on AI-related earnings and oil prices rose, according to HTT News. That backdrop puts added scrutiny on any company betting capital on proprietary AI buildouts rather than licensed models, a dynamic GM now faces as it shifts OnStar off Google's Dialogflow and Gemini roadmap.

What to watch

• Whether the OnStar AI Assistant expands beyond the Cadillac Lyriq to higher-volume brands like Chevrolet and GMC in 2027.
• How the unified OnStar app handles crash-detection and emergency features that the Guardian app previously offered to non-GM-vehicle owners.
• Whether GM's in-house AI push helps or slows progress toward the $25 billion connected-services target by 2030, as TechCrunch reported GM is also racing to match Chinese automakers' in-car technology.