Troubleshooting and FAQ

Troubleshooting & FAQ

Onboarding fails with "access denied"

BMW's device-authorization backend can return access_denied ("The user has declined authorization") even though you never saw a consent page and the login clearly worked. This is flakiness on BMW's side, not the integration — BMW support has confirmed (in response to a ticket) that the device-code flow is handled by an internal partner system with "sync problems." There is nothing the integration can do to fix it.

It can take a few attempts. This sequence has worked reliably (multiple times) for others:

1. Open a fresh incognito/private browser window.
2. Go to the My BMW / CarData portal manually — do not use the pre-filled complete link, and strip any ?user_code=… from the URL.
3. Sign in, open Authenticate device ("Gerät authentifizieren"), then type the user code by hand (make sure no "incorrect code" banner appears) and approve. You'll typically land on a "Login successful" / "continue in the car" screen — you don't need to do anything in the car; that screen is just confirmation. Go straight back to Home Assistant and press Submit.
4. If the code timed out meanwhile, press Submit in Home Assistant for a fresh code and repeat.
5. Still failing after several tries? Delete the client in the BMW portal, create a new one (tick both subscriptions), and redo auth with the new client ID.

If none of that helps, stop retrying and wait. This is genuinely a lottery on BMW's side. Many users only got through after leaving it alone for several hours to a couple of days (sometimes it starts working overnight with no further action); rapid retries don't seem to speed it up. There's no single trick that works for everyone. For the hardest cases the only lever left is BMW support: bmwcardata-b2c-support@bmwgroup.com (include your reference ID from the error, if BMW showed one).

No data arriving

1. Make sure you completed step 4 — descriptors must be ticked and saved in the portal's Data Selection.
2. Trigger a lock/unlock in the MyBMW app to prompt the car to send an update.
3. Run bavariandata.get_coverage_report (Services) — it tells you exactly which expected descriptors haven't arrived, so you can tell a selection problem from a car-doesn't-send-it problem.

If nothing streams for 48 hours, a repair issue appears under Settings → Repairs pointing back here.

Stream authorization failing (MQTT rc=5)

If the stream is rejected as unauthorized (MQTT rc=5) and stays that way, a repair issue appears under Settings → Repairs. The integration retries and re-authorizes on its own first; the repair only appears once that hasn't recovered it for a while. Two usual causes:

1. Stale tokens. Run Configure → Refresh tokens now. If it keeps failing, Configure → Re-authorize with BMW (the refresh token expires roughly every two weeks — see access denied if the re-auth itself is rejected).
2. Another client holds the stream. BMW allows only one stream per account — disconnect any other CarData client, then reload the integration.

Only one stream per account

BMW allows a single concurrent streaming client per account (GCID), so no other tool can be connected at the same time. If another CarData client is running, disconnect it.

The car can't be controlled

Read-only. CarData cannot send commands, so this integration can't lock, precondition, or otherwise control the car. Automations act on external devices in response to the car's data — see Events & blueprints.

Debug logging

Off by default. Turn it on in Configure → Debug logging and reload. It's verbose and can include vehicle data such as GPS and VIN, so leave it off unless you're chasing a problem. (Separate from Home Assistant's generic per-integration log level.)

Capturing a drive for trip detection

If trips are being missed, split or mis-measured, a capture of one drive gives us the raw data to improve detection. Turn on Trip-capture diagnostics under Configure → Trips (independent of Debug logging), take a normal drive that reproduces the problem, then turn it back off.

For the richest capture, first select as many data fields as you can in the BMW portal's Data Selection (Choose data) — especially the navigation/GPS, speed and drivetrain fields. The capture can only show what the car actually streams, and part of what we're looking for is which extra signals (GPS fix quality and satellite count, heading, speed, HV-system and door/lock state) your car sends while driving.

It produces two things:

• Log lines tagged for easy filtering — grep the Home Assistant log for [trip.:
  • [trip.gps] — every GPS fix with its step, inter-fix gap, stream latency, odometer, SoC, the close-timer countdown, and GPS fix state / satellite count / heading (so a "no movement" run can be told apart from a lost fix).
  • [trip.timer] — when the stationary-close timer arms and fires.
  • [trip.seg] — each BMW trip-segment batch in full, with timestamps.
  • [trip.watch] — a curated set of candidate "is it driving?" signals (speed, HV-system state, ignition, driver door/lock, active navigation) whenever the car streams them.
  • [trip.raw] — every other descriptor each message carried.
  • [trip.post] — a one-line summary per closed trip (distances side by side, fix counts, largest GPS gap).
• A capture file bavariandata_trip_capture.ndjson in your Home Assistant config folder — one JSON record per message, so a drive can be replayed offline while testing detector changes.

Both contain GPS coordinates and your VIN. Share them only with the maintainers (e.g. attached to a GitHub issue you're comfortable making), and delete the capture file when you're done. It stops growing at ~25 MB.

The card doesn't show up after an update

Hard-refresh the browser — the bundled card is cached aggressively.

Quota exhausted

If you've spent all 50 REST requests in 24 h, a repair issue appears under Settings → Repairs telling you when it resets. Streaming keeps flowing throughout — only fetch_* calls pause.

Where to get help

• Bugs in the integration → Issues.
• BMW-side registration trouble, setup help, or general questions → Discussions.